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Christopher Low

Work in progress screenshots

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The following screenshots show upgrades and alterations to several airfields, for inclusion in Seattle 2004 and SanFran 2004.1. GREEN VALLEY.....showing the new log defined runway and parking area, and the increased number of trees.2. MARTHA LAKE.....This airfield package was originally combined with Apex Airpark and Harvey Field in a single folder (a result of one of my first ever scenery projects with FLED). I finally decided to completely rebuild these packages as three separate items, and this screenshot shows the new Martha Lake package. The trees do not extend around the lake anymore, since I wanted a tighter, more realistic feel.3. SEQUIM VALLEY.....I have only just completed the tree upgrades to this airfield today. There are now lots more trees, and the airfield has a denser and more realistic appearance. There is still plenty of work to be done here, including the erection of fencing around the taxiways.4. VASHON MUNICIPAL.....This screenshot clearly shows a far greater number of trees, which are tightly clustered for maximum effect. Once again, plenty of work needs to be done, including adding runway markers, creating a new parking area, and eventually deleting the dotted lines.5. SONOMA SKYPARK.....Note the new, improved section of taxiway adjacent to the runway 26 threshold.Best Wishes,Chris Low,ENGLAND.PS. I have not used any of the new tree models in these upgraded packages. Trying to determine which new trees to add (and where) would have greatly increased the time taken to complete these upgrades.....and I have far too much other work to do here besides adding trees ! :-)


Christopher Low

UK2000 Beta Tester

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Guest R_Driscoll

Very very impressive - i have always thought that FU3 needed a bit more verticality. The effect of adding a few (hundred?) trees is remarkable. Well done again!RobD.

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Guest Robs

Chris:-(Please keep in mind that some of us don't have machines dropped from LGM I have just a P111 650 and it might struggle!!!I love you packages but I'd like to keep the frame rate up!Rob.

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Sorry Rob, but I'm thinking about my next PC :-)Chris Low,ENGLAND.


Christopher Low

UK2000 Beta Tester

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Looking good Chris! Regarding low-end PCs and frame rate issues, please consider putting some of the heavy stuff in a separate package. As I've mentioned a few times that's what I'm doing with the London City airport. A separate enhancement package may contain trees, fences, static aircraft etc for the entire region and may be set up to mesh with the essential main package. This way the "low-enders" may easily opt out of the heavy eye candy by avoiding the enhancement package. Further, since the enhancement package contains no airport info it won't add to the limited number of airports.Next PC? I'm going to get the most powerful processor that this motherboard will accept first. My current processor is 1.2 Ghz but the card will run up to 2 Ghz. FU3 can be incredibly "heavy", even by today's standards. Lots of overlapping models (ground textures) will exacerbate the problems since the sim has to render all textures and all layers, even the ones we don't see. Polygon size doesn't really matter but polygon count does. This means that it pays to cover the ground with one large slab of grass / concrete rather than using multiple smaller ones. Trees are "heavy" since each one presents two crossed surfaces and we need a lot of them to create a realistic-looking grove.best regards,Hans Petter

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Hans,Actually, it isn't framerate on low end PC's that concerns me. That can easily be corrected.......just upgrade :-) No, the problem that annoys me concerns the "freezing" just after take-off or landing at certain airports. Many of you are no doubt familiar with this around the San Francisco area, but it is also present at McChord AFB and SeaTac International (and possibly other locations) in the Seattle region. The increase in the number of trees in my new packages is only going to exacerbate the problem. At the moment, I am getting a 5 or 6 second freeze after take-off at McChord AFB :-eekThis is unacceptable in my opinion, but it is also unacceptable to leave the current airfield packages as they are. It was only when I checked them all in FLED that I realised how sparse and unrealistic many of the airfield packages were (the trees were too few, and far too thinly spread). I am hoping that my new upgrades will make them feel more "alive", even without animated objects.If anyone has any idea how the freezing problem can be solved, then DO IT ! :-) I know that there are plenty of talented programmers around here, or does this involve messing around in the FU3 source code itself ? If so, then I will just have to send an e-mail to Electronic Arts, asking them to send me this by airmail as soon as possible :-lolSeriously though, if they (or anyone else who thinks that they own the code) aren't going to do anything with it, then it makes sense to donate it to the FU3 community, who most assuredly WILL :-)Chris Low,ENGLAND.


Christopher Low

UK2000 Beta Tester

FSBetaTesters3.png

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SF2004 makes me even more angry than usual that i lost FUII!!!!!!! I hope its in my New Jersey home..............-Tom

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Tom,Don't worry. You should be able to find a copy of Flight Unlimited 2 for sale, since it is still available on the SOLD OUT budget label. That means it's CHEAP !Chris Low,ENGLAND.


Christopher Low

UK2000 Beta Tester

FSBetaTesters3.png

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Guest Robs

Chris,Perhaps you could put the trees in seperate packages eg McChord trees....If you spread around the packages then it might try to load less on take off and landing.... and try to load some more trees as you fly over them .....it may reduce the freezes to a couple of stuttersIt was the freezing that bothered me too.....I think it loads all the objects in the area into memory off the hard drive.....Rob.

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thanks. oh yeah....i almost forgot about ebay. i remember seeing them being sold for under 5 bucks.

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Rob,Unfortunately, attempting to spread the trees around different packages would result in this project becoming Seattle 2010 !!!If the objects are all loaded from the hard disk, then what FU3 needs is some kind of intelligent "cache" system, whereby the software "thinks ahead" as to what will be required. Can this be done, or is it something that we (yet again) need the source code for ?Of course, you could always have only certain packages installed at a time, depending on where you want to fly on that particular day. For example, McChord AFB is also relatively close to Gray AAF, Tacoma Narrows, Spanaway, Shady Acres, and Clover Park TC. I will have to experiment here, and see if removing these other packages significantly improves performance.Chris Low,ENGLAND.


Christopher Low

UK2000 Beta Tester

FSBetaTesters3.png

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