A couple of unedited shots...

 

San Francisco...

 

 

LA Smog...

 

 

City views Spectacular!

 

HLJAMES

I think sometimes we get too focused on what things don't do rather than appreciating what they're meant to be.  The Cities products often get dinged for lack of night lighting and low-res textures when viewed from helicopter-between-the-buildings levels, but as your images show - what they do, they do very well, creating a very real and complete city skyline and at reasonable cost.  I have LA and Chicago and enjoy both of them for what they are.

 

Thanks for sharing these.

 

Scott

 

 

I think sometimes we get too focused on what things don't do rather than appreciating what they're meant to be. The Cities products often get dinged for lack of night lighting and low-res textures when viewed from helicopter-between-the-buildings levels, but as your images show - what they do, they do very well, creating a very real and complete city skyline and at reasonable cost. I have LA and Chicago and enjoy both of them for what they are.



Thanks for sharing these.



Scott

 

I didn't see anything low res at all on the Los Angeles scenery.  The coast and the mountains by the city are brilliant.  Catalina is really nice, covered in photoreal.  (I landed the Turbine Duke there without even sticking the numbers and still had 1000 feet left)  Pretty airport.  I think I'm gonna pick up 'nawwwwlins to.  Maybe one more. 

Very nice shots.  I use Cities X too and as you say, great stuff for the daylight hours.

 

 

Very nice shots. I use Cities X too and as you say, great stuff for the daylight hours.

 

Yeah, I was worried about what it would look like at night which is why I sat on the sidelines for so long.  It's actually not that bad for Los Angeles.  The ground textures they add seem to have night lighting.  The main city buildings are dark (Seems like it'd be a good idea to put some lighting on those but, honestly, I barely noticed with all the other stuff) but the airport buildings have night lighting.  I do get some stutters as I come into core city though my settings are quite high...might try to do some tweaking.  I like things smooooooth.

 

What other Cities do you have and what do you think of them?

I have Buffalo/Niagara Falls, Detroit, Cleveland, Chicago and Indianapolis.  I like them all but Chicago is my fave due to having a really nice Meigs Field.  I was a little disappointed with Niagara Falls--not enough dynamic effects for the Falls--but all in all not too bad.  I really don't regret getting any of them, but Chicago remains my favorite.

My least favorite of the CitiesX series is New Orleans and that is in my backyard.  I think it is the bluish tint that will not match any month of FSX or MSE scenery.  Basically not much improvement other than Lakefront airport and a little improvement to the old NAS.  Downtown and the River improvements are hardly noticeable.

 

Cleveland and Los Angeles are just the opposite.  I am very pleased with these two. Loads of improved areas that match the surrounding much better.

 

Ray

Really enjoying the atmosphere in these shots. What sky textures/ENBseries settings are you using?

I use the custom ENB ini file from REX, a custom little envpalette.bmp file I created and SweetFX.  I wanted a brighter daylight and to not have a dark cockpit.  

FWIW, here's a shot of me on VFR final at Meigs: