MegaScenery - Huge expense . LA Basin $30

[Guest]

I was looking at this and wondering if this initial release was designed to get some cash flow going for this company so they can offer say "regional areas" at a more reasonable cost. NOt sure but figuring in the number of major cities that may be included in the future, a simmer's investment would be tremendous. Im sure it is great scenery but pricey. I am assuming there would be no autogen as it would defeat the purpose. So low level flight would really not be an option I would assumeBob G

[vscimone 16]

Keep in mind the high cost of sattelite photos. The ones freely available from the CA government are infrared and black and white, so either full color was purchased at an exteremely insane price (probably in the neighborhood of $1 or $2 per sq km), or someone painfully hand-painted in thousands of square miles.Not sure about the autogen. I know that autogen in MSFS is controlled through some kind of GIS data.. so you never know.While we are on the subject, I personally would love to do a sat photo layout of the Hudson valley area of New York State. New York State currently offers full color FREE :) downloads for most of New York State counties, but the project seems a bit overwhelming for one person.Anyone up for a co-project? Any volunteers just email me thru avsim mail.Vinhttp://www.vinscimone.com/dancnkid.gif

[HawaiianCondor 0]

Bob, Excellent question, I'm taking pause here too. By the time my $50 copy of FS2002 had run its course, I'd spent several hundred dollars to get Simflyers, FSScene land class, UK airports and various Lago meshes to get the FS world to look more like the real one we fly in rather than the MS checkered tablecloth. Although FS9 has made some strides in this area, I'm sure there will still be all kinds of demand for add-on sceneries... This company made some great stuff for the Pac Northwest back for FS98, but $30.00 is a bit of change for such a small part of the country..even though I fly there a lot I'll probably not jump until I hear what other users say. Especially what the satellite scenery will do to FS9 performance, with what the clouds and other weather is already doing to it... So for me, the jury is still out and the plastic is staying in the wallet...(at least until I read the first post about being in "flight sim heaven"!) regards,

[Guest]

Agreed. Not for everyone I guess. I know that this company has put a lot of work into this but for most the price will have to come down at some point. The autogen at least for me and wont be giving it up.I will wait also. Thanks for the reality check.Bob G

[KERNEL32 497]

I'm kinda neutral on it all, and wont be getting it just cause I have no interest in add on scenery- BUT, I remember back in the Sub-Logic FS days when they released 2-3 STATES of scenery and all it was - was lines for roads, inaccurate placements of airports, and those modules costed about $30 or so. Considering the area they cover w/satellite imagery and the accuracy and detail, it seems thats probably not a bad price IMHO.

[W2DR 1,859]

But...on the other hand (there is always one of those), my wife and I just returned from dinner. Modest place, US$84 plus the tip. At least with the scenery I'd have something to show for it tomorrow. Or, maybe, even two somethings. I ordered the scenery this morning and it'll be interesting to see how it compares to half a dinner for two, minus the tip.Doug

[Guest PaulL01]

>I was looking at this and wondering if this initial release>was designed to get some cash flow going for this company so>they can offer say "regional areas" at a more reasonable cost.>NOt sure but figuring in the number of major cities that may>be included in the future, a simmer's investment would be>tremendous. Im sure it is great scenery but pricey. >>I am assuming there would be no autogen as it would defeat the>purpose. So low level flight would really not be an option I>would assume>>Bob GNot sure what you are using to compare for bang for buck but this is mostly Full color not the cheaper "enhanced" false color as was used in the FUII/FUIII serries, it is real 4.8 meter res, not 8 or worse resampled down. Considering its quality it covers a huge area, (very expensive data).The AG issue is the "realistic" trade off one has to except for this kind of scenery as the AG would have to be placed by hand to each corresponding texture and an area of this size would be drawn with more than a thousand custom textures, so if you want AG rendered on it the wait would be quite long.This scenery will be great for low level VFR, not AG tree skimming mind you but very nice for a virtual air tour of that area.

[michal 44]

I personaly feel that it might be an honest price considering effort that went into it. But I won't be buying it anytime soon. My "dream" scenery would the same 140000 square miles of 4-m photoreal textures but distributed around various secondary but 'prominent' airports. Say 15x15 miles box around Vun Nuys, another such box around Monterey, another around Lake Tahoe airport, etc. ... that would give me room for about 500+ airports. If such airports were selected based on their photo-appeal from the best fly-in destination in the USA that would be my absolute dream scenery - I would be willing to spend $100+ on - but I know it ain't coming soon .... :-(Michael J.http://www.reality-xp.com/community/nr/rsc/rxp-higher.jpg

[Guest sssummer]

You don't have to worry about AUTOGEN, its included. Here is a quote from their websiteDoes MegaScenery Also Support AUTOGEN?"Yes absolutely and not only that but we've actually improved FS2004 autogen! Yes, that's right, we've improved Autogen with our own more "correct" autogen. Our technology enables us to differentiate land use and as a result we correctly place houses, commercial buildings and trees, etc. So its a more accurate representation. You can activate or de-activate Autogen as you wish with Megascenery."It maybe be a bit pricey, but if the framerates are good, to me its worth every dime. Hopefully they will drop other areas to around $20 US which would be reasonable, but it will probably depend on initial sales and how fast they can crank these areas out. I've ordered mine. It reminds me of FU3 scenery and that was fantastic. It sure looks like a keeper. Can't stand the generic repeating tiles.

[Guest kurtj]

Actually it isn't a bad price at all. I am going to order mine and I just can't wait. I finally get to fly around my area without generic textures. This will be a cool package.

[Guest wathomas777]

Their Pacific Northwest and Austrailia Sceneries for FS98 were beyond belief. This looks equally good.However, I am on a funds limit, and for me Ultimate Traffic for my 30 bucks enhances almost every area I fly in, not just one region.However, Just as their Pacific Northwest scenery provided a glimpse of what is possible, I expect in most of our lifetimes, we will see a flight sim in which that quality scenery will be available for a very large portion of the US and Europe, with the rest of the world to follow.

[Guest]

The autogen was a big one for me so if they use a customized version of autogen, why cant I find any pics of it. I would like to see how the transition to a lower altitude allows the autogen to come into play. Anyone seen any pics of this or am I just blind. Heading to the site now just to double check.Bob

[bob.bernstein 0]

you mean, just like all the scenery produced using the custom flag in resample.exe.If you want to fly scenery like this for free, check out Julio Estefan

[Guest cw1011]

Couple of thoughts:If you read the FAQs they claim to have developed a way to incorporate autogen into the scenery in a way that matches up with the textures. This package strikes me as being all about low level flight. On the cost side, don't think its exorbitant, given the expense of licensing a satelite image for this kind of product, and the amount of work that has to go into working and colouring textures for FS use. I'm guessing its a bloody lot of work. Just my $.02.

[Guest PaulL01]

Hi Bob,I'm not sure I understand what you meant.I have been using the same technique myself since Christian uncovered it last year and have compiled all of my image data this way, but still kept going back to the (still working in FS2k2) Meshwith1tex command as that enabled the use of the high res textures (1 meter or better). It is very easy using either Elrond Elvish's resample or Misho's Terrabuilder as all the calculating for LOD and placement as well as cropping is automated and certainly comes in very handy when working extremely large areas."But its not because of coloring black and white imagery, that is VERY simple, once you develop a system."Sorry if I got this wrong (it is a little strange here with the power going down) But Mega scenery is not all based on false colored imagery and as such I am sure you are aware that there can be an extreme expense involved. For example for a cloudless 2 meter full color data set with noon day sun-late spring of Rochester NY including just a few of its suburbs (about 100 sq miles) the cost is more than $30K. If you want to go on the cheap you can purchase 1 meter black and white and 20/30m false color and merge the two or have it done for you at less than 30% of the cost for full true color imagery but then you get what you pay for.Anyhow, I think the Mega scenery is a bargain just try getting a 4-meter Tiff or a Sid file of full color data of that region let a lone to be able to fly over it all for less than $50, I think that is a bargain.I am interested with the use of AG as someone pointed out, I'll have to revisit that as I'll bet they used simple landclass data to transpose FS AG as apposed to actual placement building to building city block to city block etc. Hmmmmm