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

Possibly. We'll see what we can come up with. No guarantees. Goran

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

Just a small heads up. In case people are possibly wondering why there haven't been any more renders of the 747, I haven't worked on it at all in the last few days as I'm getting the Saab manual finished along with getting the last few animations done with Reuben. When it's finally finished, it'll be a massive push to get the other 3 aircraft done. Hawker 4000 programming, Bonanza (FINALLY!) and the 747. Goran

Joining the panels isn't terribly difficult. I used to just eyeball it but as of about 3 months ago, pretty much around the time I started making the Saab, I use the Snap tool quite excessively. It's extremely accurate and fast. The main problem I have is scaling the individual panels to make sure they are the right size in relation to the surrounding panels. But I found a way to do that fairly accurately too. I can certainly understand the intimidation factor of a cockpit with so many knobs, gauges and dials. But that's part of the fun. I assure you, once you get it started and take off, it's all routine. Goran

Thanks Zach. My wife has a different reaction. She keeps saying "You're at that computer more than a teenager!" Re: the inverted triangles. Is this what you're talking about? That took about 2 hours to model correctly. It's a very unusual shape. Goran

I've managed to shave off another 10 000 quads from the cockpit and made very little change to the visual appearance. So in between that and working on the Saab, I managed to make another panel. Took a few days but it wasn't as tedious as the throttle console. I was having a few small issues with the join between the throttle console and main panel so that is still be done. I did do it a few days ago, but didn't like the way it joined. Too many polys so I have to find another way to make it a clean join. Feedback welcome! And for the technically curious, a couple of wireframes...

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

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

Thanks Maxime. For anything Saab related, please check the Saab forums for updates. Thanks Andy, AFAIK, PC Pilot will be reviewing many new x plane add ons, including X-Aviation products, so I'm hoping my work will be among them in the near future. Ouch! Ouch! and Thank you.

Starting to come together. This was just an experiment to see how it all fits together, any scaling that needed to be done, any missing parts, etc... I won't be positioning the overhead and FE panel yet as they have to be angled and I want them to be UV mapped before I position them. Comments, feedback, opinions are always welcome. Goran

The throttles and throttle console are a very "organic" shape. Lot's of round surfaces. And if it's not modelled right, it can look really messy. I'm definitely happy with how it turned out, but it was a rough road to get there. In any case, it's always nice to read positive comments. So thank you! Goran

Only took 3 days... :-\ Goran

One of my original plans when I started the 747-200 was to continue the series with a -400 somewhere down the line. It's definitely most peoples favorite aircraft, as well as mine. Not to mention the cockpit being easier to make than the -200. The 1 huge problem with it is the programming involved for all the various systems. From what I understand, and I could be wrong, the -400 has approximately 250 "amber warning" messages on the EICAS. That doesn't include Red Warning messages. And all those messages have to be tied into the different custom systems. Not to mention the FMC that has to continuously show updated calculations in real time during flight. I'm only speculating, but I'm guessing programming for such an add on would take between 6 months to a year. I'm not saying I would never do it. What I am saying is I would like to have a committed programmer who is willing to take on the project. I guess we'll wait and see what happens after the -200. Goran

Easily one of the hardest things I've had to model. Believe it or not! Goran

747SP=747 Special Performance http://www.747sp.com/Explained.asp Goran

The SP is something I have hesitantly considered, although there are no immediate plans to make it, even after the 747 is finished. We'll have to just wait and see. ;D Goran

Still too early for any kind of minimum specs. To be honest, I don't really know how powerful a mac mini is. I'll keep everyone posted on all the necessary details as they arise as we get closer to release. Goran

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

FS9 has a poly limit of 65000 but FSX is unlimited. So the detail can be added in FSX. Doing my best to make a pretty cockpit. Adding detail and keeping to a poly budget is very similar to driving a ferrari...6 feet at a time. I just want to open the throttle up all the way and go crazy but I can't. Goran

I don't think he meant you in particular, Simon. I like to think he means all the people who admire the work I'm doing. In regards to the lack of complete cabin. I would absolutely love to model a complete cabin. First, Business and Coach. It's pretty simple to make a few seats and just multiply them. Logistically, it would be a nightmare. A Nightmare to texture and a nightmare with the polygon count. Just the inner walls would be roughly double the fuselage polygon count. With regards to gauge quality...I don't really want to go so far as to compare the gauges to the BK-117. I have seen screenshots of the BK panel and it looks brilliant. I can tell a lot of work has gone into that helicopter. I haven't been in contact with Nils in any way, but I do have a great deal of respect for him and I can see him going very far in add on development. What I would LIKE to accomplish is the highest quality I can possibly achieve but at the same time, keep the polygon count to a respectable level. That said, I hope the overall quality of the 747 will make everyone enjoy their simming experience. Also... Jason (aka Airbus) was messing around with some colors in the rendering and he came up with this. Goran

Thanks for the comments Zach. I have a lot of FS9 and FSX add ons and I can safely say that no other FS add on has as much detail in their 3d pits as we do at X-Aviation. Personally, I want to make cockpits that actually LOOK like a real cockpit. Not a bunch of textured leggo blocks. Why do they build such low poly/low detail cockpits? Who knows. But they're more than welcome to continue doing it. Goran

I'm REALLY sorry for working so slowly. I left the computer desk for an hour because my wife ordered me to eat a decent meal instead of some of that instant stuff. Won't happen again! I'm just thinking of this now. What if I were to somehow break or severely injure my "birdie" middle finger? Oh my god. I use that for the scroll wheel and selecting verts/edges/faces in Blender. Who would think 1 finger would be so important to ones livelihood!? KNOCK WOOD! Part of the pre planning for this aircraft was to make sure I was able to fit a highly detailed, high polygon main panel into an aircraft as large as the 747. I'm fortunate I stumbled onto making the Hawker 4000 with a high polygon count before I trimmed it down. I flew the Hawker 4000 in the simulator with a poly count of 600 000 and it flew quite well on my E6750. Eventually, I managed to cut it down to about 240 000. The 747...let's just say the polygon count is climbing rapidly now because of the main panels, but I'm still "under budget" at about 310 000 polygons. The bad news...It appears unlikely there will be any kind of virtual cabin. Not even an upper deck. It's still possible, but I am leaning towards the "no virtual cabin" side of things. At best, POSSIBLY a crew rest area right behind the cockpit. The reason for this is, with the poly count now above 300 000 and quite possibly being able to hit the 400 000 mark by the time the cockpit is finished, any "unnecessary" texture maps for any kind of cabin will slow the sim down. But as I said, it's not a definite "no cabin". Everything will be decided somewhere down the road. Goran

Moving along nicely, although the Captains panel, in particular the HSI, was a little tricky and took a while. I have a couple of people who are willing to experiment with color renders so I'll throw some color renders up soon. But for now, here's the Main panel minus the FO's side and MCP. Comments, feedback and/or criticisms are welcome. Goran

Thanks for your comments, Andy. The main difference between what we do and what developers for the MSFS series do, is we want to model actual objects that actually appear solid and somewhat true to life within the constraints of a "simming" engine. That includes gauges that are not painted on to flat surfaces. I am of course speaking of add on aircraft. We also do scenery, but I'll leave the technical aspects of that to Eric, Tom or Cameron. We (the developers) also try not to get involved with the X-Plane vs FS9/FSX debate. The developers for FS9/FSX are somewhat convinced that X-Plane is a vastly inferior flight simulator and we really don't want to convince them otherwise. Many have tried and failed. If you have any questions about anything x plane related, please feel free to ask us. We're always more than willing to help people enjoy their simming experience with a little friendly ranting thrown in, just to balance it all out. Cheers, Goran