I just discovered myself flying over a "local" city with photogrammetry. Normally I'm landing or taking off at the local airport, but this time I was flying over the city at cruise altitude (about 6000 ft +/- in my GA plane), and it looked pretty terrible! It was like it was made of wax but melting in the sun. There were also lots of "side effects" like weird fault lines, "waterfalls", etc. I paused and turned off photogrammetry and it looked much, much better. Of course when I'm flying low over those buildings on approach, then photogrammetry wins the "looks better" contest.

So now I am curious, what does a city like New York look like with photogrammetry turned off? Does MSFS 2020 rely solely on photogrammetry to render buildings like the Empire State Building, or does it have a basic model of NYC like ever other sim out there? I would be kinda shocked if NYC was pure autogen for everyone who doesn't have the bandwidth to download gigabytes of photogrammetry data. This would actually be a step backwards from previous sims.

Anyway, I may just leave photogrammetry off for now, at least until I decide to visit some iconic city for the purpose of spotting landmarks.

6 hours ago, Keto Ketchup said:

So now I am curious, what does a city like New York look like with photogrammetry turned off? Does MSFS 2020 rely solely on photogrammetry to render buildings like the Empire State Building, or does it have a basic model of NYC like ever other sim out there?

It's very bland.  The Empire State Building, Brooklyn Bridge, Statue of Liberty and Governor's Island I believe are the only "hand drawn" objects that remain.  So NYC becomes very bland.

If you want an example, Fly through London,  It is all autogen except for the Houses of Parliament/Big Ben, The Spire, Tower Bridge and the O2 arena.

Seattle looks even worse with Photogrammetry turned off because The Space Needle,  That's it.  Safeco Field is nothing but a sticker on the ground and Seahawks Stadium is replaced with a very generic oval building with a rectangle hole in it.  Smith Tower, Columbia Tower, All gone.

To people who are unfamiliar with the area, the number of buildings and placement are fine, but they lose their character.  When you turn it off, you realize just how few hand drawn objects their really are.  Much less than FSX.  

I understand all the limitations of photogrammetry.  But there's something to be said when you are flying around an area near you're girlfriends house that you've never been to before, and telling her on the phone, there's a Home Depot, Wal Mart and Shop Rite there and they know EXACTLY where you are.  

That connects with me in a way autogen never will.

Often get lots of bizarre polygon looking shaped objects all over - are they photogrametry related?