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Will be pushing a Gizmo64 dev-beta out to the team later today... pretty happy with where it's at. Some minor stuff left to tweak but it won't be too much longer!

Just joking guys A wave of excitement for this aircraft overcame me and I had to post those images which are obviously not from me... All credits go to JarDesign and their wonderful work!!

Hello, all, This will serve as a formal forum announcement that we have released the version 2.1.1 update for SkyMaxx Pro. All customers who have purchased SkyMaxx Pro up till now have been sent an e-mail by X-Aviation with complete instructions on how to obtain your update. We have made this a very simple process! For those that purchase SkyMaxx Pro from today forward, your purchased download will already be updated to version 2.1.1 for you. What if I didn't get the update e-mail? If you did not receive your update e-mail don't fret! X-Aviation has updated our system to allow all customers to update with ease, regardless of whether you received an e-mail for the update! Here's what to do: 1. Login to your X-Aviation account here: https://www.x-aviati...talog/login.php 2. View your past order history invoice that contains SkyMaxx Pro purchase on it. 3. At the bottom of the invoice you will find a blue highlighted link to your update that says: "SkyMaxx Pro". There are some important fixes and requests implemented in this update. The following is a list of additions/fixes included: What's New / Changed: Clouds viewed through transparent surfaces (cockpit glass, rotor blades, etc) will blend properly with terrain, if the model with transparency was properly modeled. Converted FSX aircraft for example may still have issues, but they would have the same problems with default clouds. 2.1.1's clouds should work as well as default clouds in this respect.The "overcast quality" setting will now affect stratus clouds as well.Stratus clouds are now allowed to be at ground levelStratus clouds with medium or high overcast quality will use soft particles for terrain blendingPerformance is improved when the sun is in viewLightning is less frequent, and thinner, in cumulonimbus clouds. As always, thanks for being a customer with X-Aviation. We appreciate your feedback and support! Enjoy these latest updates, and stay tuned to the forum as we continually announce the latest happenings.

I couldn't sit idle in the last days, and started some very extreme experiments pushing the scenery generator even further outside of its comfort zone. I massively increased the mesh resolution (almost 3x of HD Mesh Scenery v3) and added in some nice 30m DEM data (everything else - on the data side - is identical to HD Mesh Scenery v3). Well, the results have surprised even me ... the Alps or the Grand Canyon changed their look in a quite obvious (and positive) way, making them look even more realistic (and big - yes, the "feeling" of dimensions has improved very nicely!). At the moment I am tinkering with the results, and am also waiting for some DEM data improvements (the good guy behind Viewfinderpanoramas.org hinted to me, that he wanted to increase the 30m Alps data very soon - and of course, I will wait for that). But then, I am definitely considering to share a few, smaller UHD regions with you (don't even bother to start asking for "regions" ... I will do the ones, I find the best to do at the moment). Like the - entire - Alps, the Canyon Land in the USA, and Maybe Colorado and the Yosemite region ... BUT, there is one drawback. of course, this absolutely insane (consider it experimental) mesh resolution needs some beefy hardware to run (users who have FPS concerns with HD Mesh Sceney v3 should not even think about it). On my machine, it worked quite well (yes, definitely usable FPS) ... BUT it will definitely need a minimum of 16 GB RAM (24 or 32 might be much safer). Here are a bunch of comparison screenshots (labeled UHD and HD ... so you can browse trough them and see the differences): https://picasaweb.google.com/101666907909842492197/PREVIEWUHDMeshSceneryV1?authuser=0&feat=directlinkAnd some quick examples: PS: This is also showing you, what X-Plane could one day achieve with hardware tessellation (its on the roadmap of Laminar ... but without a due date) with less heavy DSFs.

SkyMaxx Pro doesn't do anything with rain, and never did.

The one thing I did not manage to learn well, now I do not have a clue how its done