VLC expansion ideas...

[toprob]

One of the ways in which we can expand on VLC is by introducing a lot more custom landclass textures -- this is an ongoing project, but it is underway.

Here's an idea of what the Canterbury Plains might look like, although only one landclass updated here...

The windbreaks are the existing vectors, I've said before that these will 'fit' better with a more accurate texture set, and this shows up well here.

[Ian Warren]

That looks a little interesting , wonder how it blends in with photoreal , the Canterbury paddocks/field increase in size , is there any way off producing a texture plate with large more vast types ?

[toprob]

QUOTE (Ian Warren @ May 27 2011,3:13 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

That looks a little interesting , wonder how it blends in with photoreal , the Canterbury paddocks/field increase in size , is there any way off producing a texture plate with large more vast types ?

Yep, this is just a test with a couple of textures -- finished, it'll have a few more textures in the set, with most of them 'sparser' to give larger paddocks.

[Bazza]

That's really impressive, I take the point about the paddock sizing, that would just set it off realism wise....

[ZK-MAT]

I don't understand the vector bit regarding the windbreaks but I have to ask why the windbreaks / hedges are orientated differently to the paddocks? They run 45 degrees one against the grain of the paddocks.

Cheers

[Ian Warren]

Its the same issue with the default towns , the reason for example Alexandra , re-color the photo and re AGN it , it would be nice to have them suit , think that,s were i believe increase that paddock texture to conform , i would love to see the wind breaks and hedges also get enhanced condition but this is in the hard task of programming .

[toprob]

QUOTE (ZK-MAT @ May 27 2011,5:58 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I don't understand the vector bit regarding the windbreaks but I have to ask why the windbreaks / hedges are orientated differently to the paddocks? They run 45 degrees one against the grain of the paddocks.

Cheers

The landclass textures are just that -- photos of paddocks which represent the area, they can't be rotated -- in this case, they're aligned roughly with the compass heading, as this is the way this particular landclass works. The vectors are based on reality, so their placement and heading are accurate. A good chunk of vector elements are aligned north/south or east/west, and these work best, but of course a lot of stuff is aligned to something different -- such as the prevailing wind, a river or the coast. Take a look at the bottom left of the screenshot -- the texture aligns a lot better with the vectors.

Ian's issue is similar -- unless you use accurate photos of the area -- as in photo scenery -- FSX has no way of knowing the orientation of every paddock -- it just knows the landclass. Roads have the same limitations, they run every which way, but the underlying landclass texture is always a north-aligned photo-texture. Since a lot of the city landclass are aligned to the compass, a little town along a diagonal river just doesn't work as well as a nice north-facing town. This is how FSX works, and without the benefit of photo scenery, this will always be the case, no matter what sort of landclass or topo is used.

As a simple example, just have a look at the default texture in any city -- it has photos of roads and streets, but they bear no relationship to the actual roads, which are vectors over the top. In my screenshot here, the new textures include roads, but they would need to be removed, otherwise you end up with both real and unreal roads. For city textures, I like to work the same way -- have textures showing a city, but without roads. Tricky.

With FSX there will always be a disconnection between vector elements and the underlying landclass. Hence the preference for photo scenery, where everything is 'real'.

[ZK-MAT]

... and that's why we have you gurus to try and make things work !

Thanks for the explantion Rob, it makes sense of the situation. The roads running diagionally across cities in FSX does bug me too lol.

[Timmo]

The interesting thing that I found after doing some travel over the USA is how well the MS type of land synthesis works there due to their original survey system. Whereas in New Zealand, our land parcels and roads are more closely tied to the physical features such as streams and hills, in the USA their land parcels are all 'square based' aligned north/south/east/west. When flying over the States the uniform pattern and alignment of paddocks and roads is very evident and the effect in FSX mimics this well.

This reminded me to put some pictures up of a flight from Vegas to LAX I did a couple of months ago- One shot shows the alignment fairly well although it is more evident in the larger/flatter areas in the center of the USA.



As Robin mentioned, there is no easy way around this apart from covering the whole world with aerial photos.

It will be interesting to see how well the new X-Plane 10 landclass system gets around this restriction and whether MS changes their approach for Flight.

[skysimcaptain]

Custom NZ land textures for VLC would be the icing on the already delicious cake.

[robmw]

Hi,

I've been following the various threads on texture landclass issues with great interest as I only discovered VLC a few weeks ago. I've been a long time user of Robin's scenery (and Red Baron) for many years prior to FSX and was delighted to find VLC after upgrading to a machine that could finally run FSX properly. The detail and quality of VLC only highlights the deficiences of the default textures and experimenting with texture replacement packages like GEX hasn't produced good results for me (as noted elsewhere on these forums). However, I have just purchased the new GEX AFME (Africa and Middle East) product which apparently contains a few textures used in Australia and New Zealand as part of the 'generic' landclass textures used in many parts of the world. The GEX developers refer to this as a 'texture bridge' to remove the need to install / uninstall texture sets when flying in different global regions. I'll try them out over the next few days and post some screenies if I think I see any differences although having no real knowledge of what NZ should look like apart from photos this might not be entirely valid

I even considered trying to use some of the OrbX AU blue textures as I remember the old VOZ textures had some applicability to NZ but it seems these are tied to the actual OrbX scenery and are not a texture replacement.

One thing does puzzle me and that is that I cannot get the look of VLC to match that in some of the promotional videos and screenshots. I'm certain that I'm using the right combination of default textures and the VLC replacements as the look matches that in some of the pics posted here by other forum members. I've tried using the ENB mod, adjusting my monitor gamma etc. etc. but can't quite get the same appearance.

That being said I'd readily pay for some decent NZ landclass textures so maybe this would be worth pursuing as a payware project if the effort involved justified it?

Cheers,
Rob W

[Ian Warren]

QUOTE (robmw @ Jun 3 2011,12:56 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

One thing does puzzle me and that is that I cannot get the look of VLC to match that in some of the promotional videos and screenshots. I'm certain that I'm using the right combination of default textures and the VLC replacements as the look matches that in some of the pics posted here by other forum members. I've tried using the ENB mod, adjusting my monitor gamma etc. etc. but can't quite get the same appearance.

Hi Rob and Welcome to NZFF , getting NZ to look the part , I still hum and harr - no its not all there yet but its damn good - I still prefer photoreal , coming into my home city Christchurch i know exactly were i am , but most bits still require VLC , with this addon i can see it miles out and no exactly were i am , currently I no Robin is working on a texture set and that is no easy task.
The promotional videos and screenshots have also included weather themes and other addon's such as REX or Active Sky and putting in the time off day creates themes that seem a little different , it may require you to adjust distance settings to give you the depth .

[robmw]

Hi Ian,

Thanks.

I was hoping that somebody would say that as I'm sure I've got all the right pieces in place! I'll have a play with different seasons and times of day and see what I get. I have most of the environment add-ons such as REX, FEX, ASE etc. but I guess I'm not used to the look of the default textures after a long time of GEX and OrbX. I think some of the screenshots you've posted look very close to what I'm getting anyway. Your suggestion about distance setting is also something I may have overlooked.

Rob

[Timmo]

welcome Rob,
I think the easiest way we can unravel this is for you to paste some screen shots of what you are seeing Given that VLC is a landclass and mesh package, it will mostly use whatever textures you have installed in the default directory. It was devloped with default textures in mind but some people do prefer addon textures such as GEX.

[robmw]

QUOTE (Timmo @ Jun 2 2011,7:03 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

welcome Rob,
I think the easiest way we can unravel this is for you to paste some screen shots of what you are seeing Given that VLC is a landclass and mesh package, it will mostly use whatever textures you have installed in the default directory. It was devloped with default textures in mind but some people do prefer addon textures such as GEX.

Hi Timmo,

The more I look at screenshots in the forum the more I think I have the right textures i.e. default. I suspect my problem is trying to get things to look like the results achieved by the pros!

I've got some screenshots ready but I'm having trouble linking to the correct ones at the moment (they are appearing in my post as 1920x1200 rather than a friendly reduced size which is what I thought I uploaded). Running out of time today but I'll post them as a soon as I can.

Cheers,Rob

[toprob]

QUOTE (Ian Warren @ May 27 2011,3:13 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

That looks a little interesting , wonder how it blends in with photoreal , the Canterbury paddocks/field increase in size , is there any way off producing a texture plate with large more vast types ?

Here's another screenshot showing the photoreal/custom texture interaction. Just about everything in this shot is early days yet -- the NZCH image is yet to be tweaked for colour, the visible AFCAD is just to test aeroclub traffic, and the same single landclass texture change as the original shot. The darker textures are new, the lighter ones are default. The golf course is default, but this is another landclass which would be replaced in a customised set.

QUOTE (robmw @ Jun 4 2011,7:43 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Hi Timmo,

The more I look at screenshots in the forum the more I think I have the right textures i.e. default. I suspect my problem is trying to get things to look like the results achieved by the pros!

I've got some screenshots ready but I'm having trouble linking to the correct ones at the moment (they are appearing in my post as 1920x1200 rather than a friendly reduced size which is what I thought I uploaded). Running out of time today but I'll post them as a soon as I can.

Cheers,Rob

Maybe just post the links to the photos, or PM them to Tim or me.

[Ian Warren]

Oooo Now that is really starting to look the part .

[brad63]

Lookin real nice

Also
Not sure if this is the right area for this topic.
Is/has anyone been interested in doing a kind of Aerosoft "Andras Field" kind of thing here in NZ?
Thought it might be cool to have a NZFF base somewhere.Fictitious of course.
Maybe have our local scenery designers involved in it somehow.
Just an idea.

B-RAD

[toprob]

QUOTE (brad63 @ Jun 5 2011,12:02 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Is/has anyone been interested in doing a kind of Aerosoft "Andras Field" kind of thing here in NZ?

"What, am I sleeping with BOB?!"
Some of the people in the video don't know how to behave at an airport, they need to learn how to chill out.

I have been thinking of some sort of system I call 'later that day' which updates airport layouts via the web -- just simple things like baggage cart placements etc. I know that you can animate stuff like that, but there are plenty of things which just sit there all day, but when you visit the airport later, they've all shifted around...

[connor]

QUOTE (Ian Warren @ Jun 5 2011,11:39 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Oooo Now that is really starting to look the part .

Glad I didn't spend anymore time on my scenery than I did, this is really looking brilliant.