Getting back into simming with XPX

[PingPong 60]

Hey all, it's been a while since I have posted, I left FS for a while to get some other life-type stuff together, but the itch came back so here I am.  FSX is too daunting and time-consuming to install with all of its accessory programs, patches, updates, OS settings etc...so I got my simpler X-plane install up and running, and I thought I would share some shots.

 

I wanted to make a sim environment that would be highly satisfactory and useful to me, I don't have a lot of time to sim, so I decided to keep to my home state of Florida, USA and really refine the sim in that location. That way I could do short hops that would be applicable to any IRL flying I might do.

 

I have a 256 GB SSD that limits the overall size of my sim(but helps tremendously with load times), so I started making high detail photosceneries, and then added a few addon airports of just places I would fly.

 

Overall I am happy with the result, this is a test flight both for the plane and the sim using the newly updated 64 bit MU2 Marquis crusing around north central Florida.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On the whole I am happy with how it turned out, the photoscenery + default autogen blend well, I haven't tried any of the newer OSM/xplane stuff as it tends to be sparse in my part of the world.  I am actually using a triple widescreen display at 5040 x 1050 and 125 degree FOV (on a GTX 680 4gb)so my AA levels with HDR enabled is pretty low, but the increased framerate and smoothness compensate for any jaggies, and I have the other rendering options set very high thanks to copious Vram.

 

Thanks for looking.

[HLJames 2,568]

Looks good..Love Florida!

 

HLJAMES

[LeeL 272]

Lovely shots and scenery

 

Any chance you'll put it up for people to download?

[FloG 148]

Nice shots!

[Rocky_53 1,566]

Looks brilliant!

[steve310002 1,198]

 

 

so I started making high detail photosceneries, and then added a few addon airports of just places I would fly.

 

Where did you download the photoscenery from?

[Phantom88 3,282]

Fantastic!!! I love your clouds and choice of Aircraft.

 

p.s Great place for Florida freeware airports

http://fred-e.net/x-plane-sceneries/

[woodhick 504]

Saw one of those MB-2's in the real world once.  For its size, noisiest dang airplane I've ever seen.  Great shots  and scenery too.  Thanks :-)

[PingPong 60]

Thanks for all the responses guys, let me answer a few questions:

 

Re the scenery; I actually purchased the RealScenery offering for Florida and was disappointed in how low resolution it was, it is okay for higher altitudes, but I wanted more detail for the areas that I fly constantly in real life. However, I did take note of how they organized their scenery and did the same thing myself.

 

Basically, they break Florida up to 1 x 1 degree squares which are named after the primary city in that area.

 

So after doing that I got a list that looked like this;

 

Name

St Augustine 81 29 17 LOD

North Tampa 82 28 18 LOD

South Tampa 82 27 18 LOD

 

etc, for a total of 26 blocks, then I downloaded each block with G2XPL and either Microsoft Virtual Earth or Google at either 17 or 18 LOD depending on how much I would be flying over it. You have to set: hi_res_textures_threshold_radius_m=0 and dsf_threshold_distance_m=0 in the G2xpl.ini, that way it only does one block at a time in full detail.

 

The whole thing is 200+ GB (Therefore I cannot host it for downloading, also there may be some legality issues in sharing it this way), but it offers a few advantages:

 

1) You can install only the blocks you are going to overfly, this keeps install size down(important on my large, but limited SSD)

2) If you have errors, clouds, or simply don't like one block by from service you can re-do just that one(which may take an hour vs days to redo the whole scenery)

3) You can use two or more instances of G2XPL to download and render the scenery faster.

4) If power goes out during rendering(like mine did TWICE) you have to redo a much smaller area.

 

With an organized plan and a constantly updated checklist for each block I was able to get the whole state in 4 evenings, at the resolution I want.

 

Thanks again for looking.

[JAT 185]

Love that plane. Is there a place to  get it.

 

nebojsa

[PingPong 60]

@JAT

 

X-aviation.com, this is one of the first "high complexity" addons for X-plane and it just got a big update for the 64 bit sim.

[captain420 3,099]

Wow amazing, would be lovely if you can do a video tutorial of the G2XPL thing. Amazing results as I would love to do this for Hawaii! 

[fritzgohl 29]

looks real

 

Regards;

 

Fritz

[adi518 73]

looks very good.. no doubt the lighting aspect of the x-plane engine is superior to fsx.

[JimmiG 244]

Re the scenery; I actually purchased the RealScenery offering for Florida and was disappointed in how low resolution it was, it is okay for higher altitudes, but I wanted more detail for the areas that I fly constantly in real life.

 

Most of their products are several years old not very high resolution. They've had a high resolution California scenery in development for many years but it seems they always come up with some last minute tweak or fix that pushes back the release date another 3+ months.

 

I promised myself I would get back into X-Plane once that came out, but it never seems to happen. Your approach to building the scenery yourself is interesting. The trees really add the third dimension to the scenery that is normally lacking with pure photo-scenery.