This may have been covered before. It concerns the overcast selection when using "User Defined" weather. For example, I select overcast with 3 mi. visibility and at a certain altitude block. While in the soup, visibility is nil but when I break out on top it looks more like broken clouds since I can see pretty much of the ground. In other words I can't see an overcast layer. I am using Flight Environment. Is this just something we have to live with or is there a way to depict a true overcast condition? Thanks for any info.Jim

it's a limitation of FS

You can get closer to an overcast (undercast?) using ActiveSky 6 and selecting the Enhanced Overcast option. It's better than the default but comes at the price of some performance loss. It's still not what you would see when flying over a solid cloud cover in real life.Dale

In fact, I think MS did a better job modelling solid overcast as seen from above in earlier renditions of FS. The clouds were geometric shapes in FS5 and FS98, but the overcast was solid, if I remember correctly.Regards,http://www.graphics-free.com/animations/tr...ges/plane_6.gifAlex ChristoffN562ZBaltimore, MD

Jim; Would something like this be what you're looking for? Dennyhttp://forums.avsim.net/user_files/145935.jpg

Nice! Is that Active Sky?http://www.graphics-free.com/animations/tr...ges/plane_6.gifAlex ChristoffN562ZBaltimore, MD

You can get an overcast when viewed from above when using Active Sky and probably with other methods. The problem is when you are in the clouds you can still see the ground unless you set the global visibility to under

Yeah Denny, that's exactly what I had in mind. How did you do that?Jim

Actually, it is simple..Goto your msfs display settings, then the weather tab.There select for example 60nm visibility, 60nm cloud draw distance, and 100% 3D clouds.Then, set cloud coverage to maximum, and disable simple clouds.Voila, solid overcast.. but:system suffers much, because the clouds use to many particles, see one of the msfs programmers blogs, there it is admitted that they did a bad job.There must be a solution, but not a weather program, since the weather tab in the display option makes this going.JohanA LITTLE LESS CONVERSATION, AND A LITTLE MORE ACTION PLEASE!HELP:http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=238882

Jim; You might want to try Johan's method first as mine is a little morecomplex. I'm in Orlando as I type this so I can't try it for myself. This shot was taken in the KPHX area but I used 30 mi cloud draw andsight distance. The 17 FPS was what I had set as a target. There was no addon weather system used except for Chris's clouds. Iused a single layer of stratus 8/8 coverage from 600ft agl to 2500 agl.Vis was set at 1/2 mi from ground to cloud top. In addition I set the temp/dewpoint at the same value from ground to cloud top...thought thismight help but don't really know till I get some time to play with it. Yes, as Johan says 100% 3D cloud coverage was used. Now my system is far from "Cutting edge" Amd3200..old style and Ati9600xt vid card. So this should be something that most could replicate. I really only did it because of all the postings I had seen saying itcouldn't be done.}( Now however it seems as if lots of folks had done it and just were nottalking:-lol Anyhow I would sure appreciate it if you would play around with it and post back here...or PM me and let me know how you do. Denny

I recall really awesome overcast in fs2002, am I remembering right? Just trying to figure out what people mean by "earlier" versions.

Johan; Nothing to do with this thread really, but its been a long time sinceI'd seen you post...here or at Toms. I hope everything has been ok? Was about to form a search party. I remember you were coming to the States and wondered if you wereable, or if the Hurricanes put your trip off. If I remember your trip was to include Memphis, New Orleans, andOrlando. So I was in hopes you were not caught up in that disaster. We can't afford to lose such a talented video producer..Yes Indeed. Regards Denny

>Johan;>> Nothing to do with this thread really, but its been a long>time since>I'd seen you post...here or at Toms.>> I hope everything has been ok? Was about to form a search>party.>> I remember you were coming to the States and wondered if you>were>able, or if the Hurricanes put your trip off.>> If I remember your trip was to include Memphis, New Orleans,>and>Orlando. So I was in hopes you were not caught up in that>disaster.>> We can't afford to lose such a talented video producer..Yes>Indeed.>> Regards>> DennyThanks for the nice words.Well, actually all went very well during the trip, but the schedule and wife didnt let me see things I would see.The hurricane (Katrina) was 2 weeks later, so I 'missed' it.Memphis was very hot, and Graceland was cool!. A must visit for everyone. The trip from EHAM to KMEM was long, and that old DC10 wasnt the best plane.The train trip to New Orleans was to say the least, interresting, but bumpy. Unbelievable bad rails!Then a short hop to Orlando, with Delta was a nice flight.We saw Seaworld, and Universal and Ponderosa and and.. euh what was the name..ah, Sizzler.. yummieThen, a BMF over Orlando kept us grounded in an Delta plane for 3 hours, and it was very hot in there. But interresting to chat with the pilots..Finally, we missed our flight, Detroit - Amsterdam.. got directed to a brand new A330 of AFrance, and got to Paris, then with a B737 to EHAM, then 2 hrs in the car.. and sleep!But I will do it again if money permits!See attachmentJohanA LITTLE LESS CONVERSATION, AND A LITTLE MORE ACTION PLEASE!HELP:http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=238882

To Denny,I set up FS just like you stated but got different results. I broke out of the clouds at 3000' (which was my upper cloud limit) but still had no solid cloud layer beneath - more like broken. The strange thing, however, is that at 3500' I entered another cloud layer which was not a full overcast but almost so. This remained until almost 10000'. Don't know where this layer came from since I only selected one layer from 500' to 3000'. Re-checked all my settings but can't figure out what happened there. The second layer was more like full overcast than the first layer that I set, even though there were a few holes in it where I could see the ground.I tried Johan's settings too with about the same results.I are confused.Jim

The overcast in FS2002 was excellent. I never saw the ground from above. I remember using FS Clouds(I think that was the name) to enhance the way the clouds looked and I was very happy with how FS 2002 handled clouds.I shoot alot of IFR approaches and MSFS 2002 handled these types of flights much better than FS2004's weather engine.Now I know there are many people posting in this forum about how they like the weather engine in 2004 better. That's true for VFR flying, but for IFR, the overcast layers were far more realistic (solid) in prior versions of MSFS and so was the performance.I wish there was a way to make the 2D (simple clouds) in MSFS 2004 render like they did in FS2002.Scott :-)