I saw this video on youtube of FSX and you can actually see the waves move, it stood out because it looked like the waves you would see when surfing, it was white, and it really stood out. Was curious how this affect is done?

 

I currently have my water settings at low.2 i believe. Would love to see a comparison shot or video between each setting to better judge what I'm missing out on.

Would you please post the video? 

DX10 Preview On?

Water effects set to high and REX + FS Water Configurator! Awesome combination

Water effects at maximum? What REX water settings do you use? Sorry I can't seem to find that video. :(

 

I found a break down of what the different water settings are for in FSX:

 

Here is a breakdown of what the water slider does:

1.x has no reflections:

·         The lowest 1.x level does the basic shader.

·         The mid 1.x level adds an animated detail texture. 

·         The highest 1.x level adds some specular effects

2.x adds a 2nd pass to get reflections and this can be a killer:

·         2.low reflects only the clouds and has a little more complicated shader – it can be a good compromise

·         2.med adds scenery, eg terrain and custom objects

·         2.hi adds Autogen (trees, generic objects ) and basically reflects the entire scene, which costs a lot

 

Water 1.x thus just increases the shader cost and adds sampling from more textures as you move the sliders to the right. For modern hw, thats no problem.

 

Water 2.x needs a 2nd pass to generate the reflection. That means rendering the world a 2nd time into a texture as a render target. Which is an obvious performance hit.

 

And thats just for the 1st 2.x level.

 

Reading my list above, with Water 2.hi the shader and rendering cost is intense and directly related to full scene complexity. So having Autogen and Scenery to extremely dense coupled with Water 2.hi has a direct negative impact on performance. Water 2.hi, like our other 2 2nd pass features ( shadows, bloom ) basically cuts your FPS in half.

 

Water 2.med with Scenery complexity at extremely dense and Mesh resolution all the way right means that the 2nd render pass is going to cost a lot. Lower your scenery and mesh settings, though, and 2.med might not be such a FPS killer while adding a bit more visual quality.

 

Water 2.lo renders only the clouds and the skybox on the 2nd pass, and can be a very good compromise. And in general when over water its mostly the cloud reflections you see except at the shoreline. So this choice doesnt sacrifice too much visual quality and is FPS friendly.

 

Understanding this lets you make intelligent choices. Water 2.lo with high Autogen and high Scenery is much better than any other Water 2.x because 2.lo doesn’t render the terrain or Autogen.

 

What you want this for?

 

I turn off fx.waves in Effects folder, looks terrible IMO...

Water effects set to high and REX + FS Water Configurator! Awesome combination

 

Yes, exactly....This is the combo I use...darken the water, get very realistic effects...and I don't notice any impact on my sim and I am running an older computer. tweaked appropriately.

JSkorna post above hit the nail on the head.  You need DX10 enabled for the animation.  DX9 ain't going to do it.  Here's a quote from Phil Taylor, the lead developer on the FSX Aces Team:

 

"Given the globe is 70 percent water or more - water enhancements still make sense. What wasn’t possible was to match the water in the magic screenies due to the confluence of hardware issues, constraints on new content, and schedule. What we have does make the water visually different with whitecaps and make water react to weather—wind causes whitecaps on water."   I think what they did is exceptional considering the limited time they had to develop FSX for DX10.  On a cold windy day in Portland on a flight to Seattle, the water looks forbidding and you do NOT want to crash there....

 

So just turn on DX10 Preview, get some good heavy weather and enjoy the animations.

 

Best regards,

Jim

you can get waves in DX9, REX has 11 sets of wave animations and i think most of us use REX

The "sparkling" water texture set in REX looks good. This adds "white caps" to the water textures, and gives a decent impression of waves from certain angles.

you can get waves in DX9, REX has 11 sets of wave animations and i think most of us use REX

But does the animations react to weather in DX9?  Or do you just install a set of animations and that's it.  There are a lot of programs that have animations in DX9 mode, including the default.

 

Best regards,

Jim

i think you have right, waves are not reacting to wind in DX9. But i don't know how relevant is this, it looks good. There are some interesting things in DX10, shame that is not finished