ground flattening

[flyingnoob 25]

Morning folks,

 

I need a little help flattening ground outside airport boundaries(and inside I guess.)

 

I use IS, IOS, ADEX and FSX's SDK, I guess I could use sbuilderx, but I have no idea what I am doing with that.

 

I have posted in various other forums, as to get an answer quicker

 

Thanks

 

[N60JBravo 27]

Create a ground poly in ADEX and set it's properties to flatten.

 

With ADEX connected to FSX via FSUIPC you can slew around in FSX top down view and press the "M" key at your desired poly corners and that will place a marker at those positions in ADEX.

 

Then you simoly connect the dots with the poly tool in ADEX and compile.

 

regards,

Joe

 

[edit]

if you set the flatten to a different elevation than the airport's default elevation, and the new flatten includes the airport, you will want to use the ADEX airport elevation change tool also.

[/edit]

[flyingnoob 25]

Hey Joe, slowly making progress i think.

 

I have my aircraft centred on an area i want to flatten, ade is open and i opened a stock airport (egph), clicked "connect" for fsuipc > centred on A/C and i see a red cursor that follows the a/c when i slew, so i uess i am half way there? when i hit "m, the triangle i created moves(or actually ade's position moves).

 

i cant see where properties is to get to the flatten or elevation section

[N60JBravo 27]

When connected to ADEX you need to have focus on FSX for the "M" key to leave a marker.

 

This way you can move around in the sim and define the corners of your flatten with ADEX minimized.

 

After you have defined the corners (the poly can be any shape, by the way) shut down the sim and bring ADEX back up.

 

You should now have red "+" markers at the desired locations.

 

Select the ADEX poly tool and click on the markers in order around the poly making sure you don't get a crossed, or twisted, poly. Double click on the last marker.

 

When you double click on the last marker ADEX will present the poly properties window.

 

You want "Airport background" in the top window and "flatten" in the bottom window. Verify the elevation is what you want, then click on OK.

 

Save your work, compile the airport making sure the .bgl gets placed in an active scenery folder, and test.

 

regards,

Joe

[flyingnoob 25]

^{hey joe thanks, can you go on chat? i think i am getting it except not the way you describe,}

^{I am not getting to add more than one  crosshair, i only get the one that slews with the aircraft.}

 

^{Anyway, if i connect and then select the poly, i left click on the crosshair holding it down,  then slew and click on the new located crosshair and so on till im back at my initial crosshair, - double click and get my green poly box (seems a long way for a sort cut i know), i have my properties box and selected what you said, how am i to find out what the elevation needed is?}

 

^{when i say long way for a short cut, i meant it as in i still cannot get the "m" key to place markers - is that maybe something needing configured with fsuipc by any chance?}

 

thanks

[N60JBravo 27]

 

 

i still cannot get the "m" key to place markers - is that maybe something needing configured with fsuipc by any chance?

I have determined that this is an ADE ProKey function.

 

Without the ProKey you do not have it. Your procedure of having FSX and ADE open side by side is the next best thing.

 

Sorry to have led you down that rabbit hole.

 

As for determining the elevation, you can use any aircraft and the Shift+Z readout to determine the elevation of that aircraft. Note that the Shift+Z elevation is the aircraft reference point, not the ground, or wheels, elevation. You have to subtract the static height of the given aircraft from the Shift+Z elevation.

 

I recommend you download crosshairs plus- http://library.avsim.net/esearch.php?DLID=73331

 

This nifty "airplane" is an excellent tool for scenery design.

 

Add to it this panel- http://library.avsim.net/esearch.php?DLID=108863

 

Lastly, you will need to read this topic- http://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/showpost.php?p=150485&postcount=27 to get the crosshairs to work in FSX.

 

It's a lot more simple than it sounds and well worth it.

 

regards,

Joe

 

 

 

[flyingnoob 25]

Hi Joe, not a problem, your forgiven

 

I think I have it now, - I could not get it to work, no matter what combination of "what folder went in what folder, due to the amount of folders inside each folder" lol

It wasn't until I added the texture folder it worked.

 

So when I slew this around - it always stays on the ground?

 

OK, so now, at what point do I add exclusion rectangles? and do I use instant sceneries exclusion??

 

Where does "layers" come into play? and can I combine all these different "edits" into one BGL?

 

Thanks

[N60JBravo 27]

flyingnoob, on 05 May 2013 - 04:22 AM, said:

So when I slew this around - it always stays on the ground?

No, you can slew it up in the air too.

 

When it is on the ground the gauge (or Shift+Z) gives you the actual ground elevation without having to subtract the airplane's static height.

 

As an example, if you are in the default Cessna 172 and sitting on the ground, the actual ground elevation is 3.7 feet less than what Shift+Z gives you. That value is different for every plane.

 

With the Crosshairs Shift+Z gives you the actual ground elevation.

 

flyingnoob, on 05 May 2013 - 04:22 AM, said:

OK, so now, at what point do I add exclusion rectangles? and do I use instant sceneries exclusion??

Depends on what you want to exclude.

 

If you want to exclude default airport objects like hangars, etc, ADE does this by simply clicking on them and hitting the Delete key.

 

If you want to get rid of autogen buildings and trees the best way is to again use ADE to create a ground poly that excludes autogen.

 

Honestly, I have been using Instant Scenery for years and can count on one hand the amount of times I have used it to create an exclusion rectangle.

 

In FSX exclusion rectangles can not always work as planned where other methods are more reliable.

 

flyingnoob, on 05 May 2013 - 04:22 AM, said:

Where does "layers" come into play?

Not sure what you mean by layers as that could refer to a couple different things.

 

If you are talking about layers in the Scenery Library, higher layers trump lower ones.

 

I need more info to be specific about this one.

 

flyingnoob, on 05 May 2013 - 04:22 AM, said:

...and can I combine all these different "edits" into one BGL?

Most likely, though there is no need to do so. FSX does not care how many .bgl files you have and there is no performance gain to be had by combining them.

 

In some cases, doing so might actually break excludes, so again, more specifics needed.

 

Welcome to the wonderful world of scenery design.

 

regards,

Joe

[flyingnoob 25]

hey Joe, thanks

 

"No, you can slew it up in the air too.

When it is on the ground the gauge (or Shift+Z) gives you the actual ground elevation without having to subtract the airplane's static height.

As an example, if you are in the default Cessna 172 and sitting on the ground, the actual ground elevation is 3.7 feet less than what Shift+Z gives you. That value is different for every plane.

With the Crosshairs Shift+Z gives you the actual ground elevation.
what I did mean by that was if I was on the ground and slewed, would it stay "on the ground", which I now know it does
Depends on what you want to exclude.

If you want to exclude default airport objects like hangars, etc, ADE does this by simply clicking on them and hitting the Delete key.

If you want to get rid of autogen buildings and trees the best way is to again use ADE to create a ground poly that excludes autogen.

Honestly, I have been using Instant Scenery for years and can count on one hand the amount of times I have used it to create an exclusion rectangle.

In FSX exclusion rectangles can not always work as planned where other methods are more reliable.

Not sure what you mean by layers as that could refer to a couple different things.

If you are talking about layers in the Scenery Library, higher layers trump lower ones.

I need more info to be specific about this one."

 

 

 

I read in a few places about "layers" and didn't take much notice as I thought I was not "ready" for it, but I have seen it being spoken about in a few places.

 

 

 

"Most likely, though there is no need to do so. FSX does not care how many .bgl files you have and there is no performance gain to be had by combining them.

In some cases, doing so might actually break excludes, so again, more specifics needed"

 

 

 

So I can literally throw any BGL's I create into my addon scenery folder?

 

I have managed to do a few dummy runs with the flatten and the flatten with excluding autogen, and on one part it wasn't quite as accurate as it should have been - I had my crosshairs and polygon "apparently" south of a road but when fsx was run. the road had been included in the flatten.

Well I have just bought EGPH extreme and it keeps crashing so I am going to have to get that sorted before I do anything else!!

When I do my flatten, is there a way I can make it look like concrete in one move with ADEX?  like a car park, or even a pond etc, or does that have to be made with something else? i.e. IS poly constructed with the concrete texture?

 

lastly, with ADEX, any scenery I flatten - even well away from an airport - say 50nm for example, it seems as if it has to be saved in the "nearest stock airports"  is this correct?

 

With IS, it just gets saved as a BGL,  and I don't have to open an airport to have to save it.

 

Regards

 

Paul

[N60JBravo 27]

The concept of layers shows up in several areas of scenery design. Without knowing which one you are talking about, I can't advise further.

The Scenery Library works with layers, the ADE display uses layers to move objects above or below one another in the display, Scasm based polys use layers, etc, etc.

You can through any .bgls you create into ...\Addon Scenery\scenery and they will work.

Not a good idea as that folder will quickly become full and updating/troubleshooting can become a nightmare. It is better to have distinct folders for individual airports added to the Scenery Library, especially if they have many files for each airport.

I do have one folder that I put ADE-type addons where there is only one or two files, and usually no textures, to keep the folder count down a little.

One of the challenges with creating flattens is dealing with how FSX transitions from the flatten back to the mesh. Sometimes compromises have to be made so something looks better in the sim.

If you want a concrete flatten you can create a concrete apron in ADE, though this will have to be at the elevation of the airport. You can also make a water poly, I believe, I am not on a machine equipped with FSX right now and am working off of memory.

Yes, everything ADE does is to be associated with an airport. ADE is, after all, Airport Design Editor.

If you want to get into a bunch of off-airport terrain design then you need to get SBuilderX. It is more of a terrain editor than ADE.

IS is really just for placing objects.

If you get serious about scenery design you will quickly learn it takes a bunch of different tools to do the job.

regards,
Joe