resolved FTX NORWAY mountains slow to reflect snow?

[STUARTH]

I am finding that even though my LOD range is set to max in FSX (default max 4.5), that middle distant mountains in FTX NORWAY are not reflecting snow until one gets closer.  This makes the scenery look very odd at this time of year.  Is there any settings that will improve this in FTX Norway?  I have Texture detail set to 2048 (Very High in FSXSE) and as I said LOD at 4.5.  I don't really want to increase the LOD, but is that the only way?

 

I have the following FTX products installed:

FTX Scotland

FTX Norway

FTX Global Base

FTX Global openLC Europe

FTX HD Trees (enabled through FTX Central)

I also have UTXv2 installed.

 

The FTX Global user guide states that FTX is fully compatible with UTX, however I can't seem to get the correct textures in certain areas outside of the region's. 

Could someone please advise the correct layering in the scenery.cfg for the above when using UTX?

 

Stuart

 

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[STUARTH]

Further to my post above. Just flown again in FTX Norway and same issue appears. If  I switch to topdown ouside view I can only see snow textures within the LOD 4.5 area, anything beyond that is green.  Surely if there is snow on 'them there hills' it should be reflected beyond the 4.5 range, even if at a lower resolution. The snow textures load in as I fly, so they do exist and should already be reflected, but just get sharper,  I am not seeing vast expanse of snow when coming into land like is reflected in the latter part of this video which I found on youtube.  Do you have any suggestions?

 

 

[STUARTH]

Further again to my above posts, this is what I'm seeing:. Snow textures stop at the limit of the LOD range set to FSX max of 4.5.  Any idea as to how I can resolve this issue:

 

 

[Holger Sandmann]

Hi there,

 

that's doesn't look like the LOD=4.5 limit, which should be much farther from the user aircraft. Moreover, if it was the LOD boundary, then snow and no-snow would be blended with the landclass textures meaning not show perfectly straight lines as in your screenshot.

 

More likely you're flying with a sim date for which the seasons control file allocates mild-winter ground textures (= no leaves on deciduous trees but no or little snow on the ground) but the local weather includes active snowfall. That causes the sim to dynamically switch to "hard-winter" textures; see http://www.orbxsystems.com/forum/topic/114325-ftx-global-textures-changing-mid-flight/

 

 

Cheers, Holger

[STUARTH]

Holger,

Thanks for the advice.  That does seem to make sense, although if I manually change LOD in FSX.cfg to 6.5, then the snow area does get slightly larger, but elsewhere is still green!

 

I've been doing some further investigation, and it seems FSX is doing some strange things re seasons.
If I select todays date 14/12, the season jumps to "Fall". If I then select "Winter" the date jumps to February! However, in either case, when viewed in TopDown view, it would appear that Winter doesn't happen until locations east of a certain latitude near Kirkenes. Is there anyway to amend season settings in FSX outside of the internal dialogue? Is there a file, bgl or other, that one can replace?  I fly for a VA and use Active Sky Next live weather, but their pirep capture app dictates that one has to fly on the current date, hence my wish to resolve this somehow.

 

I also seem to have several *season*.bgl files installed for different sceneries in addition to the FSX base one. Could this be causing the issues? Which season.bgl does fsx use when say Aerosoft Tromso, FTX Norway and Base scenery are all active at the same time, and could the one being used cause the above.

 

Any other thoughts?

Thanks,

Stuart 

[Holger Sandmann]

Hi there,

 

welcome to the club  That season selection menu is confusing a lot of users as it simply picks a fixed calendar date and not a specific season; see http://www.orbxsystems.com/forum/topic/106546-winter-textures-at-fall/?do=findComment&comment=960422

 

 

I should point out that when you zoom out very far (or fly at high altitude in clear weather) you will see the global default background image, which may indeed be different in coloring and seasonal variant than what you see near the user aircraft. However, we're talking 30-40 miles in the distance, nothing near the user aircraft. See http://www.orbxsystems.com/forum/topic/125487-total-desert-over-all-orbx-regions-and-lc/?do=findComment&comment=1120478

 

Seasons control files can be "stacked" like any other landscape/scenery element and also be restricted to a specific spatial coverage area. In your screenshot, "seasons.bgl" is the global default seasons control file that will kick in if no local replacements are active. The other three are local seasons control file that only influence their respective FTX Region: Germany North, FTX Norway, and the Great Britain/Ireland Regions, respectively.

 

Cheers, Holger

 

 

[STUARTH]

Holger,

Thanks for the links that you provided on this subject.

I read through your links and, if I understand it, the FTX Norway file should be reflecting Hard Winter in North Norway during December.

You also mentioned that the freeware Norway, which I presume is Airports of Norway, actually show whole of Norway as HW from Dec.  So if I have AoN above FTX Norway, and both above FTX Global and base scenery, then surely in North Norway it should now be snow covered as HW.

 

Should I try disabling or renaming the various local season.bgl files, and/or the base file to see what effects this has?

 

[STUARTH]

Holger,

I thought I would move FTX Norway above AoN Norway, to see if the Orbx Seasons file would take precedence.

Also set FSX time to system time and ran FSRealTime.

However as you can see from the attached it hasn't made any difference.

If I select current December date, the season switches ro Fall, selecting January onwards it switches to Winter, but nothing changes to this top-down view.

Something is wrong somewhere I just need to know how to resolve to get expected winter/hard wintertextures in FTX Norway?

 

 Do you have any suggestions?

 

Thanks Stuart

 

[Holger Sandmann]

Hi there,

 

your last screenshot seems to indicate that you're using low-LOD photoreal coverage in that area of Norway, which probably doesn't have seasonal variants meaning it'll never display winter textures. It's possible to compile photoreal imagery in such a manner that it doesn't display near the user aircraft but only from a certain distance. That would explain what you're seeing beyond the coverage area of FTX Norway. It also explains why your LOD range appears to be that much narrower than 4.5 should be.

 

I don't know whether AoN includes such a file or whether it's some other third-party add-on. I just didn't notice the photoreal image in the background since your first series of screenshots were taken in the dark.

 

Cheers, Holger

[STUARTH]

Holger,

I thought I would move FTX Norway above AoN Norway, to see if the Orbx Seasons file would take precedence.

Also set FSX time to system time and ran FSRealTime.

However as you can see from the attached it hasn't made any difference.

If I select current December date, the season switches ro Fall, selecting January onwards it switches to Winter, but nothing changes to this top-down view.

Something is wrong somewhere I just need to know how to resolve to get expected winter/hard wintertextures in FTX Norway?

 

 Do you have any suggestions?

 

POSTSCRIPT - RESOLVED MY ISSUE

Thanks for all your help Holger,

You are quite right. I was reviewing my scenery library this afternoon and found that I still had FSALTITUDE enabled (high altitude photo scenery for the whole of Europe), which of course takes preference.  Having disabled in the scenery library I finally have the FTX seasonal weather for Norway. Yeah! 

 

Thanks again for your patience and advice. Glad we both came to the same conclusion.

 

Thanks,

Stuart

 

 

[Holger Sandmann]

Hi Stuart,

 

glad I could help; enjoy FTX Norway!

 

Cheers, Holger