ok, so photogrammetry is something new to MSFS20, right? I remember FSX and prior using ortho I think. The photogrammetry is what allows MSFS to actually generate buildings that sort of resemble their IRL counterparts then?

I'm working on building an ortho set for one of the areas I tend to fly (near the airport where I'm going to be getting my flight training later). Unfortunately, it's a slow process with my internet, probably won't be done until late tonight or tomorrow. Also downloading simHeaven at the same time (can do that since it's downloading slow because the server is slow, even with my lousy connection I've got bandwidth to spare for the ortho download at the same time).

8 minutes ago, MrBitstFlyer said:

1.  Ortho4XP - ortho (satellite scenery) and mesh.
2.  SimHeaven for expanded autogen buildings

Ok, so the tutorial I watched for Ortho4XP mentioned to use the alpilotx mesh for the autogen overlay, but SimHeaven is also for autogen. I can use it for the overlay in Ortho4XP, correct? That way, I don't need to download the alpilotx mesh just for the overlay.

2 hours ago, kananesgi said:

Ok, so the tutorial I watched for Ortho4XP mentioned to use the alpilotx mesh for the autogen overlay, but SimHeaven is also for autogen. I can use it for the overlay in Ortho4XP, correct? That way, I don't need to download the alpilotx mesh just for the overlay.

Download the ortho / mesh with Ortho4XP, no need for overlay as SimHeaven will have overlays.

16 hours ago, MrBitstFlyer said:

You are very wrong with that assumption.

I'm ecstatic that I'm wrong...don't get me wrong. 🙂  I've always admired the potential capabilities of XP, and have a few friends who've, just like you, poured a lot of time in effort (and disk space) into getting XP to look beautiful like you've depicted in you shots.

To satisfy my curiosity, can you go to the same place I did in Orlando and take a screenshot (closely matching mine) of how XP looks with your current scenery for this area? (You said you have the US ortho installed so I'd assume that KORL and surrounding area is depicted?).  If you have to find specific Ortho for this area to get it to the default MSFS scenery I show, please let us know if you had to grab and install it.  I'm not trying to be facetious, I really want to see what XP looks like with a direct comparison I can relate to.

Just depart off Runway 07 and fly 4.7ish miles and that perfectly round lake at the intersection of Hwy 50 and Dean Road should roll up under your nose (or just to the right of it if you fly straight out) 🙂  I want to see if my childhood baseball fields are depicted in XP as they are in MSFS.

 

5 hours ago, Steve Dra said:

To satisfy my curiosity, can you go to the same place I did in Orlando and take a screenshot (closely matching mine) of how XP looks with your current scenery for this area? (You said you have the US ortho installed so I'd assume that KORL and surrounding area is depicted?)

Here are some screenshots around that lake and surrounding areas. I have the whole of USA and Europe installed - I personally don't find it tedious because I get to choose the quality of the ortho.  I actually download while I'm out, asleep or watching a movie 😁

Edited November 26, 20223 yr by MrBitstFlyer

59 minutes ago, MrBitstFlyer said:

Here are some screenshots around that lake and surrounding areas. I have the whole of USA and Europe installed - I personally don't find it tedious because I get to choose the quality of the ortho.  I actually download while I'm out, asleep or watching a movie 😁

 

 

 

 

There's no doubt these look great.  But what is the storage cost?  When I ran xp11 with Orbx TE Socal I think installed it was around 6GB.  I believe they use ZL16 which less than you have here.  The entire USA at 17 would be TB's of data?  Or no?

33 minutes ago, ryanbatc said:

There's no doubt these look great.  But what is the storage cost?  When I ran xp11 with Orbx TE Socal I think installed it was around 6GB.  I believe they use ZL16 which less than you have here.  The entire USA at 17 would be TB's of data?  Or no?

I use ZL17 everywhere with ZL18 around ICAO airports.  For special areas I do put a few tiles of ZL19 in, but just a few as that would be memory intensive.  I have three 8Tb drives (for all my software, games and ortho) that were just £69 each ($90?), so for me that is a small cost to get the quality I want.  I subscribe to Garmin Pilot for the USA and Europe so they are the places I fly and have ortho for.  On those three drives I have XP11/12, MSFS, about 40 steam games, Microsoft office plus my ortho (with approx 4Tb free space).

I still rate MSFS as excellent, but I have been won over by the XP12 lighting engine which is being refined each beta.

Edited November 26, 20223 yr by MrBitstFlyer

1 hour ago, MrBitstFlyer said:

Here are some screenshots around that lake and surrounding areas. I have the whole of USA and Europe installed - I personally don't find it tedious because I get to choose the quality of the ortho.  I actually download while I'm out, asleep or watching a movie

Very nice detail indeed!   I too echo Ryan's question about the disk space...and if this area had to be specially downloaded to get this detail...or you just boot up the sim with all your USA scenery installed and go?

I really like the fact that you don't have to rely on data streaming to use the scenery in the sim, but if its a download or install configure each time you want to fly in an area, that I feel is a drawback too.  

I see by your latest reply you've got 24 Terabytes of diskspace, so no problem with having to shuffle ortho areas.  I can't do mechanical drives anymore except for off-site backup/storage.

On 11/20/2022 at 11:34 PM, kananesgi said:

word not allowed man, that's exactly what I was looking for. I really appreciate it, and it tells me what I was afraid of. MSFS has actually modeled the area quite accurately (though maybe a little outdated as there is a major building that is missing which was built a year or two ago). I can recognize and pick out a number of structures in the MSFS shots, while the XP12 shots are missing massive landmarks (like "where's the racetrack", lol). All the trees are totally out of place in the XP shots, too. Honestly, if I didn't already know where these are taken, I wouldn't recognize the XP12 shots, but I do see the are in MSFS.

Sucks, since I'm not a huge fan of MSFS, but I may have to go for it after all.

Again, I really appreciate it man. 

Be careful though because those are default shots from both sims, so MSFS will appear better because of the streamed ortho and accurate building placements.  SimHeaven X-World is free and will add all the buildings you see in the MSFS shot to XP12. Global Forests V2 will add trees in the correct places for just $15.

See my XP12 screenshots above.

 

Edited November 26, 20223 yr by MrBitstFlyer

I started simming with FS2000

I've used XP since 2004 (currently in the messy XP12 beta)

Prepar3d since 2011

MSFS since alpha in early 2020

Nothing comes to close to real flying ambiance in a GA than MSFS. XP12 has the looks of Prepar3d v5 with envshade running. While it's nice looking, it is not groundbreaking and you still have to download terrabytes of data for adequate ground coverage.
I am currently airborne in the Rotate MD11F in XP12, real weather running.

 

If I miss the ambiance in MSFS, yes a little 🙂

Edited November 26, 20223 yr by SAS443

1 minute ago, SAS443 said:

Nothing comes to close to real flying ambiance in a GA than MSFS. XP12 has the looks of Prepar3d v5 with envshade running.

Well, post one of the worst shots I have seen of XP12 with a great shot of MSFS why don't you. 

MSFS clouds are superb, no doubt. With XP12 still in beta, clouds from certain angles are poor, mostly from above. As I have said many times, I am a fan of both sims so don't feel the need to poke fun at either of them. Both have good and bad points, but it is great we have two great sims to choose from - or indeed use both.  Just for balance I post some examples of great XP12 clouds and lighting, because I wouldn't want to put anyone off either sim.

Sure XP12 still has development to do on the clouds, but there are some great clouds, haze and lighting to enjoy at its current development stage.

 

 

15 minutes ago, SAS443 said:

...it is not groundbreaking and you still have to download terrabytes of data for adequate ground coverage...
 

But remember, your still downloading those same terabytes of data with MSFS, it just does it in the background as you fly, which isn't an option for someone like me with slow internet. Yes, it may take me days to download all of the scenery for the areas I fly in and require terabytes of storage, but once I have them downloaded in XP, that's it. I can fly in them whenever I want and I don't have to download them again if I fly someplace else. The fact that XP12 can be made to look almost as good (if not as good or better) than MSFS without the need to stream data (the only high-speed access I have available is data-capped at 100Gb/mo) makes it the more attractive option for me. I know MSFS is impressive, but it just won't work for me.

21 minutes ago, Steve Dra said:

Very nice detail indeed!   I too echo Ryan's question about the disk space...and if this area had to be specially downloaded to get this detail...or you just boot up the sim with all your USA scenery installed and go?

Boot up and go once the ortho is downloaded.  I use ZL17 everywhere (ZL16 is fine high up, but too blurry for GA flying imho), with ZL18 around ICAO airports for the extra detail for take off and landing - higher detailed tiles around airports is an option in Ortho forXP, so no manual configuring needed.  For those very special places like ones house or small local places I fly often, I put some ZL19 tiles in.

2 minutes ago, MrBitstFlyer said:

Well, post one of the worst shots I have seen of XP12 with a great shot of MSFS why don't you

it's the state of Real weather clouds  in B14 as of today NOV26 1950z.

It's basically always like this at high altitudes. This is the same view but looking to my right. 

LM needs to fix this prior to release because this is far worse than the infamous "TrueSky" clouds we initially had in P3d v5.0.

2 minutes ago, MrBitstFlyer said:

Boot up and go once the ortho is downloaded.  I use ZL17 everywhere (ZL16 is fine high up, but too blurry for GA flying imho), with ZL18 around ICAO airports for the extra detail for take off and landing - higher detailed tiles around airports is an option in Ortho forXP, so no manual configuring needed.  For those very special places like ones house or small local places I fly often, I put some ZL19 tiles in.

I am curious, just how much room does your USA Ortho take at ZL17+?