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LAdamson

How much time, during a flight, do you spend outside?

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With the all the critics we read here on FS airplane models, I was thinking that FS2002 is first and foremost a FLIGHT simulator. Poeple expect the outside view of the plane to look as good as any technical illustration or scale model. Now I do look over a downloaded FS plane very well when I first get it and try it out. I love a realistic looking model and admire the craftsmanship and art work that go into these. I also like to analyze my landings from the outside by using replay to see how I can improve.However, once I start an actual flight, things can get very busy with doing navigation, atc and all that goes with flying a plane. I would have to say I probably spend only 10% to 20% of the time looking at the plane from an exterior view and flying the thing becomes much more important then how the plane looks. At the point, how many revits it has and if it has blue wheels does not matter so much anymore. I would like to hear comments and....Just wondering how much time do you spend looking at the plane from the outiside when doing your actual flights? :-grnmd

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>Just wondering how much time do you spend looking at the >plane from the outiside when doing your actual flights? Actually....... quite a bit. I like to do simulated cross country flights across the mountainous and desert areas of the western United States. Usually a combination of VFR, IFR, and GPS navigation. When stuck in the cockpit for VFR, I can't see near the actual panaramic view that I can in a real plane because of monitor size and limited field of vision. By using spot mode and panning, this field of vision becomes much more open. I can do this somewhat with the W key, but would rather see a good looking aircraft anyway.Other reasons that influence my preference for "spot" views is that I spent many years flying R/C which tremendously helps for exterior flight, and my "main" hobby is building real aircraft with lot's of rivits and caring what it looks like! :)L.Adamson

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Guest

In FS2000, I used to spend maybe half the time outside, mostly because I could not look down from the cockpit to see the ground and landmarks going by, so I was forced to "step out" to have positional awareness. I keep up with pilotage navigation, even when flying IFR, unless IMC (instrument met. conditions). In real life I would do this even in the King Air!Now that I have 2k2 and an excellent VC (SF.260), I have little need to look outside unless doing aerobatics with smoke on to see if my spins are vertical, loops are symmetrical, etc. But mostly I fly cross-country, so I look out using the VC and am deeply satisfied. On X-Cs I never need to step outside, any more.So, put me down for 5%.Best,--BeachComer Stephen "Beach" Comer Real World Pile-it Commercial ASMEL, Instrument Airplane 4500 TT, 2500 BE20 & BE10

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I rarely look outside, maybe once in a while on a long flight when there's nothing else to do. I almost never view the plane up close, usually from the chase plane view. I have no real appreciation for textures and airline liveries and stuff like that. I bought PSS A320 and was perfectly content with the house colors provided. I wasn't gonna be looking at it that much from the outside anyway. Ernie.


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Guest RobK

I'm kinda like you John. The only time I really look at the plane from the outside is during replay mode when I am watching my landings. Sometimes during a flight, especially long haul flights in a heavy when the auto pilot is doing most of the work and I start to get kinda bored, I will occasionally switch to spot plane view for a few seconds. Also if I am flying a VFR flight around some nice scenery I will go to spot plane view long enough to take a screen shot now and then. Most of the time during a flight though, I pretty much prefer to be in the cockpit. So I would say I only spend about 10% of my time looking at the plane from the outside. :)Rob

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With all the great modeling going on and all the great scenery and textures that are out, I probably do about 80% of flying outside so I can see all that. These designers try so hard to make the planes match the actual planes, that to me, it's a crime not to look at them a while and watch their functions. If it's inside flying you like, we should somehow just have a panel sim that requires nothing but panels and gauges! LOL! BUT.....I also do like the way panels are coming along these days. I have sat in the real ones long enough to not want to spend all my time in there now. I set my courses if on a/p and get out again and admire the scenery. Being I fly mostly in the mountains, it's sacreligious to not look at the beauty around you. On my continuing flight back to AK. from the Virgin Islands, I spent more time inside over the water. Nothing to look at! I also want to say that when I am outside, it's not in "arcade view" ie. directly behind the plane. I like to move all around it and view it and the scenery from all angles. I like to see the reflection in these great GMax planes and watch all this great animation in action. As with everything else in this sim, to each their own. There is NO wrong way to fly this sim. The only thing wrong is there are only 24 hours in a day! :)Don

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>Now that I have 2k2 and an excellent VC (SF.260), I have >little need to look outside unless doing aerobatics with >smoke on to see if my spins are vertical, loops are >symmetrical, etc. But mostly I fly cross-country, so I look >out using the VC and am deeply satisfied. On X-Cs I >never need to step outside, any more. >With the SF 260's VC mode, I find myself spending more time locked in the cockpit also............. but then I also use tower mode as well as replay in spot mode to see just how well my aerobatics worked out. It's probably still 50/50.L.Adamson

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Guest

Hi..........i find i'm spending less time outside.......like other contributors to this thread i like to watch landings but i find my system is less and less able to handle the fancier aircraft textures in use these days.........up close in fly-by view(my favourite courtesy of the .dll by Andy Newman & Serge Baye) it's all becoming a bit of a slide-show........if i back off to a point where the fluidity is better, the plane's out of range to see in detail.......so i'll be spending more time with my feet up on the glareshield on these longer flights...............alan d kerr

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Guest

I am with you guys. I spend about as much time outside the aircraft in FS as I do when I fly for real. I'll do a virtual walk around before the flight. This gives me the opportunity to look at the visual model. I sneak an occasional look in flight if there is some cool scenery or clouds. Then I do a replay of my landings, or go back on replay and take some inflight screen shots. Even with all that, I still want the best visual model possible. Even if I spend 5% of my time looking at it. I want it to look as real as possible.DAVE

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Guest

I made a similar point a couple of weeks ago when Mike was getting a bashing. If the aircraft has a decent VC then I spend at least 90% of my time in it - however if it has poor visability then I may well use the spot view when flying over "interesting" terrain. Still nice to have a good looking model though !!!

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Guest jaapverduijn

To me the fun is "flying" the plane, not "spotting" it. Although I can admire visual models as the veritable works of art they are rapidly becoming nowadays, when it comes to actually *playing* FS2002 I wouldn't miss them if they didn't exist. It's always a great disappointment to me when I download let's say a "new and improved" B29 bomber, and then the bloody panel turns out to be aliased to the default Boeing 737 or (god help us all!) a Cessna 172...As far as I'm concerned (and please take that as my MICRO opinion without any MACRO value of judgment), all energy put into adding yet another rivet or yet another lick of paint to the outside of whatever plane without doing something nice to the panel or the flight model, is a total waste of time and energy. But then again... most hobbies are, aren't they (grin)?!Jaap Verduijn.

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Guest gasebah

I used to spend almost 70% of the time outside. But the new fabulous VCs like the one in the Archer and the SF260 together with TrackIR changed all that. TrackIR was the breakthrough. It is so natural now to look left and right and I also have assigned my yoke keys to move the view point up and down. So now I can really move up and look down.wit this setup I very very rarely go to the outside.Alex

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I almost exclusively use the 2D and VC panels when in flight-switching back and forth as required, and often changing the zoom as well.However, when watching replays, I prefer the spot view, so I do appreciate good exterior models !

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Guest

Hi All,For me, I spend a ton of time admiring the curves and colours of my favorite bird from spot view. What else is there to do in cruise flight anyways?When actually flying the aircraft, of course I'm in the cockpit, but I do watch a lot of replays of landings, take offs, etc. Alot of the repainters out there have a keen eye for their paint jobs and I really do enjoy looking at their works of art.Just my 2 centsCF-AOA

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It depends on what you fly. If I fly an airliner (and that's what I mostly fly these days), I spend a considerable ammount of time outside, looking at it from different angles, admiring the reflections and watching the sunlight bouncing off the windows. If I do an occasional GA flight, I almost exclusively stick to the panel and VC, as there usually is too much going around to stick my head out. As mentioned previously however, I hardly fly VFR these days, although I still buy most of the releases :) To sum it up, I spend a lot of time outside looking at my babies :)

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