So, I’ve been using XP12 a lot recently. Just fired up MSFS (both sims are good, this isn’t a debate about sims!), and the glare of the sun with HDR on is way too bright. Seems the lighting in XP12 is more natural. 
My question is, is there anyway to reduce this? 

Edited March 4, 20233 yr by Ianrivaldosmith

Happened to me the other day going into the sun on landing into KAVX.  Thing is I thought it looked uber realistic.

sp

11 minutes ago, Ianrivaldosmith said:

My question is, is there anyway to reduce this? 

Sunglasses  😎

I should clarify, it’s not just the glare of the sun, the whole sky is like an over exposed bright white colour. Having flown a lot recently in real life, I can categorically say, it isn’t realistic. 

19 minutes ago, Ianrivaldosmith said:

Seems the lighting in XP12 is more natural. 

I'd have to disagree. Compared to when I actually fly IRL, MSFS is way closer, at least in terms of lighting. Sure, color saturation is a little off in MSFS, but the lighting is lightyears ahead of XP12. Glare is natural and in real life, it's even worse. I'm not talking smack about XP12 or saying what sim is a better sim. Im just politely disagreeing about the lighting.

Edited March 4, 20233 yr by Bdub22

21 minutes ago, Ianrivaldosmith said:

I should clarify, it’s not just the glare of the sun, the whole sky is like an over exposed bright white colour. Having flown a lot recently in real life, I can categorically say, it isn’t realistic. 

Consider it just part of the fun of flight simulation.

Didn't you know that's how fighter pilots used to gain the advantage over their opponents?

sp

Edited March 4, 20233 yr by Sky_Pilot071

41 minutes ago, Ianrivaldosmith said:

So, I’ve been using XP12 a lot recently. Just fired up MSFS (both sims are good, this isn’t a debate about sims!), and the glare of the sun with HDR on is way too bright. Seems the lighting in XP12 is more natural. 
My question is, is there anyway to reduce this? 

I used to have this problem until I upgraded to 4090 and switched to DX12 with DLSS+HDR. Now problem is gone!

I don't think you fly under VR, but for those doing it, the OpenXR toolkit has three strengts of sunglasses to choose from. Some presets use at least the lowest one by default (which I don't though). 

Kind regards, Michael

To the OP, are you using a monitor that provides for HDR10 and has HDR been turned on for both the terminal and Windows? If "yes" to that, has the monitor been calibrated as well? I have read that the calibration is more easily carried out in W11 than in W10, but can not be sure.

Turning on HDR with an SDR terminal is a recipe for blown out highlights of the sort that you describe. Since I went with full HDR in MSFS, that problem has gone away.

Cheers.

I think the problem here is that sunlight in MSFS and accompanying clouds are set up to be viewed from a camera, not the human eye, which has way more ability to perceive a far wider dynamic range. You can test this by going outside in your garden on a bright morning with cumulus clouds around. You'll see that while the highlights are very bright they are almost never "washed out", even when the clouds are close to the sun. While clouds can be very bright, the eye rarely fails to see at least some grey. Clouds are rarely completely white.

MSFS needs work on clouds. The tops are way too bright and the bottoms look like someone took a 4b pencil and drew a straight dark ruler line underneath. For this reason I never set clouds to be "dense" as to my eyes they look completely fake. I have to use a lot of reshade tweaking to get a reasonable balance between reading gauges and looking outside. When you see flight videos and observe blocked out gauges because of exterior light, this is NOT what a human eye sees. It is what a camera with limited dynamic range "sees". For this reason I never understand why sim designers call views "cameras". They are implying that views are not simulating what the eyes see but what a camera sees. I don't want my simulator to show "camera" views, but "eye" views.

5 minutes ago, robert young said:

I think the problem here is that sunlight in MSFS and accompanying clouds are set up to be viewed from a camera, not the human eye, which has way more ability to perceive a far wider dynamic range. You can test this by going outside in your garden on a bright morning with cumulus clouds around. You'll see that while the highlights are very bright they are almost never "washed out", even when the clouds are close to the sun. While clouds can be very bright, the eye rarely fails to see at least some grey. Clouds are rarely completely white.

MSFS needs work on clouds. The tops are way too bright and the bottoms look like someone took a 4b pencil and drew a straight dark ruler line underneath. For this reason I never set clouds to be "dense" as to my eyes they look completely fake. I have to use a lot of reshade tweaking to get a reasonable balance between reading gauges and looking outside. When you see flight videos and observe blocked out gauges because of exterior light, this is NOT what a human eye sees. It is what a camera with limited dynamic range "sees". For this reason I never understand why sim designers call views "cameras". They are implying that views are not simulating what the eyes see but what a camera sees. I don't want my simulator to show "camera" views, but "eye" views.

Agreed.

Before HDR came along, digital cameras exaggerated this issue.  Traditional digital cameras only have access to 256 graduations of intensity meaning that scenes like a heavily shadowed rest room doorway on a bright sunlit beach are impossible to record with out black out in  the shadow and white out in the bright light.  Film cameras never had that limitation. Nor do our eyes.

The Hollywood solution to this, once digital movie cameras became commonplace, was to light up the shadow area with bright lights to reduce the dynamic range while filming.

In essence HDR is an attempt to produce in the digital world what analogue film processing used to be able to do all along.

1 hour ago, Ianrivaldosmith said:

So, I’ve been using XP12 a lot recently. Just fired up MSFS (both sims are good, this isn’t a debate about sims!), and the glare of the sun with HDR on is way too bright. Seems the lighting in XP12 is more natural. 
My question is, is there anyway to reduce this? 

I turn off bloom especially and usually glare as well.  I know the sun is bright - I don't need to simulate not seeing the instruments because irl I just use sunglasses.

20 minutes ago, ryanbatc said:

I turn off bloom especially and usually glare as well.  I know the sun is bright - I don't need to simulate not seeing the instruments because irl I just use sunglasses.

That's how I was able to land the plane with full sun into KAVX.  I used the instruments to get down while outside it was glaresville.  That's what made it so realistic.  Yes I use HDR 10 and Bloom.

Cheers

sp

5 hours ago, Ianrivaldosmith said:

I should clarify, it’s not just the glare of the sun, the whole sky is like an over exposed bright white colour. Having flown a lot recently in real life, I can categorically say, it isn’t realistic. 

I am actually having the same issue. In the PMDG 737 with its tiny cockpit windows you sometimes can barely see anything in specifiy angles. I completely agree with the OP.

I think Asobo has chosen a cinematic approach for lighting to be more appealing to the eye.
This happens with other games too as far as I can tell.
Personally I do like the lighting of MSFS because of that.