Godzone Photoscenery subscription

[toprob]

'Kid in a candy store' certainly sums up the last couple of weeks, so much nice scenery to make, so little time... and no income, incidentally. So I've created the Godzone Photoscenery Subscription, covering the next 12 months almost entirely dedicated to photoscenery based on the new high-quality aerial images. Well, apart from the time I hope to spend to complete Wellington, of course.

The subscription basically gives a way for me to arrange some kicker-starter funding, taking the pressure off having to find a proper job. So really those who take up the subscription are banding together to get my almost-total support for the next 12 months, fleshing out New Zealand scenery.

A 12-month subscription costs $99, although early adopters (those who buy in over the next two weeks) can get it for $50. You can pay this up-front, or in two monthly payments of $25. After the two weeks, the price will revert to $99, or 3 monthly payments of $33.

For some idea of what will be included, see the Godzone Photoscenery subscription details page.

[MichaelBasler]

Experience brings confidence. Subscribed immediately.

My only plea is keep an eye on us ORBX users (yes I read the corresponding lines on the product page).

All the best, Michael

[emfrat]

Excellent timing - I have a birthday coming up, and a dear daughter who, as a teenager, declared many shops "dangerous", where I was not allowed in unsupervised. Can't imagine why, they were all respectable establishments that sold old railway books, live steam models and fine educational stuff like that. She regularly updated me with any new ones she came across

[Charl]

Ah, yes...

[toprob]

Wow, Charl, that takes me back a bit. From memory the labels were laser-printed on sticky stock, but it looks like yours has held up well. I can remember having to make hundreds of those discs one at a time, and stick the labels on by hand. Thank god for downloads these days:)

[sandman]

Oh, that picture reminds me of the ten old discs (Godzone, Real NZ), lying useless now in the closet, but I can´t throw them away - to many memories! So I´ll subscribe immediately!
Cheers sandman

[Charl]

QUOTE (toprob @ Apr 30 2014,10:41 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Wow, Charl, that takes me back a bit...

About a decade, I think.
Pristine condition, when you are inducted into the New Zealand Flight Simulator Hall of Fame, this can be exhibit #1.
Wait a minute... you ARE the NZFS Hall of Fame....

[toprob]

A decade is a long time in flightsim. Thinking back to the developers back then, it seems like I've been playing a game of 'last man standing', so I guess I deserve a prize for perseverance...

Through the magic of the WayBackMachine, here's a look at the Windowlight site back in 2003.

I'm amazed the flash animation was archived. OnTarget was a companion site to my work website, target.co.nz. It started out as a resource site for people who were looking at digital printing, mainly using Microsoft Publisher. The site, in fact the copy centre in general, was in reaction to the rather prissy attitude of existing print centres at the time, who wouldn't let you in the door if you didn't have a Mac.

The little button image is my ex and me, at Hot Mamas, our favourite cafe in Motueka:) Since then I've been divorced, broke, had bits of my heart replaced, and generally had a good time.

I've just delved into the archives on my hard-drive, and found this excerpt from the FAQ:

QUOTE

How often, how many, at at what price?
Initially, we are planning four issues of Godzone Virtual Design, on a quarterly basis. Each issue is priced at NZ$19.95, or EUR12.50 for online orders. It may be that we will continue with the magazine beyond the four issues, and/or increase the frequency.

What do I get for my money?
You get a disc-based magazine chock-full of tips and articles on sourcing, installing and tweaking addon scenery. You get AT LEAST 350 megabytes of additional freeware scenery per issue, mostly photo-real ground textures. Individual scenery areas typically cover an area approx 30 x 40 kilometres.[/quote]

That was 20 bucks for a disc, so there wasn't much profit to be had. I see I changed the name at some stage from Godzone Virtual Design to Godzone Virtual Flight.

Last edited by toprob on Thu May 01, 2014 1:39 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[NZ255]

QUOTE (toprob @ May 1 2014,1:37 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

A decade is a long time in flightsim. Thinking back to the developers back then, it seems like I've been playing a game of 'last man standing', so I guess I deserve a prize for perseverance...

Through the magic of the WayBackMachine, here's a look at the Windowlight site back in 2003.

How times have changed:
The Netherlands 2000 is a particularly effective addon, and is available free. It is a large download, about 50 megabytes, so be prepared for a lengthy download time if you use a dial-up connection

[toprob]

QUOTE (NZ255 @ May 1 2014,2:30 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

How times have changed:
The Netherlands 2000 is a particularly effective addon, and is available free. It is a large download, about 50 megabytes, so be prepared for a lengthy download time if you use a dial-up connection

Yes, considering the latest version of NL2000 is 49GB, or 1000 times the size, and we don't even baulk at downloading it... No, wait, that's more than my month's allowance. Dial-up, eh. Nobody harks back to the good of days of dial-up, that's for sure.

[Ian Warren]

And I thought that was last week .. nah , ... dial-up, I still recall a duffess at the Wanaka Airshow 1998 and he was raving about the internet and the fact you could get everything off it, even today it still in the build stage but just fortunate now NZ is waking up and follow other, you still can't get every fact and detail nor is it correct, still requires someone to collect the facts and data ..... least the cost has come down.

[Splitpin]

Ive got both of Robs first discs ..... very special , and delivered by hand. Your the man big R.

[deeknow]

Hey Rob, what a great idea, looking FWD to it.
Out of interest, you mention VLC, and Orbx compatibility in some way, I was thinking of dipping my toe in the FTX Global stuff (global and vector?) and was wondering how it would play with that? Any idea if you can selectively enable/disable FTX global regions?

[toprob]

QUOTE (deeknow @ May 1 2014,8:15 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Hey Rob, what a great idea, looking FWD to it.
Out of interest, you mention VLC, and Orbx compatibility in some way, I was thinking of dipping my toe in the FTX Global stuff (global and vector?) and was wondering how it would play with that? Any idea if you can selectively enable/disable FTX global regions?

I'm not too sure about Global, but I wouldn't expect to be able to disable bits and pieces. However one of the good things about photo scenery is that it'll sit on top of just about anything. The issues will be with the blends, and the autogen. Blends are always going to be an issue, I'll be making a single version of the photo scenery, so the blend assumes something close to actual colour/tones, and only VLC handles this well. So I can colour-correct an aerial image simply to get it looking good, with no reference to any landclass textures, and the colour/tones will match quite well with VLC, but Orbx has a very different, darker palette. There are ways around this -- for example, on the coastal airstrip areas I blend out the native bush, so that the landclass shows instead -- whether default, VLC or Orbx. That way you don't get an abrupt change of colour and tonal range within a single block of bush or forest.

Global has it's own autogen, I think, which is a bit of a wild-card, but I can't see it being an issue, it'll just mean that whichever base you use -- VLC, Orbx NZ, Orbx Global, or default FSX, you'll probably see different trees in some places.

EDIT: autogen buildings are another matter, and I'll cross that bridge when I get to it.

[deeknow]

nice, thanks for the reply

[NZ255]

Do orbx have their own autogen? Not just texture replacements? Or is that what your mean about working out later?

[toprob]

QUOTE (NZ255 @ May 2 2014,11:46 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Do orbx have their own autogen? Not just texture replacements? Or is that what your mean about working out later?

A good question. I don't really have a lot of Orbx scenery to test, except for NZSI and NZNI. With these regions, and I suspect all Orbx regions, some new autogen is added, and some default autogen textures are altered. I don't know whether Global adds autogen classes, or simply alters textures. Not that it makes much difference, except that if they alter textures, then my autogen will 'take on' the new textures. When I talk about FTX Global, I really mean the base package, rather than the Landclass and mesh, as photo scenery happily lives on top of just about anything.

When I place autogen, I only place default autogen, for two reasons -- first, this is the only way to get a single result which works with everything to some extent, and secondly, Orbx don't allow outside developers to use their autogen classes.

It sounds trickier than it is, but it is something which can be an issue with photo scenery. Since this project will not involve any changes to landclass or any other simulator default definitions, it can't control all aspects of how it will appear.

The important difference can be summed up like this:
Say there are two trees, both defined as autogen vegetation, so to all intents and purposes they act the same way in the sim. One is an oak tree, and one is a money tree. The oak tree is defined in the default autogen definitions, and comes with a default texture. The money tree is defined by Orbx's definitions, and they supply new, custom textures.

Now Orbx can put as many money trees as they want into their scenery. They also might (and do, in NZ's case) supply custom textures for the default oak tree, and many others. Vector Land Class uses ONLY default autogen vegetation, definitions, but supplies custom textures for a couple of the default tree types -- mainly Rainforest, which is used in VLC for native bush.

You won't see any Orbx money trees in my photoscenery, but you might see a lot of oak trees. (Well, not an awful lot...) So if you have Orbx NZ installed, you'll see the altered Orbx oak tree, and with VLC you'll see the default oak tree. I can't change that.

With the rainforest autogen, you'll see the default rainforest trees if you use default FSX, custom VLC bush textures if you use VLC, and altered Orbx rainforest textures if you use FTX NZ. I'm not sure what you'll see if you use Global. But whatever you have, you'll see a lot of these particular trees in my photo scenery.

[NZ255]

Just reading through the FAQ page on the GVF page. I'll be subscribing when i get home.... Orbx NZAA was on the roadmap for 2015, have they made an announcement since then? The FAQ says they've cancelled all NZ airports.

[toprob]

QUOTE (NZ255 @ May 2 2014,1:23 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Just reading through the FAQ page on the GVF page. I'll be subscribing when i get home.... Orbx NZAA was on the roadmap for 2015, have they made an announcement since then? The FAQ says they've cancelled all NZ airports.

It's still on the roadmap, just not in development.
The FAQ really refers to planned airports -- NZAA was already in development, so I would think that they would be keen to salvage the work already done. But everything else was cancelled.

[toprob]

Here's a Prepar3D video peep at one of the first areas -- Mt Cook. This shows the cloud shadows nicely. They move because of the time-preview function, rather than the clouds themselves moving, but it is quite a nice effect.



As always, best to click through to Youtube and view it in 720 or 1080p, depending on your monitor.