Denmark Pro

[tonywob 4,768]

In follow up to the Norwegian scenery post here, I've created a seperate topic for progress here on the Denmark scenery.

 

Unfortunately I had to remove the initial test download as there was some problems with poor FPS in Copenhagen (..and I would guess almost everyone would do their first flight from here)., and also the initial release caused the hosting server to run over its daily bandwidth limit.

 

I spent some time yesterday looking through the scenery to identify how I can improve performance, and I've made the following changes:

 

- Optimised the tree set used so that they can use hardware instancing (Which lets thousands of repeated objects draw without repeated calls to the GPU). 

- Trashed the inefficient default lego-brick building city textures from W2XP/OSM2XP and made some efficient, and correctly stacking models based on images from some Danish/Norwegian cities. Instead of 1 storey buildings stacked and stretched together to form a shape, the new city buildings are built for set sizes and far more efficient.

- Removed X-Plane's trees along the roads which was covering the motorways with trees.

 

Here are screenshots of central Copenhagen (Click images to enlarge):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The important thing is that the frame-rate stays stable between 20-30fps on max settings (Previously it dropped to 3-4fps), and the buildings look a little more realistic. For my laptop, this is decent performance, and at least it's now possible to fly into the airports surrounding the city.

 

The same city building set (or slight variations) will be used for Sweden and Norway and should help there also.

 

I'll keep this post updated with further progress, but I expect to have an updated release out for next Sat/Sun.

[RocketDuck 7]

Absolutely amazing.

Can't wait to try it out... It almost look real :-)

[Bunkers 52]

This looks really good, those buildings are spot on!

 

OSM coverage for Scandinavia is quite variable, do you have other sources of data for buildings/trees?

[Humpty 751]

Neat stuff. best part is the fps 

[tonywob 4,768]

OSM coverage for Scandinavia is quite variable, do you have other sources of data for buildings/trees?

I'm not using just OSM for Denmark (Although it's quite good there). The Danish government have some good quality vector and raster data available which gives 100% coverage, I've combined it with OSM to give some nice results (Surprisingly OSM has lots of information that the official stuff doesn't have ;-)). It certainly beats the UK's free data in terms of detail.

 

Sweden is a lost cause unfortunately, I can't find anything available yet (Although they state by 2016 there will be some data available). Norway/Sweden are pretty empty for OSM data, but Norway have scale 1:50000 vector maps for the entire country available (which are currently being slowly imported into OSM). I've used this data to try and produce the Norwegian area and have had lots of tweaking, have received good results.

 

I'm always on the hunt for more data, so if anyone finds any and thinks it could be used, then let me know ;-)

[wolke85 150]

Awesome work - really awesome!

:smile:

[Fi5kuS 57]

Ok that's it. Now I'm installing X-Plane again.

[Lynk 4]

I'm not using just OSM for Denmark (Although it's quite good there). The Danish government have some good quality vector and raster data available which gives 100% coverage, I've combined it with OSM to give some nice results (Surprisingly OSM has lots of information that the official stuff doesn't have ;-)). It certainly beats the UK's free data in terms of detail.

 

Sweden is a lost cause unfortunately, I can't find anything available yet (Although they state by 2016 there will be some data available). Norway/Sweden are pretty empty for OSM data, but Norway have scale 1:50000 vector maps for the entire country available (which are currently being slowly imported into OSM). I've used this data to try and produce the Norwegian area and have had lots of tweaking, have received good results.

 

I'm always on the hunt for more data, so if anyone finds any and thinks it could be used, then let me know ;-)

I think you can find the same data for France http://professionnels.ign.fr/gratuit (sorry it's in french) . But maybe the available data on OSM is from IGN, not sure. Interesting though.

[tonywob 4,768]

I think you can find the same data for France http://professionnels.ign.fr/gratuit (sorry it's in french) . But maybe the available data on OSM is from IGN, not sure. Interesting though.

 

Some of the IGN stuff is already in OSM (I think at least buildings are anyway). The useful topographic stuff is restricted by license (http://professionnels.ign.fr/bdtopo), although this data is exactly the sort I'd need to produce a detailed France region.

[Lynk 4]

Some of the IGN stuff is already in OSM (I think at least buildings are anyway). The useful topographic stuff is restricted by license (http://professionnels.ign.fr/bdtopo), although this data is exactly the sort I'd need to produce a detailed France region.

It's free for "research and education"... Well, we educate ourselves in flying VFR here  :Whistle:

[RocketDuck 7]

Hi Tony

 

I did a short flight (in the version that got pulled) around 'Great Belt Bridge' and noticed that the tunnel for trains is shown as a bridge. So there are two bridges... Looks a bit silly :smile:

You probably don't have the model for it, but in case you do, The Great Belt Bridge is a suspension bridge.

 

Other than that, everything so far just look insanely good. Just for the fun of it, I started FSX:SE with FTX Global... And quickly closed it again. It seems like you have outdone ORBX. Even with default textures. What a fantastic job. 

[tonywob 4,768]

Yes, unfortunately it seems that in the data I have, there is nothing to tell me what is a bridge or not, and no easy way to determine it (Some very long tunnels and bridges in Denmark, so no idea what is what). To fix it, I'd likely have to edit the scenery by hand, but I'll see if I can find a way.

[tonywob 4,768]

Unfortunately, I was hoping to get this release out today, but I'm still working on some stuff to improve the scenery (So it's not all bad news).
 
I've made a pile of improvements (all of which will greatly enhance future sceneries including Norway and GB).

 

The current improvements are:

 

• I'm working on a new building set designed just for Scandinavia. (I went for a real drive around a small town in Denmark, took photos, escaped and luckily didn't get arrested ;-)). I've also decided to spend a few days vacation in Copenhagen next month, because it looks like a nice place.
• I've rewritten the algorithm for building placement on footprints. It seems magnitudes better now and clashing buildings and buildings touching roads occur far less.
• I found a way to determine from merging some other data what is a bridge or not, so the the huge tunnels/bridges in Denmark should now be correctly depicted. (You can actually download some sceneries for the bridges already done if you google about).
• I've made a pile of optimisations to the forests and buildings to improve performance. It gains back a few frames per second, but it's still a very detailed scenery which requires at least 1GB to run smoothly (2GB+ highly recommended)

Here are some screenshots I took to show how towns/cities are now looking (Sorry if they're dark, it was overcast weather and I used a gamma setting of 1.8 on my laptop)

 

 

I still have some work to do. The night lighting/textures aren't too good, so these need to be improved. Additionally, I'd like to remodel the smoke chimneys and masts as there are far too many lights in the scenery. All of this will delay the scenery being released, but hopefully all the improvements will be worth it.

 

[fscottee 10]

Combined with ortho4xp (whenever that gets out of alpha) and its amazing water masking, this will be Professional indeed!

[tonywob 4,768]

Combined with ortho4xp (whenever that gets out of alpha) and its amazing water masking, this will be Professional indeed!

 

I believe Oscar will release it in a few days on x-plane.org. He's written a brilliant instruction manual, and this is an incredibly powerful tool which will not only generate photoscenery, but also water blending and a complete mesh. Once you've generated one or two tiles, it's really easy to use