I, like many of you, changed water textures in FS9 from default to Bill Lyons' textures, and then variations of these started popping up. I got caught in the "change texture mentality" and now I believe I have the calmer wave texture. Now, I seem to be getting some weird shadows and zig-zag type textures when flying over oceans.Please....what is the final verdict on which texture is best for FS9 water ....including Ocean texture. I would appreciate hearing from some of you, and hopefully helping me restore my water to the most pleasing and REALISTIC look available. I do not want to return to the deault textures, but I would appreciate being pointed to the zip files that work best for most of you. Stan

Stan:I too ran into this quandry. After installing Bill Lyons water textures, I noticed that when viewing my AC from slightly above looking down to the water, I observed shadows that looked liked tree shadows reflected on the water from slightly behind the AC. They would move along as the AC moved over the water. It was impossible to be tree shadows when there were no trees to the back side of me or the sun.I tried various other combinations and have finally settled on using two files to achieve what I believe is as a natural looking effect as possible. I am using these files.r water0.zipnewwaves.zipI also toyed with the file clscwatr.zip but can't remember if some of the files were overwritten by either of the previous two. Could possibly be that I used all three of these files in combo. Just can't remember. My water detail setting is at "High" and I am also using the Ocean Effects files by Ed Truthan and selecting "moderate" to "heavy" wavesets to get the ripple effect when viewing the water from altitude. What convinced me was comparing the ripple and shimmering effect at dawn or dusk from the suns relections off the water, at altitudes between 2000 & 3000'.I think you will have to experiment as I did to find the right combo for you. I hope Bill can rectify the tree shadow anomaly where no trees are anywhere near the water, because his work is excellent. I had also wondered whether my video card and its settings had a bearing on seeing these tree shadows. I use a 9600 PRO 128 with AA at 4 and AS at 8. What card do you use?Chris

Hi guys,the shimmering seems to be a problem with bump mapping, maybe that's why MS only included very modest waves in FS9. Maybe using a different level of mip mapping will help, but Idoubt that there's anything a designer could do, without lowering the detail of the waves.-Daniel

I'm using a combo of Bill Lyon's first water texture release, along with Daniel Buechter's wave tweaks... The results appear in these two threads:http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...6&mesg_id=98116http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...8&mesg_id=98598I've flown overwater often, including many transoceanic hops... I guess you can never have the "perfect" set, but these seem to be the best compromise of low altitude and high altitude appearance...-John

John,I love what I see in those threads! Please be specific in which files I need to download to get that. Also, I'll assume that I just let the new files overwrite whatever's there. Right?ps. Those pics are just great. My compliments. Stan

I use Bill Lyons third set of water textures with the original default oceanfieldheight texture. Works well for me.

Here's the links to the files I used....Install Bill's textures first, then Daniel's... With Daniel's textures, I chose the "small" wave option....http://library.avsim.net/esearch.php?CatID...scen&DLID=37994http://library.avsim.net/esearch.php?CatID...scen&DLID=38044-John

Thanks John....Downloading now.I appreciate greatly the quick response and interest in my question. Hope to return the favor someday. Stan