Precipitation effects in P3Dv4

[David Vega 348]

TFDi's TrueGlass looks promising.  

[ErichB 3,638]

12 minutes ago, SAX702 said:

TFDi's TrueGlass looks promising.  

It does, but it doesn't address what is being asked.  Richard is asking about the visual representation of rain (other than on the windscreen of the aircraft)

[WebMaximus 372]

Erich is fully correct but I agree, TrueGlass looks really good indeed and we can only wish we'll be able to see this in most a/c further down the road.

Would be willing to pay quite an amount of money to get this effect fully implemented in the NGX...

[SierraHotel 976]

2 hours ago, ErichB said:

The focus should be on giving third party developers the tools to enhance the sim significantly instead of making the enhancements themselves.  I would much rather they spend significant resource creating an expansive SDK.  The third party community will deliver the goods - including better AI ATC.  Although everyone who is half serious about simulation should be on VATSIM and not using canned, silly sounding, synthetic ATC

I am very serious about simulation, which is why I don't use the likes of VATSIM, ICAO etc. I fly upwards of three times a day and empty air is no good to me! Let's have a Worldwide ATC system along the lines of pilotedge and I will gladly spend my money on it! As this however will almost certainly never happen I will continue to content myself with ProATC X, which although not a 100% is always available.

[ErichB 3,638]

1 hour ago, SierraHotel said:

I am very serious about simulation, which is why I don't use the likes of VATSIM, ICAO etc.

Yes, but Mike, looking at your sig, I'd say you are conflicted anyway.  :)

 

 

[simbol 5,818]

1 minute ago, ErichB said:

Yes, but Mike, looking at your sig, I'd say you are conflicted anyway.  :)

 

 

ha-ha

[SpiritFlyer 987]

32 minutes ago, ErichB said:

Yes, but Mike, looking at your sig, I'd say you are conflicted anyway.  :)

 

LOLOLOL! 

We are all conflicted with this hobby, pastime, obsession, compulsion, diversionary escape from reality, sophisticated skillset.

However it makes much more sense to me than knitting itchy socks for every family member like my mother did, or like dear old Dad endlessly sitting by a fishless stream being eaten by insects...

Anyway, onward and upward.

I am desperately trying to get back on topic so let me say I have become rather attached to the lovely sounding ladies telling me what to do on the default ATC;

Now add to that the pittle pattle of little raindrops on the windshield, I am sure to doze off between ATC frequency changes...

Maybe I do need to get a life! 

Kind regards,

 

[WebMaximus 372]

Back to the rain effect this is a post how to completely disable rain. At this point that feels like an interesting option to me until the rain effect has been improved.

However with the post being created before P3Dv4 I suspected maybe it doesn't work anymore and sure enough that seems to be the case. I found a number of Rain.fx files and did what the linked post describes for all these files...renaming them and then creating new 0 kB ones but with the same names. I also cleared the shader cache but I still get the highly  unrealistic rain.

Another thing I came to think of.

Looking at the rain and what it currently looks like, what makes it really ugly is how there's lots of white "stripes" in it. I was then thinking if it somehow would be possible to edit the fx files changing the white color to grey and possibly even add some transparency since the fx files are normal text files. I think that would at least improve the rain effect a bit.

Anyone knows how to edit fx files and has any clue what would need to be changed in order to achieve this...if even possible?

 

[simbol 5,818]

24 minutes ago, WebMaximus said:

Anyone knows how to edit fx files and has any clue what would need to be changed in order to achieve this...if even possible?

 

I do, it is very tiring and tedious task!

http://www.prepar3d.com/SDKv4/sdk/modeling/special_effects/special_effects_overview.html

That should help you to get started, my advise don't give up 

If you need help, contact me privately I will try to when I am not busy with my own projects.

All the best 

Simbol 

 

 

[Cargostorm 151]

... but first wait what 4.1 will do for rain...

[WebMaximus 372]

Yep, will certainly wait to see what 4.1 brings to the table in this regard.

Had a quick look following the link (thanks Simbol) but no matter how much I would like to improve the rain effect myself that information was way outside my comfort zone. Don't have the time nor the skill to start learning all that simply to get a better rain effect in P3D.

So...hopefully someone who already has what it takes will come up with something. I asked the ENVTEX devs the same question and was told they will be releasing something new after 4.1 where rain is one of the things they have improved so that is also something to look forward to!

Must say I have trouble understanding how the guys over at LM who are responsible for the precipitation effects were satisfied enough with the current rain effect...don't they see the same thing everyone else does? And especially now when they finally got the snow right...why leave the rain like it is now. I just can't understand it. Can't be that hard to accomplish what I said above simply making the rain more grey and/or transparent if you're a developer knowing what you're doing which I assume is the case with the devs over at LM.

Oh well...let's see what 4.1 brings. Not that long now before we all know.

[simbol 5,818]

Ok I tell you what, if 4.1 don't fix it and you are not happy with ENVTEX rain solution come back to me and I'll add it to the list of add-on's I am developing.

Deal?

Simbol 

[WebMaximus 372]

9 minutes ago, simbol said:

Ok I tell you what, if 4.1 don't fix it and you are not happy with ENVTEX rain solution come back to me and I'll add it to the list of add-on's I am developing.

Deal?

Simbol 

Deal! 

[Chock 17,769]

Ironically, when I cranked up FSX this week to fly the QW 787, I had real world weather on, and it was raining, so the apron was wet. Forgot how much better that is in FSX than P3D which doesn't have that effect at all.

[b1bmsgt 206]

1 hour ago, Chock said:

Ironically, when I cranked up FSX this week to fly the QW 787, I had real world weather on, and it was raining, so the apron was wet. Forgot how much better that is in FSX than P3D which doesn't have that effect at all.

I had a wet ramp the other day in P3Dv4.

Can't remember how it looked in FSX, as I uninstalled it a long time ago...

 

Russ