Hi everyone,

I feel like an word not allowed for asking, but I find it really hard to line up the runway to land at many airports when the runway tends to blend into the scenery. Is this true in real life too?

Your major airports have lights that are easy to see far away, but smaller airports tend to be tough to see until very close (at least for me, with my graphics settings).

Do others have the same issue? If so, or if not, what graphical settings tend to help, especially if in real life it's easier to pick out an airport/runway?

Thank you.

In my personal experience, it was hard to find airports in many real life situations. The lights don't help at all during the daytime, of course, and the airports blend into their surroundings. I have been in the cockpit of business jets with professional pilots on a few occasions and found that they, too, sometimes found it challenging to identify unfamiliar airports under visual conditions. Of course, if one if familiar with an airport and its surroundings, it's much easier. 

Overall I find hunting for an airport in MSFS to be similar in many respects to what I recall from my flying experiences. If I'm flying a plane with a GPS unit in the sim, I find myself cheating by looking over at the moving map display. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that IRL pilots do the same these days.

5 minutes ago, mmcmah said:

I feel like an word not allowed for asking, but I find it really hard to line up the runway to land at many airports when the runway tends to blend into the scenery. Is this true in real life too?

Yes. If anything, airfields are easier to pick out in the sim than in real life.

One thing that can help when going into an unfamiliar airfield is not to try and enter the pattern directly but to first overfly the field well above pattern altitude. That will give you an idea of how the airfield fits into the surrounding scenery and help establish your bearings. 

Thank you both for your insight.

I agree with OP on this, and it’s something that has been baffling me for a long time with this sim. It’s far more difficult in the sim vs when I did my PPL training.

Im still confused as to which settings would make runways more detailed. Is it TLOD? Honestly I don’t know.

Edited February 27, 20242 yr by Cpt_Piett

Before flying into an unfamiliar airport for the first time, I would take a good long look at charts and satellite maps (google maps) to get used to easy-to-identify landmarks leading up to and around the airfield. I found that this helped tremendously; while I may not have been able to directly visualize the airport until I got closer, I sure as heck knew the general area of where it was going to be. I find this technique works well in sim just as it does in real life.

2 minutes ago, mmaclauchlan said:

Before flying into an unfamiliar airport for the first time, I would take a good long look at charts and satellite maps (google maps) to get used to easy-to-identify landmarks leading up to and around the airfield. I found that this helped tremendously; while I may not have been able to directly visualize the airport until I got closer, I sure as heck knew the general area of where it was going to be. I find this technique works well in sim just as it does in real life.

Good suggestion, especially as I can look at those things while flying in to somewhere.

8 minutes ago, Cpt_Piett said:

I agree with OP on this, and it’s something that has been baffling me for a long time with this sim. It’s far more difficult in the sim vs when I did my PPL training.

Im still confused as to which settings would make runways more detailed. Is it TOOD? Honestly I don’t know.

I would imagine TLOD and OLOD (but more TLOD would bear on this, but I really haven't figured it out. I have Rex Global Airport Textures and I'm going to play around with its settings.

Don't even get me started on grass airfields. I can NEVER find those of they're at all obscured or I haven't overflown the airfield.

It’s really hard to find them in real life too. As said above, lights don’t do much during the day (other than PAPI etc when on final). I find MSFS (and to some extent XP with ortho) very similar to real life in that respect. 

41 minutes ago, mmcmah said:

Hi everyone,

I feel like an word not allowed for asking, but I find it really hard to line up the runway to land at many airports when the runway tends to blend into the scenery. Is this true in real life too?

 

Depending on environment (urban, country and etc), airport (dimension, runaway size , marking), time of day (dusk, down end etc) MSFS is a great tool to use before flying to unfamiliar airport. When the first google satellite images we used just that

Below is  old photos of the same airport  under different condition to give an idea 

 

 

 

 

Here is another example Lake Wahlfor airpark. Relatively easy to spot surrounded by mountains and rocks

 

 

 

23 minutes ago, mmcmah said:

I would imagine TLOD and OLOD (but more TLOD would bear on this, but I really haven't figured it out. I have Rex Global Airport Textures and I'm going to play around with its settings.

Don't even get me started on grass airfields. I can NEVER find those of they're at all obscured or I haven't overflown the airfield.

Please let me know if you find more info on this. I will experiment more with different TLOD and OLOD settings using AutoFPS.

I have REX textures, but stopped using it for some reason. Do you prefer it to the default textures?

Grass fields though… 😅

Edited February 27, 20242 yr by Cpt_Piett

54 minutes ago, jrw4 said:

I find myself cheating by looking over at the moving map display. 

MSFS2020 is quite ok concerning identifying the surroundings of an airport. Looking at an ND or GPS display unit (if available) is not cheating; it's called situation awareness and is encouraged during any operation. Identifying some airports can be difficult as they blend into their surroundings. For pilots, there are tools available for special airports or special qualification airport requirements, plus many providers like Jeppesen have detailed airport surrounding pictorial charts, wx patterns, etc., in purpose to familiarize crewmembers. 

Some real world advice that is applicable to the sim.

6 Tips For Flying A Great Visual Approach | Boldmethod

 

In real life, I used to struggle finding airports from a distance, not so much lining up.

 

Even landmarks. I remember being on a Navex with my Instructor, he gave me an unexpected diversion to a different airfield. Along that route i worked out i would intersect a small lake at a particular time. Approaching that time i was on the lookout for it but couldn't see it. 

I was starting to think i had screwed up somehow and mentioned this to the Instructor, who in turn told me, " What the ____ do you think that is at our 11 o'clock ?

I was gobsmacked, it was literally staring me in the face !

 

 

 

1 hour ago, Cpt_Piett said:

I agree with OP on this, and it’s something that has been baffling me for a long time with this sim. It’s far more difficult in the sim vs when I did my PPL training.

Im still confused as to which settings would make runways more detailed. Is it TLOD? Honestly I don’t know.

TLOD is the main one.

What people can do is find a visual approach done in real life, like this one and pause the approach where you start to see the runway. Position your aircraft similar to the video and mess with TLOD until you match the video.