Project 3

[Cat]

I'm so excited to fly this plane. It sounds like it will be a great experience. Thank you's to everyone involved in this project!

Cat ~

[Jacoba]

There are a few things giving us problems that we are trying to sort out and they are proving very stubborn!

Get a bigger hammer!

;D

[Maxime]

I found this photo on airliners.net, can you find the Saab in the photo?

I did!!

[Jacoba]

I found this photo on airliners.net, can you find the Saab in the photo?

I did!!

From the size of that thing, it could very well be in the baggage compartment... flying around! 

[Maxime]

It's behind the tail of the a380!! ;D

Good one!!

[Goran_M]

Just a small heads up for everyone who is interested.

There is a committed team of 3 people working on the Saab with a 4th person lending an occasional hand to try to get it out as soon as possible.

I sincerely appreciate all the emails I am getting and the interest shown in these forums. 

I love keeping the interest alive by posting regular updates so I can keep everyone informed.

Rest assured, Theo, Reuben and myself are working some ridiculous hours (often starting around 9am and going to sleep in the early hours of the morning) to get this project finished and to a standard we are all satisfied with.

Over the last few weeks, there have been some unforeseen challenges we were faced with that took some time to resolve.  There were some texturing, blender and dataref issues and some of the gauges were behaving very strangely.  Only recently have we been able to get them working somewhat correctly. 

If there are any updates to be posted about the Saab, I will make sure they are posted as soon as there is something worth posting.

Posting updates on what datarefs were added and adjusted or what textures were fixed is not really something that many people are interested in and is taking time away from the task at hand.

I have a deadline in mind and both Theo and Reuben are definite about reaching that deadline.  I don't want to give out "near definite" time frames, but it will be ready in a matter of weeks.

Cheers

Goran

[Cat]

Thanks for the update. I'll patiently wait 

Cat ~

PS - Oh, and thanks to everyone for all the hard work!

[YYZatcboy]

Are there any in sim renders yet?

(Don't do any just for us if it will take you away from getting it out sooner . The mountains are begging me to fly in the SAAB)

Cheers

Joe

[Goran_M]

Any sim renders?  A resounding Yes!  Interior AND exterior.  BUT, we can't show them just yet.  Textures are not final.  

Goran

[YYZatcboy]

YAY. The mountains thank you.

(For everyone who is not Goran and does not know what I am talking about, I've got lots of routes ready to go up and down the coast mountains. Pacific Coastal Airlines who actually flies the A variant of the SAAB is who I am basing these routes on.)

Hopefully Theo is back from his vacation

[Goran_M]

Progress is being made at a decent rate again.  The overhead has quite a few systems tied into it and the gauges on the main panel that were giving us problems are now somewhat co operating with us but it's all being done at a nice steady pace. 

I've never been happy with the seats and Theo has asked if I could do them again as they were a little difficult to texture.  So they will be done in the next day or 2 with quite a bit more detail.

Reuben has been showing me some progress "alpha" flights in the simulator via skype screen sharing and it looks absolutely brilliant.  Animations are all working and the displays and the vast majority of the switches and gauges are working flawlessly. 

I feel I have to apologize to those that are waiting for this, as I said it would most likely be ready by Christmas and it's now been almost a month overdue.  Yes, we could have released it for Christmas if it was rushed, but as I said in another post, we want it to be something that we can be judged on for future products.

In saying that, I have set a deadline for us to have it ready and that deadline is fast approaching.  The moment it's ready, I will mention it in these forums.

Goran

[-TheoGregory]

Hopefully Theo is back from his vacation

A vacation is where you have time from work. Working roughly 6 hours a day in a different location could hardly be called a vacation 

-Theo

P.S. Andy where about round Canterbury are you from. Only asking as I'm in Christchurch myself  ...

[YYZatcboy]

Git'er done, and git'er done well is my motto. If we have to wait... so be it. Better to wait and get a finished product than have you guys rush and not have it work right.

Congrats guys, looking forward to it.

[Gjalp]

[table][tr][td]P.S. Andy where about round Canterbury are you from. Only asking as I'm in Christchurch myself   ...[/td][/tr][/table]

Hi Theo,

Im in Halswell.

Slainte,

Andy

NZCH

[Goran_M]

Reuben is having (too much) fun flying the Saab with about 80% of the animations done.  Everything but some of the overhead panel is animated and working perfectly.

Textures are being finalized, the last of the systems are being tied into the overhead and are closely matching the actual AOM of the real Saab aircraft and the remaining bugs are being ironed out.

Once I get the final version from Reuben, there will be a small beta period while I finish off the manual, then it's going to be made available.

Pricing is still TBA. 

The deadline I gave ourselves was end of January, but to be honest, I'm guessing, realistically, it will be somewhere around mid February.  There are many systems we are simulating and it is very tedious work.  We are trying desperately to finish it by end of January, but I don't want to commit to that date.

What I can tell you for certain is, it is flying, and everything, from what we have seen, is working as it should.

Goran

[YYZatcboy]

Tell Ruben to stop playing around and get back to work so we can all fly it around

Good to hear all the animations are coming together. I can't wait to play around in the cockpit, and take her up for a spin.

[hobofat]

I can't wait to play around in the cockpit, and take her up for a spin.

Yup!  Already have a whole series of flights planned out waiting to go.

[Goran_M]

After much exporting and experimenting, we're down to just half the overhead and a few very tiny niggly pieces on the main panel  needing to be animated.

I thought I might show you guys a small peek at what Reuben has been doing when he should be working.  These just popped into my dropbox a few hours ago.

(Love ya Roobz!)

These textures are by no means final.  They are purely for reference to see the effect of different lighting on a work in progress texturing workflow.  The obj fuselage has been coded to add some shine and it is playing havoc with the texture maps resulting in unrealistic colors which Theo is slowly working around to get JUST RIGHT.

We're aware of the very few errors in the screenshots, so for the Hawk-Eyed amongst you, no need to tell us what they are.

Goran

[Kesomir]

Does that mean that repaints will have a colour shift goran?

[Goran_M]

Possibly.  We'll see what we can come up with.

No guarantees.

Goran

[Maxime]

Goran, this is awsome!!!!!

Great job!!!

Can we have some cabin and cockpit pics?

[Goran_M]

Cabin textures are still too rough to show and Cockpit textures are being worked on.  What I CAN show you of the cockpit are these:

They are pretty much final with some textures to be added to the armrests and base.  They were a little hard to texture properly on the old mesh.  So, I completely re-modelled them to have better resolution and a more "cushy" look to the cushions.

Hope you like the sheepskin.

;D

Goran

[Maxime]

Yea i think it looks wonderful. ;D

Keep up the good work!!!

[YYZatcboy]

Looks great. Glad to hear it's pretty close now.

[Jacoba]

Cabin textures are still too rough to show and Cockpit textures are being worked on.  What I CAN show you of the cockpit are these:

They are pretty much final with some textures to be added to the armrests and base.  They were a little hard to texture properly on the old mesh.  So, I completely re-modelled them to have better resolution and a more "cushy" look to the cushions.

Hope you like the sheepskin.

;D

Goran

Sweet!

They come with stains too!

;D ;D ;D ;D