Comprehensive scenery guide/tutorial/?

Hello simmers!

Do you know any scenery related tutorials? I have encoutered few scenery problems which I cant solve and I did not find any helpful tutorial.

I have bought ORBX global (from my point of view this is not a scenery it is a textures pack with higher resolution and it replaces basic old textures in FSX). This is clear.

ORBX vector ok mountains, rivers, lakes, shorelines etc this is understandable too.

Then I bought ORBX open LC

https://www.fullterrain.com/product/ftxgolceu

And I'am not sure what it does and when. I would like to know things related with scenery. For example I have found http://simviation.com/1/browse-Terrain+Mesh-64-2 high quality mesh for Finland and Norway, installed it and I did not see any difference when I had it "ticked" in the scenery library or if I had not it ticked.

It took mew few hours to find the correct order of the scenery packs it should be like this:

1) Airports scenery

2) Area related scenery (like island)

3) Country scenery

4) Region - Land - Mesh

5) World landclass mesh

6) Vanilla FSX

But wanted to ask you. What are the differences between ORBX LC Europe and this freeware mesh packages? Do they the same thing? Is it smart to use them or the ORBX will have always better quality?

Main question is. Is it pointless or it is not to download freeware scenery of country/islands/mesh/landlass mesh if you compare it with the 3 OrbX packages which I have?

If I install the mesh or landlacss mesh it is the "world" which I see from cruising altitude? Or it is anything different? And finally if you are using payware products from GEX UTX or ORBX do you combine it with freeware sceneries, if yes which sceneries are you using?

Thanks for your replies and answers in advance.

For info on mesh, there was a good thread recently about 'freemeshX'. Use that as keyword.

Library order gets explained, and does not matter. Also settings to use to see differences.

Also a link in there to more info in a paralel thread on avsim.

Lots of new info in both threads.

For info on mesh, there was a good thread recently about 'freemeshX'. Use that as keyword.

Library order gets explained, and does not matter. Also settings to use to see differences.

Also a link in there to more info in a paralel thread on avsim.

Lots of new info in both threads.

Thanks.I've checked the thread here and I learned something new that it does not matter how much mesh you have it automatically loads the one with the best resolution. It means with the Finland and Norway mesh scenery ticked or unticked I did not see any change when i was looking on the land from above in this case it should mean that the orbx open LC Europe uses higher quality mesh/textures so the 10m Finland and Norway mesh is useless, even when it is 10m MESH.

yes, and also the level of mesh detail that you have set the slider to in your fsx settings matters.

If you set it to low detail, it wont help to install more detailed mesh. All those nice nuances in the detailed mesh are there, but fsx "shaves tem smooth" because of the low settings.

And what do you think about the pacakges which could be found here on flightsim.com?

Like these:?

https://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/fslib.php?searchid=39001638#comments_start

https://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/fslib.php?searchid=39001639#comments_start

https://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/fslib.php?searchid=39001657#comments_start

I am not sure if it is worth it to download if these sceneries will look better than the global mesh and autogen which will provide the OrbX. Screenshots in the files don't tell much. Many many uploaders upload their work and put the screenshot with low settings and it does not look good.

And what do you think about the packages which could be found here on flightsim.com?

 

Like these:?

https://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/fslib.php?searchid=39001638#comments_start

https://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/fslib.php?searchid=39001639#comments_start

https://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/fslib.php?searchid=39001657#comments_start

Your links go nowhere. You might try posting the filename instead.

Your links go nowhere. You might try posting the filename instead.

That is weird links work for me.

1)

FSX - FSX Scenery

FSX Scenery--Aeropuerto Capitan Anibal Arab Fadul

[ Download | View ]

Name: slco_anibalarab_pando.zip

2)

FSX Scenery--Aeropuerto Teniente Jorge Henrich Arauz

[ Download | View ]

Name: sltr_jorgehenrich_beni.zip

3)

FSX - FSX Scenery

FSX Whanganui X Scenery

[ Download | View ]

Name: whanganui_x.zip

That is weird links work for me.

Check out the "Sticky" near the top of this forum about linking to files in our Library.

Just looking at the first download which is photo-real scenery. This is best viewed from high above like about 2,000 feet or more. ORBX scenery is best viewed from low level.

Hi, there are a few misconceptions in your first post that need clearing up, in case you have not read up on this already. So here is how the FSX world works in a nutshell:

The world consists of 5 parts: mesh, landclass, textures, vector data and objects

-- Mesh is the elevation data of the terrain (how high above the surface of the earth is a certain point). The higher the resolution of the mesh, the better your ground (especially mountains) will look (= not so flat). A resolutuion of 72 meters means, that you only have a real elevation point every 72 meters, all in between is at the same altitude and flat. A resolution of 5 meters means, that you have a real elevation point every five meters - this makes mountains look very nice... and so on. The resolution is expressed in the LOD system (read up on that one), the higher the LOD value the higher is the resolution

-- Textures are the pictures the mesh gets covered with. These are either generic ones or photoreal, depending on your scenery. Orbx FTX global replaces only the generic ones, as you already noted. Photoreal scenery puts actual aerial photographs on the mesh to make it look "real".

-- Landclass basically tells the sim, which generic(!) texture has to go where (wood, village, field etc.) and what autogen objects should be displayed there. The better your landclass data, the more real your world will look. There is a limit to accuracy, as landclass is organized in tiles, so you can't have very small pieces arranged like in the real world. Landclass does only influence the textures and the (autogen) objects. This is what the ORBX OpenLC products do, they are custom made landclass packages to mimic the position of terrain types in the real world.

-- Vector data is data about features on top of the terrain that have a specific position and altitude: roads, rivers, lakes, shorelines (in a way also runways, taxiways, aprons). FTX Global Vector is only about that.

-- Objects: there are two types: Autogen and user/custom objects. Autogen are classes of objects like trees and houses, that the sim places automatically according to the landclass information. Custom objects have been placed into the scenery by an addon developer.

There are a lot of scenery addons that address multiple parts of this world, like Utlimate Terrain (Landclass and Vector Data in one package) or only one at a time (FS Global Ultimate or FSGenesis are mesh products only - so there is only elevation info in there, nothing else).

The general rule of thumb is, that any scenery of a specific place and type that is placed in the library over another equal scenery, will override that one.

My advice for you is, to have as little scenery in your library as possible - it will slow your sim down otherwise. There are tools to organize a large collection of sceneries in such a way, that you only have that scenery in your sim that you need for your flight (this is the absolute best way to go about it).

Hope that helps with your decisions

I think part of your original question is about the difference between landclass and mesh.

"Mesh" defines the elevation of the ground (for depicting mountains, valleys). The elevation values are specified on a grid and the distance between the grid points determines the resolution of the mesh. A scenery file containing mesh will actually store multiple resolutions, called LODs (Level Of Detail), since FSX may not be able to use the highest resolutions as far as the eye can see without running out of memory or overloading the CPU with data, so it uses higher resolution data for terrain that's close to the view point and lower resolution farther away. The term Mesh is a misnomer in my opinion, the correct term is DEM (Digital Elevation Model), and mesh is really the 3D model of the ground that FSX builds on the fly from this data. FSX will always use the highest resolution mesh it can find in your scenery library, and only considers the ordering of library entries for tie-breaking.

Landclass comes into play when FSX has to figure out what textures to show on the terrain surface. Like mesh, landclass values are specified on a grid (another term for grid is "raster"), but the resolution is fixed about about 1.2km (LOD 5). The number is interpreted as the type of land cover or land use, for example 121 means a large city with highrise buildings and 3 means a conifer forest. Given the land type, FSX selects a corresponding texture and applies it to surface. The available textures for the given landclass can vary depending on the global region and season.

So, if you're expecting to fly over a town with some surrounding farmland and forested areas, this can be roughly depicted in FSX if the landclass is accurate, though things like buildings and roads will not be exactly as in the real world since using landclass for textures gives just an approximate depiction of reality. If you need more exact scenery then you'd need to use photoreal for textures instead.

Hopefully it's clear that mesh and landclass do different things and having accurate data for both will make the FSX world look more like the real world.

Thanks.I've checked the thread here and I learned something new that it does not matter how much mesh you have it automatically loads the one with the best resolution. It means with the Finland and Norway mesh scenery ticked or unticked I did not see any change when i was looking on the land from above in this case it should mean that the orbx open LC Europe uses higher quality mesh/textures so the 10m Finland and Norway mesh is useless, even when it is 10m MESH.

AFAIK OpenLC does not contain any mesh, it is a landclass product only.

Mesh resolution also depends on the setting of the corresponding slider in your display options. The differences of the mesh LODs are very hard to see, especially from above - except you know the region by heart (mountains are best to spot it)

Wow. Thank you so much for explaining it guys. Really appreciate it. If I understood it right I can download freeware scenery, photoreal scenery even the 10m mesh because the open LC is in the "Landclass" category. So What I should not download is freeware landclass because my OrbX files already does that?

And what about this freeware product? Does it interfere with orbx vector?

http://library.avsim.net/esearch.php?DLID=184283

Wow. Thank you so much for explaining it guys. Really appreciate it. If I understood it right I can download freeware scenery, photoreal scenery even the 10m mesh because the open LC is in the "Landclass" category. So What I should not download is freeware landclass because my OrbX files already does that?

You should not download any scenery for places you have ORBX regions for, with the exception of mesh, airports and objects (landmarks like castles etc). Always be careful and test every single download thoroughly - not only if it works, but if it degrades your sims performance too (happens with ex-FS9 scenery). If you download photoreal and you don't see autogen (this happens a lot) then you can deactivate the LC too, it is superfluous. You wont get the autogen to work anyway, this is in the nature of photoreal - no trees, no houses, except the developer makes them.

And what about this freeware product? Does it interfere with orbx vector?

http://library.avsim.net/esearch.php?DLID=184283

Yes, everything with vector data will interfere with FTX Global Vector, because that is a global package. For example, I never have Ultimate Terrain and FTX Vector active at the same time. You can install both, but activate only one of them in the scenery library.

Vector data has its own quirks as you will see soon enough, especially when you use additional mesh. You will see airports, roads, rivers and lakes stick out on plateaus. Not much you can do about that either, except google for some solution (basically exclusion of the offending part of the scenery)

And be very careful with automated installers - they can mess up your sim pretty good. Always make a backup copy of your FSX installation before shooting automated installers at it.

ZIP files are my preferred download method for everything sim, where you can place the files yourself.

Ok thanks nuitkati. Well I usually use the files in .rar or .zip but e.g. website rikoooo has the installers and I cant extract the files from the .exe (setup) and they have some cool sceneries which you cant get anywhere else.

Another question you wrote something about the deactivating the areas which I dont need do you have any software for that? Few months ago I saw some software which helps to organize all files from scenery to aircraft model but I have forgot the name of this software. Helps to install scenery, change the order, activate/deactivate before starting FSX.

Ok thanks nuitkati. Well I usually use the files in .rar or .zip but e.g. website rikoooo has the installers and I cant extract the files from the .exe (setup) and they have some cool sceneries which you cant get anywhere else.

Another question you wrote something about the deactivating the areas which I dont need do you have any software for that? Few months ago I saw some software which helps to organize all files from scenery to aircraft model but I have forgot the name of this software. Helps to install scenery, change the order, activate/deactivate before starting FSX.

There are a couple of tools to do this:

SimStarter (donationware)

TweakFS Scenery Config Toolbox (freeware)

FSScenery (freeware)

The best one to manage scenery would be FSSCenery if - well it only works up to 339 library entries. It is quite old and the developer never got around to fixing this. But the great feature of it is, that it keeps the scenery in a separate database, and it generates a new scenery.cfg any time you want - and that cfg only contains your selected sceneries, nothing else (unwanted sceneries are not disabled - they aren't even there). You don't lose anything, but the cfg is always nice and small. As my library is a bit larger than that limt, I'm using SimStarter, the Toolbox and a small program of my own design to achieve this. I try to convince the dev of SimStarter to implement a similar reduction feature, and maybe this will happen at some point in the future (almost there).

Btw about freeware installers: make absolutely sure that these are trustworthy. When you start one of those (as Administrator...) they can do pretty much what they want. I keep a "sandbox" FSX installation on a second Windows partition to test out freeware before it may enter my main sim, but I am a payware nut anyway. But some free stuff is just too good not to have...

These softwares are new to me. The one I meant is software called fsx utility and the other one is fsx launchpad. Both on the first page in the link below.

http://simviation.com/1/browse-Utilities-65-0

These softwares are new to me. The one I meant is software called fsx utility and the other one is fsx launchpad. Both on the first page of the link below.

http://simviation.com/1/browse-Utilities-65-0

Sure, use whatever works for you. Everyone has specific requirements, mine have been met with the tools I use, and what was missing I made my own for.

Sure, use whatever works for you. Everyone has specific requirements, mine have been met with the tools I use, and what was missing I made my own for.

You look like a guy who understands the fsx :) Do you have any opinion on FSX graphics settings? What is better unlimited fps? set to 30 by fsx or by external software like nvidia isnpector or fps to 1/2 of 60mhz refresh rate of my LCD screen. I spent a lot of time tweaking fsx.cfg, using nvidia inspector profile to "override" fsx settings by this software etc. Would like to know your opinion because I saw more than 10+ opinions on FSX performance.

You look like a guy who understands the fsx :) Do you have any opinion on FSX graphics settings? What is better unlimited fps? set to 30 by fsx or by external software like nvidia isnpector or fps to 1/2 of 60mhz refresh rate of my LCD screen. I spent a lot of time tweaking fsx.cfg, using nvidia inspector profile to "override" fsx settings by this software etc. Would like to know your opinion because I saw more than 10+ opinions on FSX performance.

Hi, you are likely to see even more opinions - performance is highly individual and more often than not only applicable to the specific system of the user. I have my own approach to this, suited to my system with Surround screens, TrackIR and EZCA (need high FPS for this to work right), that will probably not work for you. I constantly optimized the whole setup over the course of two years...

What hardware are you running FSX on? (CPU, GPU, RAM, HDD) What addons do you have (or plan to have) on top of FSX?

Hi, you are liekly top see even more opinions - performance is highly individual and more often than not only applicable to the specific system of the user. I have my own approach to this, suited to my system with Surround screens, TrackIR and EZCA (need high FPS for this to work right), that will probably not work for you. I constantly optimized the whole setup over the course of two years...

 

What hardware are you running FSX on? (CPU, GPU, RAM, HDD) What addons do you have (or plan to have) on top of FSX?

i5 2500k, 8GB ram @1600, gtx 960 4GB, classic 1TB HDD for system and on the other I have FSX - this second one is little faster than the system HDD. Using classic addons like FS recorder, FS realWX (freeware/payware weather engine), ftx global, vector, open LC Europe, few payware aerosoft's airports and qualitywings 757. Would like to buy in the future PMDG 777 or 737.

I know that settings are individual but at least the decision with the fps someone says that unlimited is bad, someone says that you have to keep it locked to 30 fps by external software or by FSX because it improves FSX performance.

I dont understand one thing and that is that if I fly with aircraft over high quality scenery like UK 2000 Heathrow or FLytampa's Sydney I get about 7-10 Fps but when I play the instant replay in fs recorder and I select the same view I have over 20 fps and nothing changed, scenery is the same, aircraft is the same, AI aircrafts are there too...

i5 2500k, 8GB ram @1600, gtx 960 4GB, classic 1TB HDD for system and on the other I have FSX - this second one is little faster than the system HDD. Using classic addons like FS recorder, FS realWX (freeware/payware weather engine), ftx global, vector, open LC Europe, few payware aerosoft's airports and qualitywings 757. Would like to buy in the future PMDG 777 or 737.

Afraid that is a completely different setup than mine, so my settings will not work for you.

I would start with the 737 if I were you. The 777 is very demanding and resource hungry.

I know that settings are individual but at least the decision with the fps someone says that unlimited is bad, someone says that you have to keep it locked to 30 fps by external software or by FSX because it improves FSX performance.

Thats actually pretty simple. Most guides out there were written for PCs that are not able to run FSX on high settings anyway. Afraid your i5 will be in the same category, because of the low clock speed. So you need to keep FSX from doing things that you don't really need, like rendering frames you could not display anyway - so it can 'concentrate' on running your flight to your system's capabilities. So you limit the frames, to prevent FSX from spending resources that you need elsewhere.

You really need to do some trial&error here on your system, there is no rule to be followed that leads to instant improvements. On my system I keep the frames completely unlocked, neither in sim nor in NVI. The FPS go from 20 to 60, depending on flight situation, but a drop from 60 to 30 is much less noticable with TrackIR than a drop from 30 to 15, so I keep this setting. But my system is actually capable of running high quality addons on triple-full-HD at 30 (airport) to 60 (flight) FPS, so my approach is very different to what most people seem to do. I have some very unique tweaks in my config, that probably only work for me. I basically set all the 'critical' parameters to crazy high values, because I assumed that my hardware does not need any limitation at all. This works quite well.

I dont understand one thing and that is that if I fly with aircraft over high quality scenery like UK 2000 Heathrow or FLytampa's Sydney I get about 7-10 Fps but when I play the instant replay in fs recorder and I select the same view I have over 20 fps and nothing changed, scenery is the same, aircraft is the same, AI aircrafts are there too...

When you fly it, FSX does it's job as a simulator. The replay is just like watching a movie of it. Most people complaining about FSX performance don't grasp what a simulator actually has to do, as opposed to a 3D game. When you are running a replay, the FSX platform just has to move the objects along recorded paths - this is practically only the graphics module that is active. But when you fly, FSX has to calculate everything that happens (also things you don't see at all), down to the tiny details, in real time. And that actually is the main part of the software...

Ok thanks for the info and probably last question. I noticed that most of the time I get "bumping-jumping" at airports. I read few articles about it it is related with "too high" scenery settings. Literally the aircraft jumps from the ground few feet and then touches it again with smoke from the landing gear. If you could share with me which scenery settings do you use in numbers? For example resolution 10, mesh complexity 100 etc.? Thanks

Hi, I only heard about this, but never experienced it. I found these settings over in an AVSIM thread, maybe they will help you:

Posted 27 August 2012 - 08:50 PM

Thanks Guys, all sorted, there is no mesh elevation so I turned Mesh Resolution down to 5m and Mesh Complexity down to 82.

No more jumping aircraft ! job done.