"If you're asking for a more detailed landclass resolution per>se, that's a different animal. Rather than using higher res>textures, you need an all new texture set, one where the>individual tiles cover a smaller area. That's rather tricky to>do, especially if you want to keep backwards compatibility...I'm really hoping for a higher res seasons file though>so we can have more realistic snow cover."Howdy Christian,That's pretty much true, but FS 2002, 2004 and on do actually have the ability to use much higher landclass-- even with the base 1km system in place.Vector based textures like parks and golf courses are just specialised landclass textures, and are not limited to a 1km grid. The season map on the other hand, exists only at 1km resolution (i maps to the landclass resolution). I agree it needs work. :)Cheers,Jason

>Vector based textures like parks and golf courses are just>specialised landclass textures, and are not limited to a 1km>grid. Good point - I should know better since I'm regularily using this feature. In my opinion the VTP polys only work well for small area features like golf courses and glaciers due to the lack of blending. Using VTP polys on a large scale to do forests and urban areas just looks a bit like cookie cutter work (in my opinion). (This is no criticism, I wouldn't have a clue how to easily incorporate blending into the VTP system and I know a thing or two). Another weak point of the current system are directional textures, it's impossible to create nice gravel/sand river flows (again, a tough problem with no easy algorithm I can think of).>The season map on the other hand, exists only at 1km>resolution (i maps to the landclass resolution). Actually, no. Seasons seem to only work for LOD3, but not LOD5 - at least if I create a LOD5 season file it doesn't get loaded in FS9. It would be great if that limit could be bumped up (or even better if you can convince me otherwise).Cheers,Christian

>the trees in the image above are 2D-- they're not autogen. Jason, this was exactly my point - they are 2D and they look very good. All what I was trying to say that high resolution 2D may ultimately get us better "illusion" of dense forests than a rather weakly autogen.Michael J.http://www.precisionmanuals.com/images/forum/pmdg_744F.jpghttp://sales.hifisim.com/pub-download/asv6-banner-beta.jpg

So were the FSX preview shots taken at 1024 resolution ?John.

"In my opinion the VTP polys only work well for>small area features... Using VTP polys on a large scale to do>forests and urban areas just looks a bit like cookie cutter work "Agreed. What I would say though, is that a combination of parks, industrial areas, concrete, golf courses, etc., combined with greater detail in coastlines and road networks can break up the sterile look of the 1 km landclass without having to worry about some sort of blending mechanism. This by itself can make an area look to have greater han 1km landclass usage data. I agree that on a lage scale it doesn't work as well-- but then I think the 1km mixed with smart gradient texture usage pretty much does okay there."Another weak point of the current>system are directional textures, it's impossible to create>nice gravel/sand river flows (again, a tough problem with no>easy algorithm I can think of)."Yup. Agreed. "The season map on the other hand, exists only at 1km resolution (i maps to the landclass resolution). ""Actually, no. Seasons seem to only work for LOD3, but not LOD5>- at least if I create a LOD5 season file it doesn't get>loaded in FS9. It would be great if that limit could be bumped>up (or even better if you can convince me otherwise)."Hmm. When I wrote original answer I was thinking more along the lines of a sub 1km season map, which didn't make any sense to me, and in part that was what I was referring to. That being said, I was under the impression the season data existed at 1km. I won't be terribly surprised if I'm wrong and you're right about that. I'll look into it Monday (but don't expect me to be able to comment on it... :))Cheers,jason

Hi there,if I may chime in here ;-)I'm looking forward to the higher resolution and agree, in general, that VTP polys can be a great addition to land class design.However, aside from the lack of blending there are three additional issues I can think of why the current implementation of VTP polys has serious limitations in landscape design and I'd be VERY happy if these issues could be addressed in FSX:* the landclass textures get flipped by 180 degrees, which means that the autogen doesn't match up with the features on the textures anymore.* there is an issue with one or more of the mid-level mipmaps of the texture tiles inside the VTP polygons: at a specific distance from the observer the tiles don't quite fill the LOD13 grid and the underlying land class shows through as a grid. Very annoying when trying to place, for example, VTP glaciers on a dark-rock landclass.* when using custom textures with VTP polys there is no option for adding custom agn files. Thus, all VTP with custom textures remains without autogen.I suspect that the first two issues are "simply" bugs in the code though they have been with us since FS2002. The third point would probably require an extension to the current code.As for the seasonal data, it would be great if its resolution could be tied to the land class resolution, i.e., LOD13. I realize that there's currently no consistent data available at that scale but it would allow us add-on designers to generate local data from elevation models or other primary sources. Moreover, a spatial match of landclass and seasons file would allow for better blending of different seasons within the same monthly subfile (see the issue described in this thread: http://forums.simflight.com/viewtopic.php?...ighlight=season )Thanks, Jason, for lending us an open ear - much appreciated! Cheers, Holger