Night lighting!

[wyman_hd 232]

Edited September 1, 2019 by arwasairl

[John F 2,406]

Really like that last one!

John

[Pugilist2 878]

Indeed, some great night lighting!

[John_Cillis 2,406]

Thanks for this tip, I installed it, and now nights are more fun.  I have always felt Xplane11 is the best sim, when it comes to night lighting options, as a member here told me to try more night flights in the sim.  It is much more realistic to fly into an Xplane airport at night, because there is virtually no horizon line to see, so one must rely on the artificial horizon if one's spatial orientation gets confused.  I have only flown in a GA aircraft once at night, in 1978 with a friend, a high school student I had just graduated with named Doug Brambrink and another friend, Joe Schnapp.  Joe and I were just driving around one night in his Datsun, and since he knew I liked flying, we drove to the Napa airport and walked on the tarmac, looking at the aircraft (we did not know that it was a federal crime to do so without a pilot's license, but no security was around that night).  We saw a car drive up to a 172 and Joe and I recognized Doug from our HIgh School, who soloed at age 16 and even was featured in an article in our hometown Newspaper, The Napa Register.  Doug recognized us and simply said, :"Wanna go up?"  Like the Godfather from the Godfather movies, lol, he made us an offer we could not refuse.

So go up we did, out of Napa at night, along the western age of the northern SF Bay, it was a moonlit night so you could, in addition to the city lights of SF coming up in the distance, make out much ground detail.  In the far west northwest, where my parents were camping in their trailer at Duncan's Mills in the Russian River, we could see a white carpet of fog kissing the redwoods on the western edge of Sonoma County, from Pt. Reyes, past Bodega Bay, past Jenner, and beyond.

Then we passed the Golden Gate bridge, Alcatraz and Pier 39 way below, with pristine glistening views of San Francisco's lit up landmarks and Sky Scrapers, like the Coit Tower, Embarcadero Center, Bank of America, and the San Francisco Pyramid--the latter three skyscrapers including the Hyatt Regency, I have all been to their observation decks, just like I went to the observation deck of the Old WTC, Sears Tower, the Soace Needle, the Eiffel Tower, the Tower of Venice--always made a point of getting to the top of the highest building in every city I have visited--except Phoenix for some reason, why bother, since our Skyscrapers are not so tall....  Highest I've ever been in Phoenix is about 30 or so stories up, when I went to a lawyer to get my insurance settlement check after getting run over from a recent car accident.

To end the story of my first ever GA flight, a nighttime flight at that, after we passed San Francisco, we wanted to avoid its airspace, so we stayed just at 5000 feet AGL and no higher, then we cruised back to Napa, and since the Tower was not in use at Night, Doug had to click his Mike three times to turn on the runway lights, which is how they did it back then when an airfield was uncontrolled at night, I do not know if they still do it today.

It was by far the smoothest GA flight I have ever been on, smooth as a jet, in the still of the cool night air.  I get euphoria just remembering the flight, and I have a permanent type of Eidetic memory, which means I can see things forever in my mind's eye, as most pilots or travelers do.  But as I grow older some memories fade, the painful ones especially, which is kind of cool, so I don't have many memories of painful flights I have had, such as the ear problems one gets, and I have never had nausea or anxiety on a flight, even in the handful of in flight emergencies I have been in where we had to abort a flight or make an emergency landing, or in once instance, abort pulling away from a gate because our 737's engine blew in Bozeman Montana with a shock and awe effect, a flash and a bang.  I was so amazed though, no one panicked or screamed, not even the kids, we just all looked at each other and said "What was That?" and then the Captain came on the horn, told us it was an engine failure, and asked us calmly to get off the plane.

My advice when that happens, do not storm the gate agent, you will be stuck in line and you will miss the next flight out, since most flights run full, and who wants to be stuck in Bozeman Montana all night?  Nice town, but few places to stay.  So when your flight cancels, bypass the gate agent and hustle past the confused pax to the airline's customer service counter, almost always located in one of their concourses.

In one instance I just used my cell, and rebooked my flight, that works too if you get stuck.

Did not mean to hijack your thread with one of my boring stories, we AARP folks ramble too much, sharing tidbits of wisdom to the hungry Pigs, lol (inside Joke).

John

[wyman_hd 232]

22 minutes ago, John_Cillis said:

hanks for this tip, I installed it, and now nights are more fun.  I have always felt Xplane11 is the best sim, when it comes to night lighting options, as a member here told me to try more night flights in the sim.  It is much more realistic to fly into an Xplane airport at night, because there is virtually no horizon line to see, so one must rely on the artificial horizon if one's spatial orientation gets confused. 

Nice John! I also live in the Bay Area although i live in the San Jose area and the closest airport to me is KSJC. Never been to Napa, closest city to Napa I've been to was Fairfield.

Edited September 2, 2019 by arwasairl

[John_Cillis 2,406]

2 minutes ago, arwasairl said:

Nice John! I also live in the Bay Area although i live in the San Jose area and the closest airport to me is KSJC. Never been to Napa, closest city to Napa I've been to was Fairfield.

I almost took a hotel job in SJC way back in 89, just before the Loma Prieta Quake.  I drove down there to interview for the job, they made me an offer, I swooned over the woman who would be my manager, she just poured out compassion and it was the perfect interview, as if we became instant soulmates.  If there was just one person who represented what a soulmate is it was her.  But I was not ready to settle down, I wanted a job like a pilot or flight attendant, where I could be sent places to work rather than being stuck in a drabby office. 

My father had that type of job when he was a health physics inspector for the Navy and Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which asked him to help them after three mile Island, which is why the US and most European Nuke plants are safe.  However they discovered background radiation, which is sadly why cancer has devastated my families and will devastate those who got too close to us, because radiation spreads.  I feel the government of the US especially owes the world a living, because of the spread of radiation in their inquisitive ways to harness the power of the mind of the Universe that made us.....

John

[ryanbatc 12,820]

Nice pics...especially the last one!

[JAT 185]

Great shots , but that last one is WOW.

nebojsa

[be1a1 25]

is that p3d? if it is can you please tell me what addons youre using?

[wyman_hd 232]

4 hours ago, be1a1 said:

is that p3d? if it is can you please tell me what addons youre using?

Yes it's P3D, the textures are from REX (sky textures, cloud textures, etc), and I'm using ORBX for the lighting. I've also noticed my Tomatoshade preset is the culprit of making the lights so dense. I've tried using a different preset, but then all the lights went away and just kinda looked a little sad. It's still ORBX lighting, but It's not as impressive as the ones i usually use.

[Phantom88 3,284]

***Amazing***