Flight Deck Shadows

[avatartrooper]

Hello everyone,

I just noticed a little thing when looking at screenshots, I'm not even sure if it's a bug or a feature (better Performance?) or if it's already fixed together with the buggy aircraft shadows from the cockpit view in a future update.

So basically some parts of the cockpit are not casting shadows like the radio knobs on the pedestal, the fire handles,* the Flap-, Speedbrakes-, Gear-, Fuelcutoff- and Throttlelevers and maybe on some other parts I haven't noticed yet. At the same time all knobs an switches on the MCP and the yoke have shadows aswell as the "problem parts" mentioned above in other default or third party aircraft.

I've tried different Plugin combinations without any change. The following screenshots were made with a clean X-plane Install with SMP, RWC, MaxxXP and in some cases RTH with shadows set to Global (high). Except for the first screenshot, all of them were made at the same place on about the same time of day

First of all here you can see the "bug" very well on the Fuelcutofflever and Firehandles.

A shot of the Pedestal. THIS SHOULDN'T BE CHANGED*

In contrast this is from the default 747, you can clearly see the shadows of the Audio and Radiopanels. And it does look worse than the ambient shadows seen in the pic above.*

And finally here's the LES SAAB, pretty much every switch, knob or lever is casting a shadow (except on the pressurization where the shadow already gets blurry) and it really makes a difference.

Again, this is a very minor thing, one on that you don't really notice if it's existent or absent, as long as you're not looking for it, but it does improve the immersion, a important part of any Game or Simulator and also something the IXEG-Team gladly seems really fond of.

To wrap this thing up, a huge thank you to the developers for creating this piece of software and I'm sure this problem will be fixed or it becomes an option. This Addon is one of the few across all platforms (the only one in XPX to this level) that really gets you into the state of mind of sitting in an living, breathing machine. Seriously on my third flight I noticed the plane veering to the left on taxi, looked at the engine gauges saw that engine one is accelerating slower and is running on an higher EGT and my first thought was "I really need to keep an eye on that engine" not the typical "Oh, that's a nice feature". That's a experience I've only had before in a A2A GA or a damaged DCS Warthog (this is a very positive compliment).

*look at my second post for clarification

So I hope my English did hold up during all of this and, I know I'm repeating myself, a huge thanks to the whole Team for the amazing aircraft and also the great support after a bumpy start.

Edited May 4, 2016 by avatartrooper

[poodster]

I think this is because of performance. I was fidling around with plane maker the other day and these objects don't have shadows turned on.

[Litjan]

9 hours ago, poodster said:

I think this is because of performance. I was fidling around with plane maker the other day and these objects don't have shadows turned on.

That's correct.

Jan

 

[avatartrooper]

6 hours ago, Litjan said:

That's correct.

Thanks for the reply, so then my first assumption was correct and it's a fair trade off. Actually the more I compare the 747 and 733 shots, the more I think the IXEG approach on the Pedestal is better, especially on the buttons and smaller volume knobs the shadows get weird and look way worse than the baked in (very well done) "texture shadows" of the 733.

But I think my point still stands, at least for other parts of the Flight Deck. I tried to capture another screenshot showing some things that can be improved in my opinion without sacrificing too much Performance (or is it really that heavy on the FPS?). Namely everything on the Throttle Stand and the Gear Lever lacking shadows, which you can see during most of the day. As you can see they somewhat look out of place compared to other parts like the Course Knob on the MCP.

I hope you can see what I mean here, maybe you can reconsider this decision for those parts. Again a minor thing that won't stop me from flying this aircraft and as I said the more I think about it the more I like the solution on the Pedestal with all the small controls. To be honest the only screenshot I found in my "collection" where the X-Plane shadows look as good is here:

(Yeah I know /\ this /\ wasn't necessary but I had it laying around and thought I might as well share it right here as it contributes to my point and also shows X-Planes capabilities very well. And yes it's the FJS 732 in Cruise.)

Edited May 3, 2016 by avatartrooper

[Litjan]

Thanks for the feedback and very constructive criticism!

We will certainly consider your suggestion - it is always a tradeoff between visual quality and performance - the eternal tug of war...

And yes, that screenshot looks really nice!

Jan

 

[lanmancz]

Would it please be possible to make these optional if you decide to implement it ? I don't mind at all that some parts don't cast shadows (in fact I didnt even notice:-)) but what I ABSOLUTELY LOVE about the 737 (among other things) is the amazingly smooth FPS I get with this aircraft. I would even go as far to say it's the best performance of any payware aircraft I own (and I own plenty), let alone a complex one like 737. This model has absolutely beatiful FPS and for me high FPS always trumps graphical eyecandy.

Edited May 3, 2016 by lanmancz

[poodster]

If I go into planemaker and change the shadows to what I can handle, will that effect my future hotfix updates?

[avatartrooper]

1 hour ago, lanmancz said:

Would it please be possible to make these optional if you decide to implement it ? I don't mind at all that some parts don't cast shadows (in fact I didnt even notice:-)) but what I ABSOLUTELY LOVE about the 737 (among other things) is the amazingly smooth FPS I get with this aircraft. I would even go as far to say it's the best performance of any payware aircraft I own (and I own plenty), let alone a complex one like 737. This model has absolutely beatiful FPS and for me high FPS always trumps graphical eyecandy.

We definitely shouldn't sacrifice all of the increased Performance we gained through this measure and as you can see from the pictures I posted there are still a lot more shadows being processed in the other aircraft than in the IXEG and still their Classic overall has better visuals. As I said in my second post the change only should be limited to areas that really benefit from this. The effects (visual and frame wise) of enabling the shadows can only be seen when the Team or an community member that knows a little bit about working with plane maker (unfortunately I'm not one of those) takes the time and plays around with those settings. You also have to see when looking at the screenshots that the visual improvement of having those shadows really depends on the specific aircraft, while they look great on the 732, they don't do the 747 a favor and considering that on the 733 has similar shapes and sizes of the objects in question, covering the entire pedestal in real time shadows doesn't add anything. Maybe I'm completely wrong and even focusing on the mentioned areas make it look worse or does decrease the performance more than I expected. As Jan said it's always a delicate balance between visuals and performance and I think discussions or suggestions from different sides are important to find the right spot.

[1achmed1]

9 hours ago, Litjan said:

Thanks for the feedback and very constructive criticism!

We will certainly consider your suggestion - it is always a tradeoff between visual quality and performance - the eternal tug of war...

And yes, that screenshot looks really nice!

Jan

 

Maybe you could work with Cam to integrate the shadow option in the installer or alternatively just make it a preferences option, which on second though would probably be easier? Anyway, just an idea.

[Morten]

As you can see on pic 2 on the textures, the is already shading in for ambient light.  With regard to direct sunlight, personally I don't like XPs shadows on the panel, they seem very *hard* to me as you can see in the last pic above.  

[avatartrooper]

9 hours ago, Morten said:

As you can see on pic 2 on the textures, the is already shading in for ambient light.  With regard to direct sunlight, personally I don't like XPs shadows on the panel, they seem very *hard* to me as you can see in the last pic above.  

Again I agree with you on the panel, but I think other parts will benefit from. I did some editing on my first post I hope that does reflect my change of mind a little bit better.