FSX Photoreal Scenery

[TheAviationEnthusiast]

I know this is a very generalized question, but how can you have worldwide photoreal scenery in FSX:SE, whether you create your own, or download a freeware add-on? I did try TileProxy, but it caused weird problems with my FSX. I WOULD try World Terrain, but it's $120. I'm hoping for freeware. What options do I have? Reason is, I wanna practice my VFR flights in FSX.

[kingnorris]

World wide? I don’t think that exists. Making your own is possible but very time consuming and difficult in my opinion.

 

FS Earth tiles is a program that you can try; I never could figure it out.

[mallcott]

I know this is a very generalized question, but how can you have worldwide photoreal scenery in FSX:SE, whether you create your own, or download a freeware add-on? I did try TileProxy, but it caused weird problems with my FSX. I WOULD try World Terrain, but it's $120. I'm hoping for freeware. What options do I have? Reason is, I wanna practice my VFR flights in FSX.

 

You don't have a large enough hard drive to accommodate ALL photoscenery. No one does - unless they have NASA on their business card.

 

VFR flights can only be practiced in one season with photoscenery added - not at all realistic for VFR flights to only fly in summer - especially if you want to fly with real world weather, which will be wholly inaccurate in Spring, Autumn, Winter and Hard Winter - the `five season` of FSX.

And what about autogen?

[TheAviationEnthusiast]

Well, have you heard of TileProxy or World Terrain? They DOWNLOAD the photoreal scenery as you fly, and I want something kinda like that, except now $120, and not a program that causes problems with my FSX.

[TheAviationEnthusiast]

*not

[llivaudais]

While you may be able to find free or payware scenery for many places in the world, the only way to get everywhere YOU want is to make it yourself, if you can find decent imagery to make it with.

 

I was a big fan of Tileproxy; I am a current fan of FSEarthtiles.

 

TP was fine until Windows 7 blocked unsigned driver use; this made TP difficult to use. At that point I switched to FSET.

 

Tileproxy was convenient to use but difficult to really "master". The fact that it downloaded sets of images for multiple resolutions made it relatively slow to complete. Also, you still had to run TP for the scenery to show even after downloading what you wanted. It also optionally stored the downloaded images after the scenery was made, requiring much more storage.

 

Earthtiles, in contrast, only downloads the final resolution that you want but it doesn't connect to the sim so it's all a manual process; you can be flying over the area that you are making but that's not associated with the actual scenery making itself.

 

The most beneficial side effect of photoscenery of either type is a marked increase in framerates. It appears that the bulk of FSX's actual 'work' is preparing and displaying scenery - just compare unlimited max framerates over the ocean vs over land and 'the living world'. If you want to really test photoscenery, just visit blueskyscenery.com and try out some free Utah, Arizona, California, or Nevada scenery (at 1m resolution). If you really like it, then you can consider making or purchasing more.

 

I'd recommend Earthtiles to start. I found it much easier to use than TP but, like most hobby projects, there are tricks that you figure out after a while that help keep it under your control and allow you to manage things better.

 

Some photoscenery by Andrev

 

There are How-To's for Earthtiles on this site also.

 

And some of my videos also utilize photoscenery that I made or downloaded.

 

Loyd

[TheAviationEnthusiast]

While you may be able to find free or payware scenery for many places in the world, the only way to get everywhere YOU want is to make it yourself, if you can find decent imagery to make it with.

 

I was a big fan of Tileproxy; I am a current fan of FSEarthtiles.

 

TP was fine until Windows 7 blocked unsigned driver use; this made TP difficult to use. At that point I switched to FSET.

 

Tileproxy was convenient to use but difficult to really "master". The fact that it downloaded sets of images for multiple resolutions made it relatively slow to complete. Also, you still had to run TP for the scenery to show even after downloading what you wanted. It also optionally stored the downloaded images after the scenery was made, requiring much more storage.

 

Earthtiles, in contrast, only downloads the final resolution that you want but it doesn't connect to the sim so it's all a manual process; you can be flying over the area that you are making but that's not associated with the actual scenery making itself.

 

The most beneficial side effect of photoscenery of either type is a marked increase in framerates. It appears that the bulk of FSX's actual 'work' is preparing and displaying scenery - just compare unlimited max framerates over the ocean vs over land and 'the living world'. If you want to really test photoscenery, just visit blueskyscenery.com and try out some free Utah, Arizona, California, or Nevada scenery (at 1m resolution). If you really like it, then you can consider making or purchasing more.

 

I'd recommend Earthtiles to start. I found it much easier to use than TP but, like most hobby projects, there are tricks that you figure out after a while that help keep it under your control and allow you to manage things better.

 

Some photoscenery by Andrev

 

There are How-To's for Earthtiles on this site also.

 

And some of my videos also utilize photoscenery that I made or downloaded.

 

Loyd

 

Thanks, I'll definitely try out Earthtiles!