Lockheed Constellation Panel

If there's anything that puts me off flying a plane, it's not having a good panel. We've been seriously lacking a good Connie panel in flight simulator. Well, now we have one, and it's excellent! Lou Betti, the creator of the Connie panel, is a pioneer of photorealism in flight simulation. Some people are put off by quote unquote photorealistic panels because all they are are out of focus, incorrectly positioned, low quality pictures. Being a photographer, Lou knows how to make a picture look its best. Lou has broken the stereotype of such photorealistic panels to create one of the most stunning panels available. You no longer feel as if you're looking at a "cartoon" panel, drawn by hand, nor do you feel like you're just looking at a photo of the cockpit. The incredibly detailed bitmap creates the illusion that you are in the captain's seat of a Constellation. His panel has detail, a great feel, and an accurate positioning; no jumpseat view. Soon, all FS scenery will be photorealistic, so a photorealistic panel would match it much better than a hand-drawn version. This is the way flight simulation is heading. Very soon, "photorealism" will just become "realism."

I loaded up the Connie with fuel at New York City's La Guardia airport. The flight was going to be a flight to Moraine Airpark in Dayton, Ohio. With the flight planning done and the fuel being loaded, I grabbed some Starbucks coffee and climbed into the cockpit. Let's get those engines turning and burning! To start the engines, you go to the flight engineer's view in Lou's panel. This panel is done by Jim Laskowski, and was included in Lou's panel as it matches Lou's panel very well.

The radios in the panel are great. You have to first turn them on to get them to work. The numbers rotate very realistically. The autopilot is in the same old style as the radios are. The mix between old instruments and new ones like the GPS is found on most Connies today. Note how all of the old gauges have been painstakingly "yellowed" to make them look old. This plane is certainly not new! What may seem like small details such as the color of the RPM gauge needles truly add to the illusion of being in the real plane. Out of La Guardia:

Out of La Guardia

Breaking through the clouds on departure

Yes, I could load up EFIS'98 and have it fly for me, but that's not fun! Lou has put in some great looking yellowed VOR and ADF gauges for navigation. Lou has also included a GPS on the

The Connie nearing Dayton with thunderstorms about

glareshield protected by a foil heat shield. The GPS is very easy to use and very helpful. I simply dialed in the coordinates of Moraine Airpark in degrees and minutes and it gives you an arrow. Just point the nose of the plane to keep the arrow forward and you're going in the right direction.

The realistic layout and perspective made it great fun to take her in for landing. It's amazing how a proper pilot's view can aid in flying the plane. You can almost fly "by the seat of your pants!" The only way to fly.

Landing on rwy 08 at Moraine

Lou's Connie panel is very enjoyable to fly with. His use of excellent photorealism will hopefully change bad opinions of photorealism to good ones.

For those that like to have the plane fly you to your destination and land you, go somewhere else <g>, but for the real pilots out there grab your favorite Connie and this excellent panel and fly the way flying is supposed to be... challenging and fun!

Noel Benford
nbenford@ix.netcom.com
http://www.stormloader.com/md11/

Download the Constellation panel

Ratings

Visual Quality: 98%
What more can you ask for? The panel shot, a photograph by John Dow, has been skillfully manipulated by Lou in Photoshop to create a visually stunning and extremely detailed rendering of the Connie's main panel. It looks brilliant. It also has the correct viewpoint of the pilot! Well done!

Functionality: 93%
It is extremely functional and well designed. It has everything you need to fly VFR and IFR right there in easy "reach." It would be nice to see some more advanced system gauges or the like. Lou will need a programmer by his side for that, though. ;-)

Ease of use: 95%
Every button is very easy to use. No guesswork needed here. Everything is easily readable.

Overall rating: 95%