Hi,

 

I have noticed that many buildings that use alpha-fade calls, do not come into full focus till you are very close.

As an example, the ksea tower can barely be seen until very close. I was approaching 34 right at 700' indicated or about 400 or so AGL, and am at the beginning of the runway threshold, and the tower is just barely coming into view and still very much a ghost. Other airport buildings do seem to use the alpha fade methods but I could be wrong as I was focusing on the tower. Is this set within the xp10 code, or is it driver dependent to some degree. My world detail distance is set at very high.

 

Regards

Bob

I noticed the same with Open Street Map scenery buildings. They appear as ghost when at some distance. I assume it's a bug?

Is this set within the xp10 code, or is it driver dependent to some degree.

 

Nah, that is just the way it's coded for now, most likely this will be addressed after they move to 64bit.

They could address it now. It is probably just a value change in some parameter passed to a function of sorts. Can't believe it needs to wait for the 64 bit version, which may not be for another year.

 

Bob

I guess this is the reason we see the sun and the moon "Behind" distant mountains too.

I am noticing the same issue as FSX with buildings popping into view. I guess alpha fade is not being used on everything.

...the 64 bit version, which may not be for another year.

 

uh don't make me cry! Let's hope for 4-6 months.

They appear as ghost when at some distance.

 

It's not a bug. Given the choice to have pixels "pop in" vs. fade in, we've chosen to fade them in. Now the distance in which that happens IS set by the author...me for KSEA, BUT that distance is modulated by the world distance detail pull down menu. Set that to lower values and the scenery will fade earlier. The goal is set the values such that the fade happens when the objects are only a few pixels onscreen thereby minimizing the effect. Certainly we can stand to go back through and evaluate the LODs (we were moving pretty fast back then) and tweak them a little. But the fade is a much better solution WHEN the LODs are set well.

 

Tom Kyler

Laminar / IXEG

www.ixeg.net

It's not a bug. Given the choice to have pixels "pop in" vs. fade in, we've chosen to fade them in. Now the distance in which that happens IS set by the author...me for KSEA, BUT that distance is modulated by the world distance detail pull down menu. Set that to lower values and the scenery will fade earlier. The goal is set the values such that the fade happens when the objects are only a few pixels onscreen thereby minimizing the effect. Certainly we can stand to go back through and evaluate the LODs (we were moving pretty fast back then) and tweak them a little. But the fade is a much better solution WHEN the LODs are set well.

 

Tom Kyler

Laminar / IXEG

www.ixeg.net

 

Tom, it was a little confusing what I was seeing as the behavior seemed to change when changing detail distance. Some objects seem to pop in and others seem to fade in. Not really sure what I am seeing anymore. Some fade in way to late and others fade in early or tend to pop in rather than fade. I hope you work out the best solution. Thanks for chiming in.

 

Bob

Hi Tom,

I totally agree that it's better than popup, however I think the fading should be faster/happen in smaller distance, thus happening farther from the observer.

Also, I think there could be other solutions than alpha transparency, but that's another subject, which I'm working on right now, just theorically.

 

Pascal

 

It's not a bug. Given the choice to have pixels "pop in" vs. fade in, we've chosen to fade them in. Now the distance in which that happens IS set by the author...me for KSEA, BUT that distance is modulated by the world distance detail pull down menu. Set that to lower values and the scenery will fade earlier. The goal is set the values such that the fade happens when the objects are only a few pixels onscreen thereby minimizing the effect. Certainly we can stand to go back through and evaluate the LODs (we were moving pretty fast back then) and tweak them a little. But the fade is a much better solution WHEN the LODs are set well.

 

Tom Kyler

Laminar / IXEG

www.ixeg.net

.....Some objects seem to pop in and others seem to fade in.

 

I have seen this behavior myself and we will definitely look into it.

 

I think the fading should be faster/happen in smaller distance

 

I think that can be somewhat controlled by the LOD settings, but possibly at a price. I say possibly because well...I haven't investigated it myself :P For many objects, there are 2 LOD settings, one for near and one for far. If you make the near one, very near, then MAYBE (need to ask BenS), the fade process the next is interpolated based on the low LOW....meaning you would want to put your LODs closer together in that case...BUT if that is the case, then you would end up increasing your low LOD to a higher level, meaning you'd be drawing parts of objects that can't be seen past certain distances. Anyhow, all that to say that I am in agreement with both you guys about making it better. I think it's a case of "part better LOD settings" and "part fade code". We'll be discussing it soon...right now, we're auditing aircraft and trying to make all those more consistent.

 

Tom Kyler

Laminar/IXEG

www.ixeg.net