Isle of Wight - Bembridge and Sandown - now uploaded

[agtim 0]

FU3 package for the UK-South regionThis package contains a new elevation file for the megatile bmam , new models (5 new hangars a Spitfire and a Hurricane) and the 2 airports Sandown and Bembridge.UK_IOW.ziphttp://www.agtim.ch/fu3/images/iowproject.jpg :-wave agtim

[Guest R_Driscoll]

Congratulations agtim! We must be close to a critical concentration of packages in the IOW area that will make flying around here very pleasant indeed. I look forward to flytesting tonight!And a Spitfire! (drool) - brilliant work!RobD

[agtim 0]

Thank you Robert,Managing the large number of models for UK-South are more and more difficult, I will try to make a modelmip.tag for UK-South containing all current models and mips. When a model is not inside the tag file then it is saved in the model file of each megatile creating more and more overhead. I think using modelmip.tag is a quicker way at runtime and we can handle the palette problems on a safe way for all.I Hope the Spitfire will be flyable one day :-) but from a Mustang to a Spitfire is a lot of work. We will see :-wave agtim

[Lars Peter 0]

Congrats Agtim!!This is exellent work.At first the install instructions seemed very difficult, but reading it carefully it was OK.No buildings floating above ground.This addon also seemed to generate a lot of more AI-traffic in the region.Looking at those new static planes I also hope some of them will beflyable some day.Thank you.Lars Peter.:-wave

[Guest R_Driscoll]

I've been thinking its time to make a special modelmip.tag as well. Go ahead! But I would suggest: - don't put in the specific models (eg Parlt House, Dome, StoneHenge), so that these can continue to be developed, but only the generic models (houses, buses, postboxes, spifires) that might be used in many sceneries. - don't put in all of the SanFran specific sceneries (eg Alcatraz, Golden Gate) unless you have used them in sceneries already - I don't mean to make you spend your whole time sorting, but I think many of these could easily be deleted from UK-South. - include the Seattle generic models - converted to SanFran textures, so that future modellers have the widest choice. - publish a list of objects on AVSIM before final assembly of the modelmip.tag to check for last minute upgrades, suggestions for inclusion/exclusion, comment. - make a night-model version as well.I can help with any of this. I already have a directory set up to make modelmip.tag's, or I can possibly help with model collection, and paletisation. Let me know.RobD.

[Guest glidernut]

agtim,Thay are grate, "Bembridge" and the "Iles of Wight Airport".I see the beter elevation extends ferther than just around the airports. The Iles of Wight was a good place for gliding, and thanksto you its even beter nouw.I like the hangers, espeshaly the one with "AGTIM" on it.Exellent work.glidernut.:-wave

[Guest qvdg]

To be able to fly a Spit don't you have to get some hours in a Tigermoth first (dream, dream .....;-)Once again great work Andr

[Hans_Petter 1]

Yes, this looks great! Since I didn't know what updates my version of UK south had already I skipped the elevation part. That was a bad idea--the sim crashed as I tried to start a flight from one of the new airport. Then I ran the elevation fix and everything was fine. Actually, the ReadMe states that we need to use GeoTilesViewer.exe v 3.0 but the one enclosed is v 2.9.3.0. Is there a newer one? Also, what does cl5bmam.tga do? The ReadMe didn't advise us to copy it or run it through GeoTilesViewer.I had the modelmip.tag from SanFran already.Then there's a section on renaming Jon's trees. I haven't done this part since I feared it might mess up other UK areas. Will the UK require "s_trees" as well as "j_trees"? I seem to have plenty of trees without renaming any of them. These are my kind of airports. I'm going to spend a lot of time flying smaller aircraft in this area. Thanks Agtim!best regards,Hans Petter

[Guest R_Driscoll]

WHoops - I've already used a lot of "j-trees"! Jon, can we just use one or the other? Whty not just use the "j-trees"? RobD.

[agtim 0]

Hi AllThanks for feedback glad to hear you get it working :-) Answer to Questions:Modelmip.tag: We need model collection handling tools - not just the modelmip.tag file. The tool must analyze all m0xxxx.mod files and display a list by location many crashes to Desktop is due to wrong models lost anywhere in the region hard or even impossible to locate with FLEDSo what I will do is not directly the modelmip.tag but a utility to handle it, add, remove models...A nice way would be a connection to Gideon's Modellviewer.Outside of modelmips.tag is a place for single used large models. Models not in the file are replicated for each location in the m0xxxx.mod files blowing it up and consuming a lot of resources at runtime.As Robert suggest we need a published list with mane and version and attributes - may be with picture and scale indication, some models are totally out of scale when put in UK-South (examples: Twins too large, Sailboat to small.)Building the scenery I found it hard to find and locate single models in all the collection missing an overview - this was the reason for the tree exhibition near Sandown airport. May be we need a rename model tool inside FLED area also, to solve problems of mixed version as s-trees/j-treesIf you don't rename the s_tree to j_tree (or hold both named version into your /GEN) then you will just not see the exhibition but all other trees and hedges are still there.Version of GeoTilesViewer:Hans, the included GeoTilesViewer.exe in the IOW-zip is Version 3.0 - I just checked my UK_IOW.zip, file date is 17.mar.2003The older one is in the last update cd from Quaxo but will be usable also. Differences between 2.97 and 3.0 is the import from painted maps. Before you can use this feature to make own elevation of megatiles like bmam I have to write a tutorial.basic drawing for current megatile looks like this http://www.agtim.ch/fu3/images/iowelevation.jpgUse the 4096x4096 tga picture created using GenQuadrant.exe reading the wanted megatile and output it as L0.tga and rename to h0xxxx.tga, xxxx for the megatile.This picture is using the Sanfran-Palette, modify the first 16 or 32 palette entries using irfanview as shown in the right part of the picture. First entry is for 0m each next color is for the next step at 10m. In the picture above the pre painted elevation from isolines (using the same palette !!) is pasted into the bmam megatile and set to the right position according to the coastline. Last things to do after that is painting the 10m and 0m level using the coastline of the picture making an excellent fit to it.at the end the picture has no color above the max. elevation palette entry. Such a picture named as H0xxxx is then processed by GetTilesViewer 3.0 making the 256x256 elevation map for xxxx. Elevation in the white parts of the picture is not changed so it is possible to change just small parts in a megatile and leave the remaining parts as generated in the distribution.This just as a very short tutorial. :-) :-wave agtim

[Hans_Petter 1]

I just renamed all of the "stree" to "jtree" and pasted them all into the GEN folder. However, I got one of them wrong and it ended up as "jstree". This one caused my sim to crash until I corrected it. The moral is, FU3 will not run if there are any unresolved models present.Hans Petter

[Guest R_Driscoll]

Agtim, I understood about making a new modelmip.tag - I did this as an exercise some time ago using the Challenge adventure tools, and it works well. I think its better to rebuild the whole file rather than an editor to modify it, as replacement models may have a different size to the original models and so their space allocation in the file would need to be varied. But its up to you!One other difficulty would be distribution of the improved modelmip.tag - maybe it would need to be run from a script file so that it could be updated "at home" rather than "at Avsim".On a more important note, I flew the AOW airports last night and it blew my socks off (I mean, it looks good). The airports are great, but your sculpting efforts on the landscape are amazing - the best ever. It reminded me again of Half-Moon Bay and the great chain of mountains following the rift valley down the coast - plenty of places to explore, gullys to follow, and all in great colour. I think you have set a new standard for packages here! I flew down to glidernut's lighthouse, listened to the gulls, flew around the Needles then back around Sandown to a perfect landing (apart from that danged idiot taking off into the wind). This area is a real pleasure to fly. Thanks again,RobD.

[agtim 0]

Hi Rob,Your welcome, updated "at home" is the right thing for modelmips.tag same as now for the updates of elevation by small parts.Landscape quality at IOW is now about that of the Seattle area, take a lot of work but looks far more reallistic. :-wave agtim

[Guest jonpoint]

Folks,My apologies for the tree re-naming! My reasoning is that the 'new' trees are slightly different from the old ones, mostly in texture though. When I tried converting the MIPs to Sanfran, some looked OK, others (esp the dead ones) took on a strange colour. This forced me to go back to the original files and convert from there but I still wasn't happy (I'd re-palettised the originals to the Seattle palette) so I had to modify the colours somewhat. Whilst I was at it I also changed a few tree dimensions (some looked too fat!) and this is why I changed the names!If you already have 'jtrees' in your Seattle, leave 'em there! Certainly for Sanfran or UK, use the 'strees'. I would prefer if developers would only use 'strees' in future for both regions. In any case, I think we should take Rob D's lead and always ship relevant models with packages. It prevents crashes and avoids having to audit our GEN folder every time we install something! As nice as it seems, I see no reason why anyone but a developer would want all 54 trees anyway - my seattlegen folder has hundreds of models in it - and I don't even know what half of them are!Jon Point*************************(effyouthree@hotmail.com)*************************

[Guest cornclose]

I have renamed s_tree to j_tree, but I'm still unclear as to what other effects this may have. Was anything using s_tree before, and now won't work ? Do I need both s_tree and j_tree in the GEN folder ?Now I only have j_tree, should I copy these and make another set called s_tree ?CheersChris E, Confused from ENGLANDhttp://www.circle-software.co.ukAvoid AGP texturing = Better Performance ;)