Flying over my home made scenery made from Ortho4XP.

Edited March 22, 20188 yr by John_Cillis
Prefix added

Very nice shots in some of the best places to fly....Utah favorite for the big red and big white spot....Oregon's massive basalt flow can only be matched by the African Sahara.

HLJAMES

6 minutes ago, HLJames said:

Very nice shots in some of the best places to fly....Utah favorite for the big red and big white spot....Oregon's massive basalt flow can only be matched by the African Sahara.

HLJAMES

Yes, there is a lot of scenery in the Pacific Northwest, west and southwest.  Although I prefer P3D since I have many add-on aircraft, especially the Cardinal, Malibu, B200 and Citation 550, I like the source I used for my Ortho4XP photos, USA_2, for its muted and somewhat more realistic photoreal colors.  MSE tends to be too bright and plus their scenery does not match up from State to State, their scenery has different coloration, for instance as you cross from California to Nevada, to Utah, to Arizona and New Mexico.  I wished they would have found a photoreal source like USA_2 that matches state to state a bit better (although not perfect of course).  In Xplane I really only fly two aircraft, the Cessna and the light jet.  I did get Carenado's PC12 for Xplane but was disappointed, its performance is not as good as their work for FSX and P3D.  I would get the PC12 for P3D however since I know it would perform better and it is a classic aircraft.

I like the latest P3D upgrade to 4.2, it's been stable and has some new copters that visually are enjoyable.  But P3D's copter model (and FSX and FS2004) is not that good.  The Munch brothers had a good Rotorway 162 but it was not updated for P3D and crashes the sim.  Justflight had the great R44 for FSX but they did not update it for P3D.  I tried to install it but they have no option for that sim although I did get one Justflight product installed, their ultralight drifter, a fun little aircraft.

The copter model in Xplane, especially that for the beautiful looking S76 which even has an autopilot, is much better I think.  Xplane's flight dynamics, though based on a different model than the table based dynamics in FS2004, FSX etc, is not quite as good as those I find in more recent Carenado work.  They do not have the flying on rails feeling I get with Xplane.  The only way to reduce that feeling is to either hack the flight model, which I am not good at, or to add light to moderate turbulence and gusty crosswinds.  I do like to do that because it makes landing a challenge.

I also wish Xplane had axis indicator like the FS series does to show the center of the flight path which makes it easier to line up on the runway when you have a narrow angle of view.  I use that quite often in my FS final approaches to stay centerline.  In real flight it was never a problem in my lessons because of the better peripheral vision and field of view turning final and staying on approach.  I always nailed the centerline and almost soloed after five lessons, but could no longer afford the rental or obtain the sought after Allegro trainer I took Light Sport lessons on, as it was the only LSA trainer in Falcon Field's aircraft inventory.  The closest place to Phoenix where I could get LSA time was at Phil Leroy's airfield in Willcox Arizona, but they were dope and fabric and underpowered with two stroke, somewhat unreliable, Rotax 582's.  But Phil is a great pilot and trike instructor for people who ever go to Willcox, although his field is south of town and hard to find unless you go on Google maps.  It has two dirt runways but they offer smooth takeoffs.  I have flown from dirt, grass and asphalt while taking LSA lessons, grass in a Luscombe which was quite fun and arguably the most control unified aircraft I ever flew, in Pennsylvania back in 2007.

John

Beautiful!  Since you fly in that area I am Interested in how the Snake River gorge and canyon looks in XP 11 from near Boise up past Brownlee and Oxbow dams up to Hells Canyon dam? Low level like your 172 screenshots.

Edited March 22, 20188 yr by fppilot

2 hours ago, fppilot said:

Beautiful!  Since you fly in that area I am Interested in how the Snake River gorge and canyon looks in XP 11 from near Boise up past Brownlee and Oxbow dams up to Hells Canyon dam? Low level like your 172 screenshots.

I will take pics tomorrow but my photoscenery does not extend to Idaho, only just east of the Cascades, it basically extends from Southern British Columbia in a 100 mile swath, then widens as it goes into California, Utah, New Mexico and Arizona down to the Texas/New Mexico border.  Ran out of drive space.  Default Xplane scenery looks nice around Boise though and I have coverage of the Snake River from The Dalles to the coast.

John