An interview with Dan Klaue of Thranda has popped up on XPlane.Org. Highly recommend all read it. Lots of grainy insights into programming, graphic development and off course model development in the world of flight simulation. 

https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/forums/topic/326465-developer-spotlight-dan-klaue-thranda-design/

This thread is the best  as there some issues are expanded- Dan does not hold back with his concerns about MS and MS2024 and MS2020. His source of anxiety about it is well founded, that and longer term of flight sim via Xplane. Anyway he has the stats. He also adresses the issue of why he uses the Org and why it is such good way to deal with customers and users of their product. Basically - service in spades. 

Dan really puts into perspective the large amount of time that goes into getting a good model into the simulator. That alone is worth the read Lots of anecdotes about XPlane's continuous improvement breaks things for developers but they accept it goes with the territory simply because of the cumulative and aggregate improvements to XPlane. 

Some  interesting between the lines stuff about Thranda, Carenado, JustFlight and MS. 

Edited February 13, 20251 yr by coastaldriver

On the issue of metrics - Steam stats are one thing but multimedia stats are another - I guess you got to count the uptake of non mainstream media where video material and discussion occurs. I would cite Q8Pilot as an example not biased to one or the other sim but appears to be more XPlane orientated. Has some 100,000 subscribers and hefty views of his videos in the high tens of thousands (It is of course content dependant or in other words the interests of simmers. So I see that and think that is pretty healthy interest for product development going forward. Q8Pilot also showcases a lot of external addon stuff for XPlane which he believes adds to his sim experience. Steam stats would not capture that at all! Q8 Pilot is but one of many doing this and I am continuously surprised at the level of interest and keen audiences who are not actually simming at the time but watching a video of simulated flight in the sim. There may be more MS flight sim videos but that is not relevant except maybe to YouTube and those Videos do not attract view significantly higher that say Q8 does with XPlane. 

So modern media accessability has given rise to a whole new genre of simmers who demonstrate, discuss and just sim fly and this attracts quite a passive viewing audience or in other words - high interest that is something given the competition in all genres of modern multi-media. 

I've been following his work since XP9, including some great Plane Maker tutorials he did, with the Embraer models...

Great guy !

Used some CARENADO models which had their flight dynamics fine tuned by Dan, which by that time really made a difference, with the quality of CARENADO addon aircraft far superior to similar products for the other platforms.

Edited February 13, 20251 yr by jcomm

I don't agree with his view on 8 k textures. Just because the rendering engine supports it and the majority of users have 8 GB of VRAM now doesn't mean that one may go and grab more than a quarter of that for the user aircraft alone because that leaves much less for scenery and other aircraft flying about. This reminds me of the FSX days which did away with FS9's polycount limit, so some developers started pigging out on detail, resulting in low framerates and massive out of memory issues even on hardware that was multiple times as powerful as FSX would have ever required. X-Plane's engine is infinitely more docile than that, but that's no reason to stretch one's luck.

35 minutes ago, Bjoern said:

8 GB of VRAM now

Honestly 8gig is bare minimum for xp12, people should be opting for 10 or more.

Well I would agree with your there Bjoern, 8K is too unwieldy. Dan then complains about the issue of working on large texture files. 8K means that they stuff the texture file even more- more unnecessary graphics load after all who really is going to eyeball the outside fuselage for blemishes? I do not like the Thranda dynamic livery at all. I can appreciate the intent but it is a huge overhead in operation and you have to go with the designated outlines or marks. I would be charitable if I called it klunky. Much easier to paint differently with lower limit textures. The alternative which is do your own imvolves working with Thranda textures and which as a repaint dabbler has driven me nuts and I have only done a few as a result!

Very "interesting" interview.  

Interpret that how you will.

🤔

7 hours ago, coastaldriver said:

after all who really is going to eyeball the outside fuselage for blemishes

You,d be surprised what people complain about. I asked them once if they would do a video on the costs and complexities of creating an add on. It appears one was started, but after thinking on it, stopped, as being a waste of time as customers dont care and it would of taken quiet a bit of effort..

On 2/13/2025 at 2:29 AM, coastaldriver said:

An interview with Dan Klaue of Thranda has popped up on XPlane.Org. Highly recommend all read it. Lots of grainy insights into programming, graphic development and off course model development in the world of flight simulation. 

https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/forums/topic/326465-developer-spotlight-dan-klaue-thranda-design/

Interesting interview to one of the great historical X-Plane addon developers.

I found his considerations on the market and add-on development process for X-Plane vs the competition very interesting.

17 hours ago, Bjoern said:

I don't agree with his view on 8 k textures. Just because the rendering engine supports it and the majority of users have 8 GB of VRAM now doesn't mean that one may go and grab more than a quarter of that for the user aircraft alone because that leaves much less for scenery and other aircraft flying about. This reminds me of the FSX days which did away with FS9's polycount limit, so some developers started pigging out on detail, resulting in low framerates and massive out of memory issues even on hardware that was multiple times as powerful as FSX would have ever required. X-Plane's engine is infinitely more docile than that, but that's no reason to stretch one's luck.

I would agree as well but when you consider the a number of XP aircraft that has come to the Xplane market and when they are profile, the first thing that gets' look at are the texturing and if they the picky user can't read the fine print on a label on the side in the cargo door, they use that as a reason for not buying the product or criticize it to death until improvements are done no matter good the aircraft is. Toliss latest aircraft A330 went through that nonsense not long ago. Aircraft could do everything except pour coffer for them and it was still not go enough because they kept crying that the cockpit textering was not good enough for their money. Once they made the improvement, you didn't hear a pin drop from the naysayer who I think we're just users from the other side only there to knock down the aircraft.

I remember the FSX where the polycount limit was change and the developers started making those monstrous airports where you need a dds compressor just make the file size smaller just so you can land a aircraft there.

The problem was FSX was frozen with its development instead of MS picking the development up and continue it with moving the sim forward and not wait 14 years later to do it.

It needed to move from 32bit to 64bit were some people at that time didn't understand why. So it would have more access to memory loaded in the machine and it needed to support Directx11 so that the polycount issue would not have driven me away due to the OOM's going into Orlando or Tampa airport in a PMDG 737. I had a very capable machine running that sim but it was not utilizing the hardware I paid for so that I can complete a flight which then X Plane became the answer. 

The way I see it, all Dan is doing is staying ahead of the curve with the 8k texture since users do have those resources especially when you have people eyeballing those RTX5090 cards or those who ran out and got those 4090 just so they can run DLSS and not give them excuse for them to complain. Plus we have a sim in continued development so he might as well take advantage of it to stay ahead of the competition.

@coastaldriver It's funny you mention Q8pilot. He is one of the biggest promoter of texturing on his stream and the biggest cheerleader. If you want to blame somebody for creating such demand for highly detail texturing among his viewers, you can blame him. If the aircraft has 8K texturing all over the aircraft inside and out, it certainly will get the Q8 stamp of approval for sure 😆  

 

Edited February 14, 20251 yr by BobFS88

8K textures? It depends on the format.
If they make them in compressed DDS we can talk about it..... but if they make them in PNG... 😬

Edited February 14, 20251 yr by efis007

I have some of his planes (the ones that have REPs) and enjoy them.

He says he largely missed out on the last 3 years and the transition from v11 to v12, that his staff handled it...?

Was he out sick or anyone know what happened...?

His take on the market vs MSFS is quite...strange. Doesn't jive with other sources of information.

3 hours ago, UrgentSiesta said:

His take on the market vs MSFS is quite...strange. Doesn't jive with other sources of information.

From the statistics I've seen, both MSFS 2020 and 2024 have been dropping pretty significantly. For ex. on Steam, MSFS 2024 droped by 10% in the last 30 days (and way more before, since its release in nov 2024). Same when watching the Twitch-statistics, although it doesn't necessarely reflect the number of users (more the general interest). I am not aware of any other statistics with numbers. Navigraph canceled it's 2024-survey. My guess is that they were scared to show bad numbers. For both 2020 and 2024, there was a huge amount of users in the first 1-2 weeks but those numbers droped very abruptly after the starting-hype. 80% or more users seems to have already abandoned it. XP12 still doesn't have close the amount of users of MSFS but the number of users has been constantly increasing since release, although at a very slow peace. So there seems to be two completely different user-behaviours and XP being way more consistent. This is what he was refering to in my opinion.

Edited February 15, 20251 yr by Franz007

7 hours ago, UrgentSiesta said:

His take on the market vs MSFS is quite...strange. Doesn't jive with other sources of information.

I wanted to say something about that, but I couldn't think of a way to say it without stirring the pot.  

He should be speaking for himself, and his own products, only.  The guys at Torquesim did very well with their Cirrus.  IXEG smashed it out of the park with the 737.  The TBM is the highest or 2nd highest seller on X-Aviation.  The CL650, also did ridiculously well.  

On 2/13/2025 at 10:39 PM, mjrhealth said:

Honestly 8gig is bare minimum for xp12, people should be opting for 10 or more.

For upgrades, yes. But there are enough X-Plane users out there still using 8 GB cards and unable to afford anything better.

Actually, I'd be curious about just how much VRAM the average X-Plane computer actually has.

 

On 2/14/2025 at 3:19 PM, BobFS88 said:

I would agree as well but when you consider the a number of XP aircraft that has come to the Xplane market and when they are profile, the first thing that gets' look at are the texturing and if they the picky user can't read the fine print on a label on the side in the cargo door, they use that as a reason for not buying the product or criticize it to death until improvements are done no matter good the aircraft is. Toliss latest aircraft A330 went through that nonsense not long ago. Aircraft could do everything except pour coffer for them and it was still not go enough because they kept crying that the cockpit textering was not good enough for their money. Once they made the improvement, you didn't hear a pin drop from the naysayer who I think we're just users from the other side only there to knock down the aircraft.

As far as I remember, the criticism of ToLiss' textures in the A339 wasn't so much related to texture dimensions but to general detailing and PBR material balancing. And I'd hazard a quess that general resolution doesn't really matter to users as long as the overall detailing and art style is realistic.

 

1 hour ago, GoranM said:

I wanted to say something about that, but I couldn't think of a way to say it without stirring the pot.  

He should be speaking for himself, and his own products, only.  The guys at Torquesim did very well with their Cirrus.  IXEG smashed it out of the park with the 737.  The TBM is the highest or 2nd highest seller on X-Aviation.  The CL650, also did ridiculously well.  

Dan takes market research for and commercial performance of X-Plane add-ons very seriously and I wish he did not, as to me, ever only looking at the numbers means that the passion for the entire endeavor got pushed to the back seat.