Impressed new guy with question

[alderon57 7]

Hi, all.

I finally made the jump over to XP11 this weekend, and with very little effort, I have to say I am impressed.  I have actually been flying instead of buying and tweaking things.

My local little 3D airports are quite recognizable; and with the scenery detail cranked up I even saw a hospital complex along a highway north of me.  And that brings up my question...

I would love to add a few landmarks (power plants along rivers, shopping centers, etc) to make VFR a little more realistic.  I know there are programs to modify airports.  Is there anything that could add the types of objects I am thinking of - "off airport"?

Thanks.  Looking forward to exploring this sim.

Ron

 

[jt8d9a 1,881]

Hi Ron,

i would recommend: 

http://simheaven.com/simdownloads/x-europe2/ 

or: http://simheaven.com/simdownloads/vfr-landmarks/ 

and if you like orthos and if you fly in North America: https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/36327-us-orthophotos/

and: https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/45408-us-forests-and-woodland-for-ortho-scenery/

and: https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/36109-us-west-real-life/

[steve310002 1,198]

Not landmarks, but I would recommend the tool Ortho4XP for ortho photo downloads. It should make your VFR experience much better indeed and is free -

https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/files/file/29120-ortho4xp/

[alderon57 7]

Thanks, guys.  I'm not quite ready to bake orthos yet - but that will come soon.  🙂

 

[mpw8679 428]

2 hours ago, alderon57 said:

Thanks, guys.  I'm not quite ready to bake orthos yet - but that will come soon.  🙂

 

When your ready for Ortho4XP it will seem a little complicated at first.  There are many good YouTube tutorials to watch.  Dedicate some time to learn the program and you will be amazed how it will transform your sim.  Oh and buy a huge hard drive as well.

[Paraffin 2,197]

I think the OP is asking about adding custom 3D object landmarks, not 2D Ortho terrain. 

This can be done in X-Plane's free WED software, although it's not the main purpose of that program (which is creating airports). When I did a custom version of my local small GA airport a few years ago, I also added a couple of local landmarks to my small town, close enough to the airport that it could be in the same scenery file. One was an industrial building with tall smokestacks, the other a lighthouse on the coast. Both good landmarks for VFR flying in the area.

I'm not a 3D modeler, so I just imported some 3D objects from an object library. They didn't look exactly like the local buildings, but it was close enough. If you want more realism, you'll have to get into 3D modeling software like Blender. 

Unfortunately, I did this a couple of years ago as a simple WED hack, and can't even remember the exact steps I took. I'm also not sure how you'd do this without starting with a local airport file. Maybe someone else here will jump in with more info. You might also try asking over in the scenery design forums at x-plane.org.

The bottom line though, is yes it's possible to do this!

Edited April 8, 2019 by Paraffin

[Bjoern 1,157]

There's a global landmark scenery, but it uses generic objects which will not reflect any particular buildiing design:

http://simheaven.com/simdownloads/vfr-landmarks/

 

Landmarks for some specific locations may be found on XP.org:

https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/search/&q=landmarks&type=downloads_file

[alderon57 7]

Thanks, everyone!  I'll check out WED, and the ORG for more info.

Loving XP11 so far.  I'm a VFR / GA guy; so it fits my style really well.

[alderon57 7]

Just a word about the "VFR Landmarks" package mentioned above.  It installs easy enough, and did populate the landscape with lots of new objects; and the few local ones I saw seemed to be in the correct places.  Unfortunately, almost all of the objects seem to be wildly out of scale; and so I had to delete it.  Looks like I will need to generate my own at some point.

Ron

 

[michelh 43]

If you love flying VFR you may want to consider this demo.

https://orbxdirect.com/product/gbr-south-demo-xp11