FC Scenery v Orbx

[Daube]

3 minutes ago, Patco Lch said:

How do you use google earth for sim scenery?

Depends on the sim, but for P3D you would probably have to generate your own photoreal scenery using a tool like Orho4XP for P3D. That tool lets you generate a terrain tile using the internal map provider of your choice (Google, Bing, Arcgis etc...). But it's a rather complicated process. And you'll need to generate the corresponding autogen too, with other tools, and this is complex as well.

[dave2013]

I applaud the efforts of FC Scenery, and if you want photoreal scenery for P3D, then FC Scenery is very good and very reasonably priced.

I, however, uninstalled mine and went back to ORBX openLC.  The photoreal resolution was lower than I thought it would be, and autogen was lacking in many places, and in some cases there are large areas of forest with no autogen trees.

I guess photoreal is just not for me.

Is MSFS 2020/2024 better where photoreal terrain with autogen is concerned?

Dave

Edited April 2 by dave2013

[G-RFRY]

I use ORBX OLC in P3DV6 the res is lower than V5 making the mountains sharper. Thats why I don`t use Pilot`s global scenery anymore it`s not as good for hight. even the other sims don`t do as detailed.

 

[FC Scenery]

Hi everyone,
First of all, I want to thank you all for the comments generated here on this forum. Freedom of expression and everyone's right to express their opinions are always a good thing. After some time, the system allowed me to create an account here.

I'd like to take this opportunity to introduce myself. My name is Fernando, the sole creator of FC Scenery. This is a solo project, where I only wanted to focus on South America. However, after many requests from other people, who are clients to this day, I was asked to cover more countries around the world, and we're just weeks away from finishing everything.

Based on everyone's opinion, I'll briefly tell you about my work. First, we don't use applications like Ortho4XP or similar to process our images, since everything is very complex and the information stored is extensive. We tried this in our first country, Chile, three years ago. This is why, with the help of Photoshop and satellite imagery from Sentinel 2, Sentinel 3, Landsat, and MODIS, which we have licenses for, we provide much more up-to-date images of real life, even better than Google Earth, where even its images are very saturated. That's why we use combined maps in our work.
These images, when transferred to P3D, have a resolution ranging from 2 to 3 meters, which allows for better definition for flights above 900 ft. There are areas that are designed with resolutions mostly for IFR flights, such as Northern Canada or Northern Asia, where there are not a large number of airports or airfields, and IFR flights primarily fly above FL300, where higher resolutions and many more GB are not necessary. In any case, there are always clients who write to us asking if they want their hometown or a specific city with higher resolution, and we have no problem fulfilling that request at no cost, of course, and we work on it as quickly as possible. It's always good to be courteous to all our clients.

Now, regarding Autogen, as everyone knows, OSM (Open Street Map) has a very poor building database. It was also tested three years ago with Chile. There are other databases, but none have complete coverage. That's why we, in applications like ArcGIS and Annotator, create our own Autogen, placing each building in its corresponding position in real life. This takes a lot of work and time. That's why you can find countries where Autogen is still at 60 to 70% coverage. That's why, now that we're finishing the entire world, V2 versions are being created where, in addition to integrating the seasons, we're adding many more Autogens. For example, Thailand started with around 2 million Autogen buildings, and in the new version available to those who have the product, we've increased that number by almost 40 million buildings. So, we're constantly improving our work.

For those who have questions about ORBX or Mega Scenery Earth, I appreciate their work because I've used them all in their time. They're really good. However, seeing that both developers neglected all of us who have invested a lot of money since Prepar3D began working on this project, ORBX TrueEarth, to be specific, used data from 2014 and only created data from four states and two European countries. MSE primarily consisted of flat Photoreal maps with little or no autogen. ORBX's OpenLC maps are simply generic maps that bear no resemblance to reality.

Now, to finish with regard to costs, many might say it's expensive, but other developers, like the aforementioned, have even more expensive products if you buy them all and only get part of it covered. So, we're being fair, even knowing that there were people who already paid thousands of dollars at the beginning, but they continue to receive daily updates to our products with us.

If you have any questions or would like more details, I'm happy to help. I can help you here, or by email or on the Facebook page.

Have a good flight, everyone.

[Daube]

1 hour ago, dave2013 said:

I applaud the efforts of FC Scenery, and if you want photoreal scenery for P3D, then FC Scenery is very good and very reasonably priced.

I, however, uninstalled mine and went back to ORBX openLC.  The photoreal resolution was lower than I thought it would be, and autogen was lacking in many places, and in some cases there are large areas of forest with no autogen trees.

I guess photoreal is just not for me.

Let's say, photoreal without a good autogen is not for you. Photoreal with good autogen would be a completely different story 😉

1 hour ago, dave2013 said:

Is MSFS 2020/2024 better where photoreal terrain with autogen is concerned?

Dave

Yes, completely.

[Daube]

1 hour ago, G-RFRY said:

I use ORBX OLC in P3DV6 the res is lower than V5 making the mountains sharper. Thats why I don`t use Pilot`s global scenery anymore it`s not as good for hight. even the other sims don`t do as detailed.

 

Ok wait, I'm getting confused here...

You mentioned Pilot's global scenery, but as far as I'm aware, this is just a mesh and not photorealistic scenery, so how is it related to our discussion here ?

Also, you said in your first sentence that OLC (Open LandClass?) has a lower resolution in P3DV6 than in P3DV5 ? Lower resolution of what ? Ground textures ? OpenLandclass has generic ground textures doesn't it ? How do these textures affect the shape of the mountains ?

Also, you're finally showing a picture of a photoreal scenery for an airport and surroundings, with very few autogen houses/buildings and no trees at all. Which product is that ?

[G-RFRY]

5 hours ago, Daube said:

You mentioned Pilot's global scenery, but as far as I'm aware, this is just a mesh and not photorealistic scenery, so how is it related to our discussion here

The scenery mesh res and the texture res sliders go down a much finer detail. Than V5.

ORBX works ok but don`t know if LC would. you may reduce the detail.

Edited April 2 by G-RFRY

[Daube]

Ah ok, by "lower" you actually meant "thiner", like "more precise", ok I got it now, sorry.

But then again, on your screenshot this is not OrbX Open Land Class, is it ? Or does OrbX Open Land Class include photorealistic sceneries now ? In any case, the shape of the mountains is purely related to the mesh definition and how it compares to the default mesh for a given area. Just because P3Dv6 offers a thinner setting choice doesn't mean that its default mesh is better than the one in P3Dv5, so installing your OrbX OpenLC product in it will probably still bring improvements (provided it's compatible).

Edited April 3 by Daube

[FC Scenery]

Hi everyone

Here I leave it for everyone to see the differences in our work.

Here you can first see ORBX OpenLC on the left and our work on the right. On the right, you can also see a part of the default mountain, also made with OpenLC. This is near Salzburg, the border between Germany and Austria.

And finally you can see how it looks now completely covered by FC Scenery in both Germany and Austria.

And here you have one where we can see Beijing, China where in this area you can see what it looks like by default with ORBX Global Base, since there is no OpenLC for Asia.

And here you have an image where you can see how it is covered with our custom Photoreal + Autogen with buildings in the corresponding locations, this image is from when we were working on our China project, but currently the city resolution is at 1m, for the main cities and points of interest we improved the resolution quality between 50cm and 1m to make it more realistic when flying.

I hope these images help you better appreciate our work. We invite you to try our demo countries so you can all get your hands on our products soon.

Best regards, everyone.
Fernando.

[Timmo48]

5 hours ago, FC Scenery said:

Hi everyone

Here I leave it for everyone to see the differences in our work.

Here you can first see ORBX OpenLC on the left and our work on the right. On the right, you can also see a part of the default mountain, also made with OpenLC. This is near Salzburg, the border between Germany and Austria.

And finally you can see how it looks now completely covered by FC Scenery in both Germany and Austria.

And here you have one where we can see Beijing, China where in this area you can see what it looks like by default with ORBX Global Base, since there is no OpenLC for Asia.

And here you have an image where you can see how it is covered with our custom Photoreal + Autogen with buildings in the corresponding locations, this image is from when we were working on our China project, but currently the city resolution is at 1m, for the main cities and points of interest we improved the resolution quality between 50cm and 1m to make it more realistic when flying.

I hope these images help you better appreciate our work. We invite you to try our demo countries so you can all get your hands on our products soon.

Best regards, everyone.
Fernando.

Great work indeed and brought 2 of your products yesterday new zealand and Australia looking forward too buying more of your scenerys thanks.hopefully one day you can do my home town perth western australia city :).

[deeknow]

On 4/3/2025 at 6:02 AM, FC Scenery said:

I'd like to take this opportunity to introduce myself. My name is Fernando, the sole creator of FC Scenery. This is a solo project, where I only wanted to focus on South America. However, after many requests from other people, who are clients to this day, I was asked to cover more countries around the world, and we're just weeks away from finishing everything.

Thanks for the background re your project Fernando, great stuff, keep it up !!

Ian S and others who were looking for some lower level shots comparing Orbx and FC Scenery do take a look at my page following which I shared earlier, I have a dozen screenshots taken w Orbx AND FC Scenery side by side with a slider you can use to compare different areas of the Swiss pack 

Hope this is useful: https://www.deeknow.com/notes/games/P3D/FCSceneries/SUI/

[Ian S]

2 hours ago, deeknow said:

Thanks for the background re your project Fernando, great stuff, keep it up !!

Ian S and others who were looking for some lower level shots comparing Orbx and FC Scenery do take a look at my page following which I shared earlier, I have a dozen screenshots taken w Orbx AND FC Scenery side by side with a slider you can use to compare different areas of the Swiss pack 

Hope this is useful: https://www.deeknow.com/notes/games/P3D/FCSceneries/SUI/

Thanks Dean, very helpful.

 

cheers

[DChockey08]

22 hours ago, FC Scenery said:

And here you have an image where you can see how it is covered with our custom Photoreal + Autogen with buildings in the corresponding locations, this image is from when we were working on our China project, but currently the city resolution is at 1m, for the main cities and points of interest we improved the resolution quality between 50cm and 1m to make it more realistic when flying.

I hope these images help you better appreciate our work. We invite you to try our demo countries so you can all get your hands on our products soon.

Best regards, everyone.
Fernando.

Gotta say, I purchased China/Japan and installed it. Took a flight between NRT and PEK and immediately bought most of the rest of the world. Second to none. 

[Stefti]

Just bought the entire world setup from FC and looking for a 18 TB for storage when it goes on sale 

Hope FC keeps at it, because it can rival msfs …and perhaps revive p3d 

Let’s s hope so 

[DChockey08]

I honestly think this is better world coverage for photorealistic than MSFS simply because it’s not streamed. No matter what happens it will always live on my ssd. I don’t have to worry about server access.