Hi,Has anyone else noted this strange mottling of the sky? I've only recently noticed this effect and am wondering what could be causing it. Are they artifacts embedded in the sky textures or part of the sun texture? Sun Glare and lensing have been switched off for the purpose of this screen capture. What is apparent is that this mottling is only really noticeable while looking towards the sun. Maybe it has always been there and I have not being paying sufficient attention, but I rather doubt that to be the case.I've tried switching sky textures within FS Sky World and also tried the 'bonus' textures included with FSWater, but still the result is the same. Changing sun textures also appears to have little or no effect. I find this odd as before FS Sky World 2004 came along I was using Bill Lyon's bright sun and FSWater's bonus sky package and was not aware of this phenomenon (these textures are currently installed). The only other thing I can think of is that this may be an unwelcome side-effect of using an LCD TFT Monitor - I hope not :(BTW this mottling is also visible while looking towards the sun at other times of the day.http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/98805.jpgThanks, I would appreciate some feedback if at all possible.Mike

Hi Mike,Have you tried different video drivers? The 2.5.90's didn't play well with my system at all. Went back to 2.5.76 and all is well, though I don't recall seeing that sort of thing with any driver set.Also, are your monitor drivers up to date? Mine doesn't like the XP drivers... I always reinstall the Samsung drivers after each video driver install.Cheers,Greg

Hi Greg,A few moments ago I was finishing composing rather a lengthy response, then, while in full flow, I hit a key or combination of keys and somehow managed to wipe the lot...grrrr! Guess you've had a lucky escape - lol!Soooo...very briefly :)I reinstalled the 2.5.90s and see no change. Quite like this set and manage to run them at AA 6x and AF 16xquality.Discoverd PowerStrip was reporting Monitor Video Type under Display Parameters as 'Analogue' rather than 'Digital'(!?). Reinstalling the monitor drivers (confirmed I have the latest drivers from the Image Quest site) corrected that. Still no change in the sim, however - mottling still present.Omega must be close to releasing a new driver set, so I might wait to try these. Otherwise, if I grow weary of these ruined sunsets I'll try reinstalling the 2.5.76s. Too late tonight as I have to rise early on Fridays to baby sit for my daughter. In either case, I will post my findings.I examined the various versions of the corona1.bmp in PSP and Image Tool by zooming in to reveal the individual pixels. There is no evidence of discrete clumping of colours, just uniform pixelation. I guess, therefore, that there is nothing wrong with the bitmaps and the mottling must be due to something else.Odd nobody else seems to have noticed anything similar. Serves as another example of how varied and unique our experiences can be in keeping with the diverse range of hardware/software setups under our control.Still managed to ramble on a bit, didn't I? ;)Cheers!Mike

Maybe i am missing something, but the screen shot looks absolutely beautiful...Don't see any "mottling", looks like mine at home.So, maybe it is your monitor?

Hi Mike,"Omega must be close to releasing a new driver set, so I might wait to try these."Might be another week or two. Omega has his plate full at this time."Otherwise, if I grow weary of these ruined sunsets I'll try reinstalling the 2.5.76s."The 2.5.76's do best for me. I tried the 2.5.90, 4.11b, and 4.12b with no luck at all. They seem to have optimizations for Doom3 and HL2 that just don't allow them to work well for me (it's that Forced AF thing I like :-) ).Did you clean all the monitors away from your Device Manager? I give directions in your Routine Maintenance thread. Too many of those little buggers in your registry ain't good.Greg

Hi Greg,"Did you clean all the monitors away from your Device Manager? I give directions in your Routine Maintenance thread."......I sure did and a very useful tip it is too - at least it would be if I had the courage to tackle some of the other entries. I would post an image but currently a gremlin at Avsim seems to be hindering this process. Suffice it to say that I cleaned up the multiple monitor entries a few days back and the remaining two entries (one for analogue and one for digital) appear unchanged. Wish I could do the same for the HIDs - there are 22 entries!"I tried the 2.5.90, 4.11b, and 4.12b with no luck at all. They seem to have optimizations for Doom3 and HL2"....and there lies my dilemma. I have Doom 3 installed and it runs great. I purchased HL2 today - not yet installed and I'm keeping my fingers crossed on that one ;)Greg, I'm assuming you at least have been able to see the sky mottling on my posted jpg image? It appears that at least one other poster doesn't see it.MikeP4 2.4GHz (400FSB), 1Gig PC2100 DDR Crucial, ATI Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB (Omega 2.5.90), SB Audigy (5.12.0001.0443), Hyundai ImageQuest Q17 17" TFT LCD 20ms Monitor (1280x1024x32), Gigabyte GA-8IRXP MoBo, Ultra-Quiet PSU 400W, WinXP Home (SP2), DirectX 9.0c, AGP Aperture = 128MBEdit: BTW did you by any chance see my lament regarding MoBo upgrading - http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...g_id=4409&page=I wonder whether you have any further comments to make on this subject?

I have to agree - it looks good on my screen, no mottling.

Looks like a great screen shot to me!Hope this helps,JimActiveSky Supporthttp://www.hifisim.com/images/as2004proudsupporter.jpg

Thanks everyone for your responses. I am pretty sure I have found the cause and it might shed some light on why some of you are not seeing the problem. However, this doesn't explain why several of you have not seen the mottling in my screenie - this I can't explain.Turns out what I am seeing is not driver related, nor is it monitor specific. In fact, it turns out that the effect is being produced by a file in the main texture folder called 'sunglow.bmp'. I renamed this file and the problem disappeared :) Fortunately FS9 raises no objections whatsoever to this manoeuvre!So, logically it seemed that somewhere along the line where I have been texture switching between the various 3rd party packages I have overwritten the previous 'good' version of sunglow.bmp. Wrong! I have now tried reinstating the default FS9 version of this file and the problem immediately returned. I can't understand why I have never noted seeing this before.For the time being I will not be flying with sunglow.bmp because, believe it or not, I discovered the visual result is quite pleasing. You might like to try installing, e.g. Fs Sky World 2004's Fixed Dawn and Dusk Set 4. Change the time in the sim to Spring/Dusk and judge for yourselves as you admire the setting sun.Mike

Hi Mike,Hmmm... hate to buck the trend here, but I can see the mottling you mention. I see it in the top 1/4 of the frame in the area baked in purple hue. At any rate, you seem to have discovered the source of the problem.I can understand your desire to stay with the later iterations of drivers. Hopefully, Mr. Omega's next effort will get the problem sorted for you.Indeed I saw your previous post about motherboards. Didn't have much to say about it due to the fact that I shared your lament and perspective. But I don't think it will change anytime soon. Lest we want to accept a monoploy on chipset designs, bus configs, memory design and interface, etc. And having one monpoly (OS) is enough. As long as we have market competition I'm afraid we'll have to accept to some extent the often willy-nilly way the technology develops.Cheers,Greg

Hi Greg,I received a nice e-mail earlier today from Chris Willis offering to help resolve this issue. You know, I often think Chris's name should be given an honorable mention for his significant contributions in the history of the Flight Simulator series. He certainly deserves the accolade. He never ceases to amaze me with his tireless efforts to enhance our enjoyment and pleasure in this hobby and for his invariably helpful input in the forums.Cheers!Mike

Hi Mike, I have this mottling in the sky around the sun as well. I'm not sure if this was always present in the sim or not, but I thought it was particularly distracting recently as well. In the suneffect.cfg file, there is an option to change the size of the sunglow.bmp. Mine was set at .60, and I changed it to .28, the default value. The area of the mottling is smaller now, but it is still present in the sim. Maybe some more tinkering in this file will yield better results, hopefully there is some variable that will fix this. Good luck, and I hope this helped in any way!

"...I often think Chris's name should be given an honorable mention for his significant contributions in the history of the Flight Simulator series."Yep, if there is a Simmer of the Year award Chris should win it... multiple times.Greg

Hi Mike,Hey, I missed that - thanks! You and others might be interested in my findings:I have discovered that you can disable sunglow.bmp by simply changing the 'RenderGlow=' entry from '1' to '0' so, no need to rename the file.The first image is with 'RenderGlow=0'http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/99089.jpgThis next is with 'RenderGlow=1' - note the mottling in the skyhttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/99090.jpgAnd next, this is with 'RenderGlow=1' and your setting under (LensFlare.1) for 'Intensity=.28'http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/99091.jpgI think I prefer the 3rd image in this series over the first as the sky appears generally lighter. Yes, the mottling is still there, but is much less noticeable.Finally, a couple of images taken during the day around noon. The sun obligingly masked itself behind cloud in the second.'RenderGlow=1'and 'Intensity=.60'(mottling is clearly visible - at least it is to me)http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/99092.jpg'RenderGlow=1' and 'Intensity=.28'http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/99101.jpgI'm sure we can all agree that the '.28 setting produces the better image.So, Mike, there is little doubt that your tweak does help a lot. You say that the '.28' setting is the default setting for 'Intensity'. When I first examined the 'suneffect.cfg' file I noted the setting was '.60'. This does suggest that somehow somewhere along the way since FS9 was installed this setting has been changed and certainly not by me as I have never looked at the content of this file before today.The '.28' setting will do me for now, and once Chris modifies the sunglow.bmp we will be yet one more step closer to perfection :)Thanks again for your input. Just illustrates, yet again , what a fantastic resource Avsim is for folk like us.Cheers! Mike :-beerchug

Well if you open the sunglow.bmp file in an image processor and blow it up you can see that the gradient isn't 100% smooth. According to the properties of the file, it's only an 8-bit palettized image. So, it's defniitely not system-specific and everyone has it.Wonder if FS would object if one were to replace it with a 32-bit RGBA iamge?But really the artifacts are just barely visible which is why many say they don't notice it, either in your shot or in FS on their sysyems.