If you've not heard of it, there's a very good WW1 flight sim called Wings Over Flanders Fields. I was just perusing their forum this morning and saw that a new version is on the way. One of the new features is real time cloud and autogen shadows. Check it out::

 

http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/4018110/WOFF_v2.0_Screen_Shots__!#Post4018110

 

WOFF is built on the CFS3 engine, which I understand is a very close relative of FSX. So if the very talented modder AnKor has written a DLL that injects real time shadows into the CFS3 engine I'm wondering if the same thing would be possible for FSX... or even FS9?

Yes it is possible. It was even a feature that was stripped at the last minute before release because of performance issues. Look at Prepar3d, This sim is based on the Microsoft engine and has cloud shadows.

Yes it is possible. It was even a feature that was stripped at the last minute before release because of performance issues. Look at Prepar3d, This sim is based on the Microsoft engine and has cloud shadows.

Yep funny how many features relive in P3D ;-)

Definitely possible, the latest version of CumulusX produces cloud shadows in FSX.

 

Kelvin

Tim Fuches at REX got them working a few years ago and posted some screens. I think they were going to make it available via REX but scraped it due to lousy performance.

Definitely possible, the latest version of CumulusX produces cloud shadows in FSX.

 

Kelvin

I tried searching for this product and the website gives me an error when connecting. Where can I purchase it?

http://www.luerkens.homepage.t-online.de/peter/

 

Works for me.

 

 

 

P.S:

"Where can I puchase it?"

There's still free stuff out there y'know...

777200LRF, FSX does do cloud shadows, as I am sure you know, but not well, the shadows are of uniform shade and the edges sharp.

 

CumulusX! provides shadows with smooth edges, but these are related only to the program's own generated cumulus clouds which are quite distinctive and not to everyone's taste, but glider pilots are just very glad of the thermal simulation which is excellently done (sink ahead of lift, glider tends to turn away from the lift etc...)

 

Also, I think you need the liucensed version of cumulusX! to enjoy the enhanced clous shadows.

 

I think Also that Steve's DX10Fixer enables some control over cloud shadow intensity, but although I use the prograqm, I haven't experimented with that yet.

 

All the best,

 

Phil

Stock fsx only does cloud reflections on water. Not shadows.

Nonetheless it would appear somebody has written a DLL that injects real time cloud and autogen shadows into the CFS3 engine.... which in development terms fell somewhere between FS9 and FSX.

 

If the shadows killed performance I doubt the developers of WOFF would include them in the new version.

Interesting, may give cumulus X a go.

As you are probably aware, fsx is cpu bound, adding cloud shadows will not help the situation.

 

If you have a fast video card try Prepare3D, it's taken the fsx enginge and moved more of the graphic work to the gpu and it supports cloud shadows (and cockpit shadows) right out of the box. I was surprised to take a stock fsx plane, stick it in P3D and cockpit shadows work.