Chris Willis came out with a wonderful fix for the clouds/dawn and dusk textures... I've been doing more night flying now and have noticed that the ground is dead black while the sky is not totally dark. The look of the horizon doesn't mesh with the sky, it's like your flying over a black carpet. It's hard to explain but night flying above 32,000ft doesn't look quit right...Is there anyone working on a fix that will mesh gound and sky together at night like what I see during the day time???

Cycle through some various dates...pick one week and go from Sun to Sat... COF randomly changes the night environment depending on date--it has several variations, ranging from a pronounced bluish night sky to inky black all the way around... The inky black variation is unnerving--especially if you've lost your instruments :)-John

Also the gentleman who brought us AEU is presently working on night textures.

Thanks for the tip John... I remember you gave me this update about a month ago about my day flights and you are correct. The only thing now is I hate flying in July because the haze looks very unrealistic, Microsoft really over did it. Back to the point, no matter what time of the year thanks to Chris Willis we have a haze effect that blends well the sky with the ground in the distance during the day. This is not the case at night... I was flying with the date set at the present (Oct. 7, 2003), the blending is none existent at 32,000ft. The horizon should somewhat blend the sky with the ground no matter the time and at this point this doesn't happen, looks very unrealistic at night... I hope someone like Chris addresses this because day/dusk/dawn are spot on but night flying leaves something to be desired if you don't have the full black effect that you mentioned...P.S. Good to hear from you John...

That would be Chris Arrington. He did a wonderful job on the AEU_MX textures. As a side note, anyone using the PSS A330/340 that does not like the way the exterior aircraft lights look, get the AEU_MX file. Inside is a new halo texture file that replaces the default one. It makes the aircraft lights look ten times better. The default MS halo texture file has the lights too bright and look like glowing orbs of light. The new halo file by Chris is much more realistic. Anybody know if Chris has his own website?

"P.S. Good to hear from you John... "Likewise... Hopefully Chris will see this and modify the environment textures accordingly. I don't think haze can be added in unless Microsoft modelled nighttime haze... One thing to try--go to your vis settings, and set the max altitude at 99999.... Then reduce the nighttime vis to 30-40 miles...see if that at least fudges it until Chris can work his magic.-John

Thanks for that! No website at the moment, sorry. :)Chris Willis is DEFINATELY the person to see about atmospheric changes, he's really got an eye for it.Chris

Good tip John but I mostly fly with FSMetro...Ooh well, Chris might have something.

Yes, PLEASE someone improve the night textures! Yikes all the cities look so much the same, too uniform in the lighting colors & distribution. Yuck!Noel

I use Chris Willis's FS2002 night textues in FS2004. Although not as bright as the default IMHO they are a lot more realistic.BruceWTB

Hi dilloll, I have actually works on these before, should be available in 2 set of night generic texture, as well of Fs Sky World 2004 with complete new more realistic sky color lights with, blended horizon, many new detailed clouds and shape/model and more, new and improved water reflection/bumpapping also add with more freindly fps than default etc.The release is not fixed, I am waiting until they will be accurate to me and others things, near 75 mb of new stuff, but it take time. ThanksChris Willis[link:fsw.simflight.com/FSWMenuFsSim.html]Clouds And Addons For MsFshttp://fsw.simflight.com/fsw.jpg

Cool... Thanks Chris--

>Yes, PLEASE someone improve the night textures! Yikes all>the cities look so much the same, too uniform Maybe uniformity could be addressed but I hate what others generally do to night textures by tampering with colors, intensity, etc. Current textures are actually pretty good as far as coloring is concerned only the uniformity could be improved. So whoever redoes night textures - please proceed carefuly !!!Michael J.http://www.reality-xp.com/community/nr/rsc/rxp-higher.jpg