Skymaxx Pro - Will this be possible in new version coming?

[Vantskruv]

Pictures says it all:

Edited March 22, 2016 by Vantskruv
space title missing

[JohnMAXX]

Yes.....cumulus congestus and cirrus are already well represented.....Storm fronts will be present with RWC....

But SMP will not take photographs, we haven't figured that out yet....

[sundog]

In all seriousness, we've been hearing from a few very vocal customers lately who really do want SMP to show photographs. I know some cloud packages in certain other simulators take this approach, and it's usually people coming from FSX who expect this.

However, we've never set out to replicate the cloud add-ons for FSX. Our clouds are created algorithmically in three dimensions, ensuring an immersive 3D experience as you fly around and through the clouds where no two clouds are exactly the same. That's not going to change anytime soon.

If you have any questions as to whether SkyMaxx Pro is right for you, I encourage you to look at the videos and screenshots on our product page. We don't misrepresent anything. The upcoming 3.1 update adds landing light illumination on clouds, but focuses more on performance enhancements than visual changes. 

[Aviator75]

Soon ?

Envoyé de mon iPhone en utilisant Tapatalk

[sundog]

We just packaged up our release candidate 3 internally - so yes, soon!

[azpilot]

Looking forward to it.

[Aviator75]

We just packaged up our release candidate 3 internally - so yes, soon!

Thanks.

[K4bel123]

Well, you said that landing lights will now illuminate the clouds. This sounds great. But does this also mean, that with SMP3.1 the clouds will now be dark at night? Because I really like X-Plane´s night lighting and therefore I don´t like these really white clouds at night. Please change that in a future update.

Besides, you´re doing a great job. Keep it up!

Also: Will the clouds draw distance improve (without a major performance hit) with SM RWC?

Edited March 23, 2016 by K4bel123

[Diego747s]

4 hours ago, K4bel123 said:

Well, you said that landing lights will now illuminate the clouds. This sounds great. But does this also mean, that with SMP3.1 the clouds will now be dark at night? Because I really like X-Plane´s night lighting and therefore I don´t like these really white clouds at night. Please change that in a future update.

Besides, you´re doing a great job. Keep it up!

Also: Will the clouds draw distance improve (without a major performance hit) with SM RWC?

It would be nice that the city lights could be reflected on the clouds. Like xenviro does

[sundog]

14 hours ago, K4bel123 said:

Well, you said that landing lights will now illuminate the clouds. This sounds great. But does this also mean, that with SMP3.1 the clouds will now be dark at night? Because I really like X-Plane´s night lighting and therefore I don´t like these really white clouds at night. Please change that in a future update.

Besides, you´re doing a great job. Keep it up!

Also: Will the clouds draw distance improve (without a major performance hit) with SM RWC?

Clouds are dark at night already. It sounds like you might be using an older version, or you're encountering a very specific time and place where the lighting isn't what you expect. There are some very minor tweaks to cloud lighting around sunset and sunrise in the 3.1 update however.

3.1 has a bunch of performance improvements in it. You may be able to get away with higher draw distance settings, with or without Real Weather Connector installed.

[sundog]

9 hours ago, Diego747s said:

It would be nice that the city lights could be reflected on the clouds. Like xenviro does

I've thought about it, but I haven't been able to find a way to do this accurately enough. X-Plane doesn't have a dataref or anything that says "city lights cover this area" that a plugin can access. xenviro must be approximating this information somehow, but I don't know how to be honest.

[Diego747s]

6 hours ago, sundog said:

I've thought about it, but I haven't been able to find a way to do this accurately enough. X-Plane doesn't have a dataref or anything that says "city lights cover this area" that a plugin can access. xenviro must be approximating this information somehow, but I don't know how to be honest.

Maybe you and xenviro developer (FlyingByWires) can share that info? Just an idea. Maybe he uses major airports nearby to determine if it's a big city or not in order to do such effect. Keep up the great work!

Sorry for my english 

[K4bel123]

Well I don´t think that there is a newer version of Skymaxx Pro v3 available since I´m using SMP3.0. And to me these clouds look way too bright at night. I´d really appreciate if you could make them darker.

[Cameron]

1 hour ago, K4bel123 said:

I´d really appreciate if you could make them darker.

You are not everyone.

We've been through this with a group before. The overall consensus was pretty overwhelmingly in favor of the current implementation. 

I'm sorry if you don't find that to be realistic, but many others do.

[Ben Russell]

3 hours ago, K4bel123 said:

Well I don´t think that there is a newer version of Skymaxx Pro v3 available since I´m using SMP3.0. And to me these clouds look way too bright at night. I´d really appreciate if you could make them darker.

I had a quick look at this with a color sampling tool and none of the pixels in the cloud zone are above 4% brightness. 

There's not much margin there and pure black in reality is extremely rare.

If anything, X-Plane needs to lighten it's landscape. 0% light return from land is.... unlikely.

 

Edited March 25, 2016 by Ben Russell

[K4bel123]

12 hours ago, Ben Russell said:

If anything, X-Plane needs to lighten it's landscape. 0% light return from land is.... unlikely

I totally agree with you on that. Same goes for the sky at night when there is moon light. In reality the whole sky is visibly dark blue but X-Plane can only show some bright blue directly around the moon whereas the rest of the sky remains pitch black.

[sundog]

We do simulate the effects of moonlight on the clouds, so that's probably what you're seeing. It's quite intentional.

[Leporello]

On 21/3/2016 at 0:38 PM, sundog said:

In all seriousness, we've been hearing from a few very vocal customers lately who really do want SMP to show photographs. I know some cloud packages in certain other simulators take this approach, and it's usually people coming from FSX who expect this.

However, we've never set out to replicate the cloud add-ons for FSX. Our clouds are created algorithmically in three dimensions, ensuring an immersive 3D experience as you fly around and through the clouds where no two clouds are exactly the same. That's not going to change anytime soon.

 

But would not be possible to mix the two approaches: photo rendering at far distance and 3D rendering around the plane? Of course 3d clouds are far superior regarding flight immersion and experience but at greater distance they loose appeal and impact heavy on FPS. Just a noob question, I know little about Xplane SDK for weather management.

Edited April 16, 2016 by Leporello

[Ben Russell]

Here's a video of how "Impostors" work in a graphics engine like SkyMAXX.

Jump to 2m 40s if the embed doesn't work..

 

 

[K4bel123]

I´m really sad that you changed the brightness of the clouds at night again. They were perfect with SMP 3.1 but aren´t anymore with the new patches. White clouds at night really kill the immersion for me so I have to turn SMP off at night. If you could just send me a fix for this this would be so great.

Besides, I noticed that when flying the IXEG 737 with SMP 3.1.2 the landing lights don´t illuminate the clouds. Have you also noticed that @Cameron ?

[Cameron]

2 hours ago, K4bel123 said:

I´m really sad that you changed the brightness of the clouds at night again. They were perfect with SMP 3.1 but aren´t anymore with the new patches. White clouds at night really kill the immersion for me so I have to turn SMP off at night. If you could just send me a fix for this this would be so great.

We have to listen to the majority of our customers. They really hated what we did in 3.1, unlike you. Our inboxes were screaming about it!

2 hours ago, K4bel123 said:

Besides, I noticed that when flying the IXEG 737 with SMP 3.1.2 the landing lights don´t illuminate the clouds. Have you also noticed that @Cameron ?

Yes. It's an IXEG issue, not an SMP one. It'll works with other lights on IXEG instead. Not sure what route will be taken for this just yet.

[sundog]

Keep in mind the brightness of the clouds at night also has to do with the phase and location of the moon. If you want darker clouds, try experimenting with different dates and times in X-Plane. A new moon or a time where the moon has not risen will result in much darker clouds.

[K4bel123]

16 hours ago, Cameron said:

We have to listen to the majority of our customers. They really hated what we did in 3.1, unlike you. Our inboxes were screaming about it!

Yes. It's an IXEG issue, not an SMP one. It'll works with other lights on IXEG instead. Not sure what route will be taken for this just yet.

I fully understand your approach to this, Cameron. I´m just sad that the majority wants these unrealistic white clouds. Would it be possible to inject a hotfix code (like with the IXEG 733) to change the cloud brightness? Otherwise I can´t fly with SMP at night anymore...

I´d really appreciate your support on this

@Cameron @sundog

Edited April 30, 2016 by K4bel123

[sundog]

7 hours ago, K4bel123 said:

I fully understand your approach to this, Cameron. I´m just sad that the majority wants these unrealistic white clouds. Would it be possible to inject a hotfix code (like with the IXEG 733) to change the cloud brightness? Otherwise I can´t fly with SMP at night anymore...

I´d really appreciate your support on this

@Cameron @sundog

Change the simulated date to a night that has a new moon, or to a time where then moon isn't out, and you'll be much happier.

 

[K4bel123]

33 minutes ago, sundog said:

Change the simulated date to a night that has a new moon, or to a time where then moon isn't out, and you'll be much happier.

 

Thx for this workaround! I didn´t know that there was something like new moon simulated in X-Plane 10. But is it really difficult to make a hotfix for people who aren´t happy with the white clouds? I mean you already have had the other version coded...