Vista product page with magic screenies

[aguiar 22]

>I did not think they needed to completely change it...>>Just use one from the real sim in-game with no image editing I second that.Very nice shot,BTW. which lake is that?

[Guest Nick_N]

I took that last year while I was working with my sunfix and playing around with the corona and god-ray scaleIts the same location as the promo image MS took downhttp://www.fsplanet.com/fsplanet_com_fsx.htm (2nd image down)It's location is:Latitude=N48

[Guest JoeInCT]

Arrrgh. I almost wish I did not see this post. After seeing it, I got excited and downloaded the new DX10 NVIDIA driver for my 8800 GTX and clicked the DX10 Preview check box, and went for a spin. Water looks great. Flashing runways, taxiways (etc) not so great -- so much so that I can't live with it. A search of this formum shows many posts regarding this problem with both ATI and NVIDIA cards for which there is apparently no fix short of FS11.It kind of stinks seeing this screenie only to come to the realization that DX10 is not a realistic possibility on many systems. It is like, seeing a photo of Pam Anderson, and then when you show up to a book signing to meet her, she doesn't want to marry you. Wa wa weee wa.This reminds me of a quote. General Douglas MacArthur once said: "It is not enough to give an order that can be understood; give an order that cannot be misunderstood." The parallel: It is not enough to design a flight sim platform that CAN work with the various video card hardware. Design one that WILL work with various video card hardware. In other words, if MS is really interested in putting out a product the users PERCEIVE is good, the onus needs to be on MS to take ownership of the problems that come up in an open system architecture. It seems to me the day MS decided to design an OS for open system hardware and accepted our payment in return, this became their responsibility. It is the nature of the beast to have near infinite permutations of hardware. Come to think of it, this is not even some obscure permutation of hardware. They need to do a better job taking ownership of problems in my opinion. The DX10 Preview has no business being in FSX without the word "beta" next to it.

[Guest Nick_N]

>They need to do a better job taking ownership of problems in>my opinion. The DX10 Preview has no business being in FSX>without the word "beta" next to it.I am not going to get into this because if I do, these emotionally based arguments will LOSE"Preview"look at #4http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/previewAppears to be similar to 'beta'People get all wrapped up in words but unfortunately forget or do not know their meaningNow Phil has already expressed over a YEAR AGO (Feb 2007 as I recall) what DX10 would and would not be and much of that was because1. The hardware was not really ready and therefore the development was slower coming2. There was a decision to make.. fix FSX RTM or develop for DX10They took the right direction for the sake of the community and the franchise and I for one am sick and tired of reading negative comments which slag a team who have placed a good faith effort in making our experience better... these are people who enjoy and take pride in what they do and regardless of the accusations they have done the best they can with what they had to work with.Phil stated quite clearly mistakes were made and lessons were learned... I think its time to drop the ridiculous slagging and get on with the program

[PhilTaylor 45]

it would be interesting to see that shot in DX10.

[pastorpilot 0]

Nick,Is it possible to share your suneffect.cfg? If not, I understand. Steve

[Guest Nick_N]

I would not mind taking a break from GEXn Europe http://www.simforums.com/forums/forum_posts.asp?TID=26352 but I am afraid I would be horn-swaggled and then keelhauled by everyone for stopping production to play with god-raysLOL!!If I get some spare time I will fire up the Vista tower and give it a go.. I need to reconfigure and calculate the god-ray scale and get the weather set up correctly... It was a fun little test last year.. the engine has potentials not as of yet realized and the promo shot is actually not that far off, it can be done. To make a dynamically working version which would respect conditions is possible.. it requires pulling sun azimuth and elevation info, altitude/angle of the view, weather info and creating a set of conditions which would invoke display of the effectI can make god rays.. no problem .. its just a matter of tapping into the system to display them under the right conditions, then creating the right textures to work with the code. Right now I am wrapped up in GEXn.. but it does sound like a fun little project.The images I was able to produce by manually invoking the rays under the right weather conditions were visually stunning so the promo image posted although not accurate for release features, was accurate with respect to design ability. ;)

[Guest JoeInCT]

Nick,Look at:http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/apologistWay to hold MS to the high standards there Nick. With expectations like yours, wouldn't be suprised to see flying xxxxx with wings in FS11.Stop being such an apologist all the time. If I am the PM on this, I either take the DX10 option out completely or the software doesn't go out the door. Besides. Really? how much effort would it be to fix that bug? My point is, that is a nice screenie -- but drool as I may, DX10 doesn't work for me.

[Guest Nick_N]

DX10 PREVIEWWhat part of that do you not understand?LOLNever mindNice try but what I quoted was a fact based on the terminology used by the team and the product.. and was announced well in advance of SP2...unfortunately your pulling things out of the air which try to support a side-slag argument in a personal attack on me and do not stay on topic.No where did I say there were not issues... but that is not the point.. its a PREVIEW and the release of it falls under the correct definition as such. Its not perfect and I am sure there are issues, but as defined it is correctly labeled which places it in the category of BETA. It took a lower priority for the better good at the time.And I am out of this part of the conversation now.. At this point what is being posted is nothing more than...http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/188680.gif

[Guest Nick_N]

Hi SteveI sincerely hope you are well!All I did was enlarge the render of corona2.bmp and I may have also enlarged lens flair 1-2, and 3 through the suneffect.cfg from my Sunfix package available on AVSIM Nicks_Sunfix1.zipIt was a manual change to look at how the rendering engine would handle the texture and light with a end result assuming it was in fact dynamic but unfortunately it wont work dynamically or 'correct' under conditions without a set of XML instructions taping into the engine for conditional data. I was just curious how a end result may look so what I posted won't create the rays dynamically.It does show however the engine can display that type of effect.. it just needs to be dev'd

[PhilTaylor 45]

Mods, can we lock this thread now?I had thought, given the moral indignation of certain elements of the community over the fact that a different division of an 80,000 person company had information wrong - there might be mild congratulations when I got that fixed.I was wrong, all my announcement has generated is off-topic commentary and continued beating of a dead horse - so lets stop now before it gets really out of hand.thank you Mods!

[pastorpilot 0]

Wow! Really interesting. Thanks. I'm fine, thanks for asking. Hope you are doing well, too. Never had so much fun with XP etc... since applying your suggestions ... "to the letter" ;^) as you say. What really made me "better" was that I went out started doing a little realworld flying after an 8 year hiatus. Got my instructor certificate renewed and been flying Czechoslovakian Light Sport Aricraft called an Evektor SportStar. Never had so much fun in 3000 hours of flight time (but I have NO opene cockpit time) ;^) ... Here's a link to the place where I am flying and pictures of the aircraft type. http://www.fasttrackflight.com/ It only costs $3500 [less than I spent on my computer and FSX set up] to gett a real world Light Sport Aircraft license, from start to finish. [7-10K in a Cessna]. Will always appreciate people like you and Phil with a "helping/service" attitude Simming.Best wishes,Steve

[Guest Nick_N]

I do think many people recognize what happened and what was accomplished by getting that changed and please do not let lack of discussion or the wrong discussion discourage announcements, even ones of this nature.The communication is great to see and thanks for pointing it outI do think what was released in artistic rendering was a bit overboard given the features were not there yet however I also think much of what was in that image is possible given the dev time to work it out. I do not believe for a minute what was posted was to skew anyone on purpose. Given what I have learned about the product over the last year I can see there was originally a sincere plan/desire to meet the features in that image and circumstances simply did not allow for it.Time was simply not working with the program as it unfolded and unfortunately it continued to be presented simply because of an error by another division. Very understandable given the size of the company.What's important is it has been recognized and resolved :-)