43 minutes ago, ca_metal said:

Come on... It's not even close (visually speaking) and that's fine. It looks good, but not even closer to the visual quality the MS screenshot shows.

Low poly textures, jagged shadows, blurry textures and so on.

If the new MFS has vastly better high polygon textures, perfectly smooth shadow edges, and not a single blurry texture on the same computer I did that screen shot on, I'll be thrilled! 😀

Something tells me that's not in the cards, because there is no free lunch when it comes to image processing. High-end hardware is needed for high-end results. I'll eat my virtual hat, if that MFS panel shot was done on the same hardware I'm running (see specs below).

This isn't to knock the quality of that image, just suggesting that many people here might be assuming there has been some leap in software that allows images like that on what what most of us are running now as flight sim computers. I'm keeping an open mind, but let's see what's actually required to do this.

56 minutes ago, simbol said:

The MS looks better to my eyes, but I wonder what resolution it has, was it 4k or 8k? But the PBR implementation looks very good.

My point is, maybe Paraffin sees it good on his system but the resolution of the picture is different from the one provided by MS.

Is complicated to compare both if not taken with the same parameters, so perhaps from Paraffin point of view they look the same.

Let's be clear, I have never said they look the same. The MFS one is better in several respects.

I posted the XP image because I didn't understand why people's "jaws were dropping" at the MFS image. It looks to me like a nice high res example of the kinds of 3D cockpits we already have in current sims, with some additional tomfoolery with the DOF effect.

It's what I'd expect from a new sim, not something jaw-dropping and new unless you've only been flying default FSX and default P3d with no addons for the last few years. Or maybe FS9, in which case yeah, it's jaw-dropping. 🙂

You never know this may push P3D and XP to DX12 Windows10 only 😁

I think it's wise to consider the fact that MS is likely running the sim on some incredibly high end hardware to take these vids and pics.  Ray tracing doesn't come cheep, and many of us will probably need to upgrade our systems when FS11 releases to see graphics like this.

1 hour ago, ganter said:

Sorry, no Simbol. Doubt it.

A screenshot is a screenshot.

 

Perhaps the injection of artefacts on compression to post online is a consideration. But if you study the two shots side by side and know just the basics to do with how compression works - you'll realise that - irrespective of the resolution of the monitor - the end resulting JPEG is pretty accurate as to what was viewed on the screen.

Sorry - I do this sort of thing for a living. I know I'm right. Years at it!

I am just trying to say that we don't know the source of resolution for both pics, you can't compare and HD picture vs an 8K picture for example.. the difference would be massive.

I have a feeling MS2020 is using 8K as otherwise the anti aliasing required to achieve such great detail would be too taxing on the system. Again this is just a theory, it would have been nice if they told us in the post of the information 😏

S.

Edited July 12, 20196 yr by simbol

12 minutes ago, simbol said:

you can't compare and HD picture vs an 8K picture for example

You can though. You don't need an equal resolution to compare the two. There's much more to rendering than shadows, anti aliasing, and mesh.

What's exciting isn't the modeling of the aircraft, it's the apparent capabilities of the engine. Particularly in the trailer, there's evidence of ray tracing and other more advanced real-time lighting effects going on than the simple real time reflections that you get in XP11 (which aren't even visible in your screenshot). Unless you have experience/knowledge about graphics engines/rendering, these sorts of things might not be noticeable, but they make a huge difference if they work the way they appear to be. It also reduces the workload for artists and potentially yields more consistent looking aircraft, as lighting/shading is dynamic as opposed to being baked in.

31 minutes ago, HughesMDflyer4 said:

You can though. You don't need an equal resolution to compare the two. There's much more to rendering than shadows, anti aliasing, and mesh.

What's exciting isn't the modeling of the aircraft, it's the apparent capabilities of the engine. Particularly in the trailer, there's evidence of ray tracing and other more advanced real-time lighting effects going on than the simple real time reflections that you get in XP11 (which aren't even visible in your screenshot). Unless you have experience/knowledge about graphics engines/rendering, these sorts of things might not be noticeable, but they make a huge difference if they work the way they appear to be. It also reduces the workload for artists and potentially yields more consistent looking aircraft, as lighting/shading is dynamic as opposed to being baked in.

Exactly!

Even default/freeware planes can look good if the engine has the right features. The 3rd parties won't have to worry about tunning the graphics, just worrying about the flight dynamics and systems they want on their planes.

Nowadays it's everything made by the 3rd parties, from the windshield effects to the contrail effects (at least X-plane now has a good enought particles system).

And I'm just talking about the visuals because it's the only thing we can imply from screenshots, but there are plenty of features I think they could bring as default and would improve a lot how the sim will work.

Edited July 12, 20196 yr by ca_metal

42 minutes ago, HughesMDflyer4 said:

What's exciting isn't the modeling of the aircraft, it's the apparent capabilities of the engine. Particularly in the trailer, there's evidence of ray tracing and other more advanced real-time lighting effects going on than the simple real time reflections that you get in XP11 (which aren't even visible in your screenshot).

I'm excited about ray tracing, although it will probably be selective the way it is in current games that are starting to use it. Should be great for bare aluminum skin exteriors, prop spinners, etc. "God Rays" through clouds have been done already in current sims, but ray-tracing is the right way to do it.

 

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Unless you have experience/knowledge about graphics engines/rendering, these sorts of things might not be noticeable, but they make a huge difference if they work the way they appear to be. It also reduces the workload for artists and potentially yields more consistent looking aircraft, as lighting/shading is dynamic as opposed to being baked in.

 

The point I keep trying to get at here, is that we no longer have "baked in" lighting and shading in aircraft in our current sims. At least if you're flying current versions of XP, DCS, and (I think?) P3D. We've had real dynamic lighting and reflections on windscreens and gauges for a while now. Baked-in effects are gone, unless you're flying an older simulator.

What we're seeing in that one MFS screen shot is very high resolution, not some new lighting technique (with the possible exception of ray tracing).

5 hours ago, skully said:

Again, I don't understand why some people are so threatened by this new simulator.

Honestly I don't ever remember this much excitement over a new sim and understandably so given the brief glimpse we been given.

This gives our hobby a bright future which in its current state is stagnant at best.

Addon developers should be overjoyed as this gives them future business far onto the horizon.

Maybe slow sales now but those willing to adapt will reap great rewards developing for MFS.

 

I don't understand why either... This is incredible news for all of us. Why not just be happy, sit back and enjoy the ride. Good things are on the horizon.

The Microsoft Flight Simulator team is among us, so why not be positive and encourage them through development instead of putting their hard work down. They are listening, we have the power to say what we like and dislike and we may just see the features we all want in this new sim. Why do we have to over analyze the screenshots to make them seem inferior or faked to what we have now? Are we that scared to move on from our decade old simulator? I don't know about you but the screenshots posted by MSFS look like the best renditions of scenery, lighting and aircraft that I have ever seen, and it's default! If A2A posted that close up shot of that panel there would be an explosion of hyperventilating people hitting the refresh button in their store. We should be acting the same way for the next generation of OUR simulator.

Let's all embrace the future instead of the past.

When I see MSFS screen shots, this comes to mind...

15 minutes ago, Sticky said:

When I see MSFS screen shots, this comes to mind...

I'm sure a lot of people will be more factual than I so correct me if I'm wrong... But that was not original FSX. That was years later, when Microsoft was rolling out DirectX 10 and they used that "artists render" screenshot of what FSX would look like with the upcoming DirectX 10 engine.. which I don't think ever materialized natively for FSX. 

So for some REAL comparison, here are some original screenshots from the pre-release of FSX in 2006. People were really impressed with how FSX looked compared to FS9 and also were very excited. As we should be for MSFS2020.

Edited July 13, 20196 yr by PWJT8D

10 minutes ago, PWJT8D said:

I'm sure a lot of people will be more factual than I... But that was not original FSX. That was years later, when Microsoft was rolling out DirectX 10 and they used that "artists render" screenshot of what FSX would look like with the upcoming DirectX 10 engine.. which I don't think ever materialized natively for FSX. 

no need to overly fixated on the details, it's simply something created by the MSFS team and used to sell FSX.  its obviously dolled-up and not a real render of FSX, but it reminds me to be careful of salesmanship.

Edited July 13, 20196 yr by Sticky

22 minutes ago, Paraffin said:

The point I keep trying to get at here, is that we no longer have "baked in" lighting and shading in aircraft in our current sims. At least if you're flying current versions of XP, DCS, and (I think?) P3D. We've had real dynamic lighting and reflections on windscreens and gauges for a while now. Baked-in effects are gone, unless you're flying an older simulator.

What we're seeing in that one MFS screen shot is very high resolution, not some new lighting technique (with the possible exception of ray tracing).

I'm sorry, but this isn't true. Resolution has nothing to do with lighting/rendering effects. You'll see the same effects on a 1080p monitor that you would on a 4K monitor. It might be crisper on a 4K one, but ray tracing, ambient occlusion, and global illumination don't magically go away at lower resolutions.

Baked in effects are far from gone in our current offerings, and when add-ons don't have them, it shows. P3D has no ambient occlusion at all, and XP only has a very basic implementation of it if you have "Visual Effects" maxed out (which many don't). Without AO, you lose lots of depth. Many add-ons still bake AO in, however it's generally very subtle to avoid looking out of place if a switch moves, or if the sun is shining on a particular area. The need to do different bakes or fake different effects goes away when you have real time AO, ray tracing, global illumination, and robust HDR - none of which the current sims do very well (or at all). The "dynamic lighting and reflections" in current offerings are only a small part of the puzzle, and are still quite limited/different compared to what is shown in the MFS trailer and screenshot. Having worked on a couple different aircraft for flight sim companies now, I've found it can be difficult to balance baked effects, as the variety of lighting scenarios can make certain effects look bad. This is where MFS will shine if they get the rest of the sim right.

I'm also curious where you've seen god-rays through clouds in XP and P3D, because I've never seen such an effect in either platform out of the box.

What he said!

22 minutes ago, HughesMDflyer4 said:

I'm sorry, but this isn't true. Resolution has nothing to do with lighting/rendering effects. You'll see the same effects on a 1080p monitor that you would on a 4K monitor. It might be crisper on a 4K one, but ray tracing, ambient occlusion, and global illumination don't magically go away at lower resolutions.

What we're seeing in the MFS shot is the combination of lighting effects and very high resolution textures. That's the resolution I'm talking about. Sorry if it was confusing.

 

Quote

I'm also curious where you've seen god-rays through clouds in XP and P3D, because I've never seen such an effect in either platform out of the box.

SkyMaxx Pro weather plugin for XP. This isn't the place to hype other products, but if you're interested, just Google "skymaxx pro god rays" and click the Images button. Should be in the first few hits. 

It's not ray-tracing, obviously, but some method for working with clouds and the sun angle like the plugin does for moving cloud shadows on the ground. Smoke and mirrors until we get full ray tracing, but at least it's there. I've seen it when flying with this plugin.