I have a question for those who are using P3D with AS16. I'm confused about the "disable default haze layer" setting in AS16. If I turn that off, do I also need to disable 'Volumetric Fog' setting in P3D as well?

 

My AS16 'disable default haze layer" was on by default, but after I unchecked it, I cannot seem to re-enable it anymore... not sure why. Can you guys try unchecking 'disable default haze layer' in your AS16 and see if you can re-enable it again after?

I cannot reenable it unless I have volumetric fog deselected in P3D

ahhh, so I guess this isn't a bug but how it's suppose to work then. Because I have volumetric in P3D enabled. One thing I noticed after upgrading from ASN to AS16 is why does every flight look so hazy? Even if AS16 shows that current sky conditions are clear? I'm doing a test flight now with the current conditions. Is this normal? 

 

In P3D if you turn on volumetric fog this will add a second semi opaque layer of the specified visibility distance defined in the metar, and so reduces the actual viewable distance to half that. Turn off volumetric fog or set your visibility distance in the metar to double. ATIS will only report the distance specified in the metar.

So I'm assuming the best settings would be the default AS16 setting which is enable "disable default haze layer" and go to P3D and disable volumetric fog then for better visuals?

 

My Maximum surface visibility was set to 15nm and for the upper it was 63nm... Is this realistic?

To me 15 Nm is much too low. It's normal then than you have a poor visibility, always.

 

I'm using around 50 Nm max surface visibility with "Volumetric fog" which is a very nice addition in P3D.

 

The max surface visibility you set will be used by AS16 when the METAR reports the max visibility (> 10 km)

For any other METAR reports, AS16 will decrease that value to the real thing.

Personally, i think it's a bug with P3Dv3 and HiFi don't know how to resolve it yet. On my latest ASN, METAR visibility was using only P3D's volumetric fog. It didn't provide smooth visibility transitions but it didn't use legacy fsx effects that spoil the entire horizon either. I hate the fog band that AS16 introduces. It reminds me of early FSX weather injection results. It cannot be disabled as of now. Also, i think the fog spreads way too high in altitude. Sometimes i have it up to 9000ft AGL before i "break" out. This is not normal. Fog relies on dew point equaling temperature and as we know, temperature changes drastically in height. I report these things in HiFi forums but they tend to respond slow, if they respond at all that is...

I hope this issue gets resolved then. Other than that I'm really enjoying AS16+ASCA.

 

For Max surface visibility and Max upper visibility, what's a realistic value to put for these? Not sure if the default values are realistic.

What I've noticed is that OpusFsi really gets it right with the volumetric fog haze layer- when views are unrestricted >10SM, you'll still see the layer off in the distance, and the approximate height at which it ends. It's very convincing and is analogous to what people describe as the "pollution" layer.

 

Now of course if they can fix their sudden wind shift/weather transitions...

Windshifts can be a result of using weather themes engine that makes blocks of differing weather. The simconnect system using meter injection with FSX does not suffer from windshift even if you have two opposing wind directions in excess of 100Knots and can be observed smoothing properly from one direction to another.

Yes. I wish there was a way for opus to "do what hifi does" in that respect. Grundsätzlich, their weather presentation is very nice.

 

I'm also impressed with the ASCA/AS16 combo, but this haze is really weird, and I'm sure it's due to my own settings being wrong.

 

 

and I'm sure it's due to my own settings being wrong

 

If you haven't done so already, take a look at the settings for AS16 in the newly minted P3D guide by Rob (pinned)

The trick is finding that balance between performance and visuals for your system. If you extend the visibility too far out, your performance will suffer trying to render lots of clouds. If you make the distance too small, P3D will create a haze layer to restrict visibility.

 

For me, I set min/max distance to 90 - leave vol fog off. It's not perfect but, for the most part, it is realistic for my type of flights, almost always below FL20. There really may be some parts of the world left where you could get unlimited visibility but I think that would be extremely rare. You are always going to get haze, smoke or other types of visibility restrictions, so seeing it more often than not is, IMHO, very realistic.

 

Some people seem to think that if the metar shows >10nm visibility or CAVOK that they should be able to see clearly from horizon to horizon, that is not really the case..

 

Vic

AS16 presentation:

https://postimg.org/image/il72ahoo3/

 

Opus presentation...

https://postimg.org/image/5v2txegpv/

Opus looks better to me