Robert455

The B-17s fly over then I start up and launch to catch up with them at about 7 minutes in. After flying with them a while I go land and they fly over again.

Using the HTC Vive...

I worked up a series of flag designs for the Franz-Luftfahrt paramotor and they have them available for free download at the Franz-Luftfahrt.com website if anybody wants them. Here is a video that shows what they look like: The hero sails aren't included in the download due to copyright. Just the flags. But for anyone who wants to make their own hero sails, or any other designs, they have a paint kit download available as well. The paramotor is a blast to fly, especially in VR. Huge fun!

I don't get the negativity either. If a company is creating something I'm not interested in, I just don't buy it. I certainly understand that Dovetail is essentially the curator of the MSFS code that many or most of us have installed and enjoy. That creates a bit of feeling of ownership. But the thing is that a flight sim is a flight sim. Those that don't seem to think enough is changing if Orbx scenery can be used easily may not understand that Microsoft, and SubLogic before them, had decades to optimize code and work out best practices. (And I know that add-on scenery and aircraft aren't that old of a feature.) There probably will be more in the way of feature adds and modernization than blank sheet of paper total re-writes. I think any new press for flight simulation is a good thing. If people are drawn in and like flight, and the DTG flight trainer or even the sim itself aren't up to snuff, these new users can always move to the more traditional sims. I have a feeling both DTG sims will be good, though. Not perfect, probably, but what we have now isn't perfect. We'll be fine and I'm looking forward to seeing what DTG comes out with.

Sure, you can tell DTG what you want and you should. But not everyone else feels the same as you or me. MS Flight isn't really a supported product now, is it? It was released in February 2012 and cancelled in July 2012. I don't think anyone won anything with that one. I don't see why threatening companies that veterans will put them out of business is useful in any way. The car repair analogy is flawed if I even understand what you are trying to say. You bought a car, FSX, and sure it has some problems but it works fine. Now the company is coming out with a new car, DFS, and before it even hits showrooms you want to tell the company they are all wrong? Nothing about getting repairs to FSX even applies to DFS. There are other car companies anyway. I don't get the whole car repair thing. If you think they are doing it so wrong, then build your own sim and show everyone how it should be done. And you have your favorite planes. Good for you. If they aren't in Flight School, maybe they will be in the overall sim the end of the year. Or maybe sometime after release. Saying they are afraid or ashamed to reveal the other plane is over the top. Maybe they just want to do a big splash at GDC? So what if you don't like their plane choices. Maybe you should wait to see what they are bringing to the table before declaring it rotten. Problems obvious to you may not even be problems at all and just figments of your imagination. I'm also a flight sim "veteran". I started out with the Bruce Artwick/SubLogic flight simulator on an Apple ][. Let's wait and see and stop with the conspiracy stuff before pitchforks, hatchets, and bad analogies get raised too much. You want something new? So do I. Let's give them a chance and see how it goes before beating them up.

I am not so sure we can require any developer to do anything. DTG is paying for all this development and taking all the risk. Maybe it works for them and is a good product, and maybe it misses the mark. Nobody has to buy it if they don't like the approach, the compatibility, the scenery, the planes, or whatever. No sense raising pitchforks or hatchets. It's just not a big deal. And sooner is better than later, in my opinion. DTG is going to keep FSX going at least for some amount of time and all our add-ons will continue to work with it. I don't know that many had a thought when they bought scenery or planes that they should remain compatible with any future flight sims. I'm just looking to see what they come up with and how it looks and flys. I also really like the Cub and there are a lot of new Cubs hitting the real aircraft market in the light sport category. Apparently it's a growing thing. The Cub may be entirely appropriate for Kitfox and Cub pilots to be.

Well, so much for that theory, then. ;-) Maybe some licensing thing if they are both Pipers? But surely they can add aircraft after release if they choose.

Thank you, FDX777!

On the 80th anniversary of the Spitfire's first flight... A flight in virtual reality. Or the direct link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6zoVdRVg_A

A taildragger like the Cub is also very light and if the flight model is good, can go a long way to teaching that you are really "flying" an aircraft until it is parked. And, obviously, when you rotate a taildragger, gyroscopic effects come into play. Not that the Cub does it too much, but shadowing the tail surfaces and the subsequent reduction in control when in 3-point position and dealing with that is another important thing taildraggers can teach. All in all, something like a Cub can illustrate a lot of really important concepts in both flight and ground handling. Trikes are great trainers but they can hide a lot of the art of flying. And besides, there are two aircraft in Flight School. Do we know what the other plane is? Maybe it is a 172 or similar?

Try going to the parent page here: http://www.flyaoamedia.com/aviatorcast/ That works for me. ;-) And Highmike beat me to it. As an aside, Episode 77 is Dan Church - the creator of DCOC and FlyInside.

You are in for a treat Fro2do! Be sure to say hi over at the FlyInside boards and join us for some multiplayer flight. We run FSX:SE mostly since we all have that. Lock FSX frames at 30 in the FSX settings, set ClipMode=Minimum for the virtual cockpit entry in the cameras.cfg file, turn off collision detection if you wish, and prepare to be amazed! Or whatever you feel like doing, it's going to be a ride! ;-)

One last thing - tolerance for VR varies from person to person. It could be that if all the other stuff doesn't apply, you just may not be able to handle it. That's apparently just how it is for some people. Not very many, but some. If that's true for you, that's unfortunate as VR flight is a huge, huge joy for me and for all the guys I fly with who also run in VR.

Hi Ohsirus, I don't know what all you tried, but stuff with a first person shooter aspect like GTA5 in Vorpx is hard on people judging by the posts I've seen. I've never personally tried it but have tried some architectural walkthrough demos and some other experiences where you move with a mouse. The disconnect between what you see and what you aren't feeling is really large in the fps kinds of things and that disconnect leads to feelings of nausea and discomfort. The locomotion aspect is a tough nut to crack and there is a lot of experimentation going on to find ways that are easiest on people. I wish you had tried FlyInside, though. Cockpit experiences seem to be a lot easier on people. Driving, flying, and space types of cockpit sims possibly make the best first experiences because there is a frame of reference around you that even though you and it are moving through the greater space, your movements relative to that frame are exactly what you are doing as you look around and move your head, etc. Not nearly as big of a disconnect for the brain to deal with. It's widely known that cockpit experiences are much much easier on people until they get their "VR legs". One thing about the Vive is the way it is being delivered with tracked controllers and full 360 degree tracking all in one box is that you can do the "room scale" experiences provided your space has enough room. But in those where people walk around and interact with their virtual environment, I don't think one single person has experienced nausea or discomfort. The only instance I've heard of with the consumer prototype Rifts was the case of a BBS reporter at CES that got put into a sim called ADR1FT and something/someone had reversed her controls where everything for her was backwards. She got really nauseous and had to go outside and sit on the sidewalk for a long time until she felt well enough to get up again. But that's the only reported instance with the Rift production prototype that I am aware of. But regardless of the benefits of the new ergonomics and higher frame rates, what experiences you choose to do are a big factor in how they affect you. Just as in real life, a lot of the rollercoaster experiences get to people regardless of ergonomics, frame rates, etc. Since you mention the straps and screens thing, it sounds like you may have just had the straps too tight or it just compounded the other issues. The designs for both Rift and Vive now have kind of a triangular cradle around the back of your head and the headsets themselves are significantly lighter than the DK2. Comfort has been reported to be greatly improved. On the screens being so close to your eyes, yep, they are close but the optics in between correct the image to where you are focusing about 5 feet or so out. That's really good for me because to see close up I need glasses but in these headsets, I can see both near and far with no issues or glasses at all. Lastly, this could have also had some contribution from your computer. If you can't keep up the frame rates, below 73 fps the DK2 drops into a high persistence mode to avoid flashing the display right in your eyes at low rates. That can induce photosensitive epileptic seizures and to keep that from ever happening, the screen switches to always being on. But that always on mode shows blurring, smearing, and that can cause problems. Missed frames are another big one. Even if you can't see it, it can still trigger effects. Keeping up frame rates is very important in VR and the game engines are even now dynamically scaling detail in scenes to keep frames high when in VR. If you still have your DK2, you might give it a try with FlyInside. It has a frame rate display so you can see how you are doing. A lot of people have been trying to do VR with laptops though and if you are too, be especially wary. Those frequently don't meet spec and have other issues that make VR not work right on them. Not all, but most.

One more thing - I agree to some extent on the Oculus missing the boat comment. I think HTC/Vive do have the better tracking solution and have been wondering about the Touch delay. Those are just plastic, some LEDs, and some simple electronics. That those not only aren't shipping with the Rift and are delayed even later than originally announced is curious. But on the other side, the Rift has the field of view more set for horizontal while Vive is more in the vertical, has the hybrid optics, and is lighter and apparently will breathe better, are all pluses for the Rift for the kind of simming I do. I think the best headset would be a combination of Rift and Vive. Aside from Vive shipping with tracked controllers and Rift's being delayed, I think the other differences are small and people will be very happy with either. But the Vive tracked controllers shipping now may be very important to a lot of people. We need them both, though. The competition will keep them both on their best game and we win. It's very, very cool!

Hi Fro2do, Have you tried VR flight before? Just curious. If you haven't, it's absolutely amazing! There are a bunch of us over on the FlyInside boards and we all love it. Being in the airplane is so different from looking through a monitor-sized viewport. But you are right. It does take a lot of computer to run especially with detailed aircraft and add-on scenery. I think both headsets will be really amazing. Dan might get support for the Rift in place sooner since he has been working a lot more with the Oculus SDK, but he got in on the first shipments of the Vive so by the time yours arrives, it could be supported. It's truly the future and nothing we say really makes sense to those who haven't tried it yet. That's probably the worst part of VR. There is just no way to convey how the ground drops away, how you feel the height, how it all just looks so cool. At least for me it's what I had always wanted in computer flight and driving simulation - to actually enter the sim and see it from the inside. The Vive is a really nice system. I like the tracking and some of the other applications that use the wands too. The technology is finally here for us to be able to do this stuff. I just wish more simmers could try it for themselves. I was looking at the Steam community boards for Vive and so many of the gamers are put off by the price (admittedly high but it's just what it costs for twin displays, the tracking, the wands, the optics, etc). Yet many of them drop even more on SLI setups or whatever. But the common bit is the way they talk about it, it's obvious they haven't tried it. But as more try it, the word will spread. I should have a Rift in the first batch and am really really looking forward to trying what gen 1 is like. I was a beta tester on FlyInside and have been flying VR since Dan published DCOC for P3D. There's just no going back, at least for me! ;-)

Hey Paraffin, the graphics card and game engine companies are working on GPU per eye so each eye image gets rendered basically simultaneously. Eye tracking and foveated rendering just missed the gen one headsets but likely will be in gen two. Foveated rendering looks like it cuts GPU horsepower required pretty much in half and if people do dual GPUs for GPU per eye, that's almost a doubling of GPU power. Put it all together and that could be four times the performance at current resolution, or, it could possibly allow doubling the resolution of current screens at the same performance level as now without foveated rendering but on a single card. SLI doesn't work for VR but GPU per eye does and support is starting to roll out.

For multiplayer it seems you have to lock at 30 or else the other panes jitter a lot.

Thanks, Jcomm. ;-) Not sure where to put this since I didn't want to clutter the main DTG Q&A with Martin, but I saw a number of posts by the cockpit builders there asking about FSUIPC support (that is some amazing software, btw). Not sure if many here have tried virtual reality flight but it is truly amazing as it puts you in the flight sim and in the cockpit. But there has been an issue with realistic activation of knobs, switches, and levers. You can use the keyboard (cumbersome) or a mouse (actually not bad but in VR you don't see the real world so well - i.e. not at all unless you lift up the HMD though one has a forward facing camera on it so you sometimes fumble a bit reaching out to find it) or with lots of switches and buttons programmed on a stick if you have a stick with lots of switches and buttons. But the guy making the VR plugin for FSX/P3D has been working on support for tracked hands. There is a thing called Leap Motion that you can use to track your hands but until a driver software update from the manufacturer just in the last month it wasn't good enough to use for reliable cockpit interaction. https://youtube.com/watch?v=dDd8psWui8A. This is what it looks like now. The thing is that with VR and hand tracking, you can have cockpit interaction in most any aircraft instead of having to build specific or generic cockpits. The thing is there is no tactile feedback yet (believe it or not there are ways of doing that coming) so you have to watch as you reach with your hands to interact, but it works. It may not be for everyone but you basically get a full cockpit in any plane just by saddling up the airplane. Reach out and start flipping switches, levers, etc. Wait until you guys try VR flight. It's really bizarre to find yourself in the airplane cockpit with full natural head tracking, able to look all around, look close, judge depth and distance like in the real world, see everything at full size, etc. It's why I can't go back to monitor flight and it is very addicting.

Tom, I just realized that you may have thought I was saying DTG's Fliight Scool program didn't have scenarios, add-in scenery, etc. I was referring to Digital Combat Simulator (DCS) - not DFS. DCS doesn't have add-in scenery (that I know of), limited support for other aircraft, and is really mostly a combat simulator but is really beautiful. I have the Steam version and am really anxious to get the Nevada scenery as all it has now is the Black Sea region. That's what I was talking about. Not Dovetail's Flight School. I think DFS will be great and as I said, just wish it had VR support but understand totally that I'll have to wait - which is OK. I'm sure it will all come in time and fingers crossed they support a rigorous flight model. But whatever they do, I am happy to see the hobby supported and progressing!

Hi Tom, no problem. I have a thick skin and can get salty myself. But also, I didn't mean that negatively about FSX either. It's just more a statement of fact that the core of the flight sim itself won't be getting any major updates especially now that DTG has embarked on this path with new sims. FSX still has wonderful community support and will be a go-to platform for some time to come. It's my sim of choice and I have it loaded up with extra aircraft, scenery, and plug-ins. I'm not a combat sim kind of person and as beautiful as DCS, I pretty much exclusively set up missions where I can fly formation with other aircraft and just enjoy the flying most of all instead of fighting. What I really love is civilian flight, sightseeing, and formation in FSX in VR. But also, I wasn't poo-pooing DTG's new sims at all. I support the effort and really look forward to seeing what they do. I'm really intrigued by the few screenshots so far and really want to see civilian flight sims get the kind of graphics that I love so much in DCS. The only thing about these new sims for me is lack of VR support right out the gate. I really can't fly a monitor any more now that I have been flying in VR and without VR support I'll just have to wait a bit longer but I'm confident it will come. Now that the consumer VR HMDs are hitting in April, as more discover and try flying in VR, there just won't be a way for flight sims to survive without supporting it. So it will get there I'm sure. And I'm sure there will be a big monitor base too. I'm just saying I'm in the VR flight sim camp from here on out. I love it and everyone I've talked with or showed it to agrees. But it won't be everyone. But it will be big. I'm a huge fan of Flight Simulator and glad to see the mantle getting picked back up. I'm also glad to hear DTG plans to work with devs because Dan Church has done amazing things with both FSX and P3D and VR. I didn't mean for my post to sound negative at all. Unfortunately FSX is pretty CPU/core bound and FSX apparently won't get any updates that fix that. That was all I meant - that FSX won't be getting any more overhauls which I think is true. But that's not bad or a strike against it. It works great and will continue to see more scenery, more aircraft, and more innovations.

Time is nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once. :smile: But seriously, all these things do take time. Just look at how long it took a legion of developers to expand out FSX, how long Eagle Dynamics has been working on DCS, etc. What they need to do is get a good basic sim out there and go from there with community feedback, etc. My personal want is VR support but that at least won't be supported immediately in either. I just can't fly now without it and neither do the other VR flyers I hang with. But even without it, I'd love to see DTG build out Flight School and Flight Simulator with all the new stuff and modern programming to make better use of modern multi-core systems and the powerful GPUs out now. FSX itself is a dead end and has been for a while. P3D is supported and is being expanded so that's really good. But for me, the best in looks and fidelity is DCS though there are very few aircraft, no add-on scenery, and no civilian scenarios. So I'm hopeful. And I bet VR gets in there either through aftermarket plugin or through direct support integrated by Dovetail. We'll get there. It just may take a while.