GES/GEN: looking for variety

[NoLonger]

I've done some flights above GE but I have to say it all looks the same and also very generic to me. Little farmfields as far as the eye can see and little towns scattered over them (very obviously too). Does anyone have some tips for area's that have some variation? Where you don't have to fly for an hour of what looks like the exact same repeated scenery? I know landclass has its limitations and Germany probably is a bit dull in places but I hope there also are some more interesting area's to fly above...? I porbably am picking the wrong places everytime.

[pmb]

Did you try Munich and the area South of it (Starnberger See, Ammersee and further South)? You could take off from EDDM (Taxi2Gate), fly over Munich and into the direction of the Alpine Mountains. Alternatively you could turn to the East over Rosenheim and further East into Salzburg  (Digital Design).

 

That's all a wonderful Region (God's own country), in reality as well as well as - according to my opinion - GES with a lot of variation. It also includes a high number of smaller airfields for landing or taking off, all being ORBX-enhanced.

 

Kind regards, Michael

[Kaktus]

Or you take off in EDDK and head north til DUS then fly heading 320 -300 and you will have a looot of things to see

[wolfko]

2 hours ago, J van E said:

I've done some flights above GE but I have to say it all looks the same and also very generic to me. Little farmfields as far as the eye can see and little towns scattered over them (very obviously too). Does anyone have some tips for area's that have some variation? Where you don't have to fly for an hour of what looks like the exact same repeated scenery? I know landclass has its limitations and Germany probably is a bit dull in places but I hope there also are some more interesting area's to fly above...? I porbably am picking the wrong places everytime.

 

Flying over Germany in real life is very repetitive most of the times.

 

PS: For a good reason PNW was the first area Orbx did as a full fat region. The variety of landscapes you will find therein the tightest of spaces you will hardly find anywhere else in the world (except New Zealand maybe).

 

 

[Benny]

16 minutes ago, wolfko said:

except New Zealand maybe

 

Alaska & Norway also

 

I didn't buy GEN and I'm wondering about GES... I have heard that it'S not so easy on FPS.

 

Ben

[pmb]

13 minutes ago, Benny said:

 

I didn't buy GEN and I'm wondering about GES... I have heard that it'S not so easy on FPS.

I can maintain > 20 fps over Munich. Never before was I able to do that in any Munich scenery. And Munich is excellently represented and really dense. Outside large cities I get 30 fps which my monitor is set to.

 

Kind regards, Michael

[bernd1151]

10 minutes ago, pmb said:

I can maintain > 20 fps over Munich. Never before was I able to do that in any Munich scenery. And Munich is excellently represented and really dense.

+1 and my system isn't the best either

[NoLonger]

Thanks for the tips so far, I will check out the suggested routes. I have flown in PNW for years and after that in Norway for years, so... I guess I am spoiled with variety. I may change my mind but for now GE is a bit of a disappointment. There may be a few nice area's but in general it is a bit boring. Can't totally blame that on Orbx, of course  but I had the idea GE was quite popular: apparently this has not much to do with the actual scenery but with the amount of Germans wanting to fly above their own country. 

[pmb]

I tend to disagree here. I would say, Germany is one of the most varied countries of the world, and I would even say GEN/S does it justice. There are a few rather dull regions towards the North, mainly Northeast, but that's it. I doubt it's possible to fly in GES in a GA without hitting a village or city for 10 minutes.

 

PNW is indeed a spectacular region, too, and yes, it's been certainly selected for a reason (same goes for the early Megascenery in 2004 still on my shelf). However, compare Germany to those huge US deserts (we once made a tour by coach and went through only yuccas for half a day) or Siberia or parts of Africa.

 

Kind regards, Michael

[Benny]

1 hour ago, pmb said:

I can maintain > 20 fps over Munich.

 

You have a good rig Micheal... 

I want to spend money today,  the new Aerosoft CRJ + either GES or Bilbao... But again I'm afraid to see 10 FPS... 

 

Ben

[pmb]

6 minutes ago, Benny said:

 

You have a good rig Micheal... 

 

Don't worry, Ben, it has to last for four years as the predecessor (an I7 2600K I was very pleased with, btw.) did.

 

Kind regards, Michael

[Sundancer]

Do you know what really boring is.......driving over the German Autobahnen......only Mercedes, Audi and BMW ;-)

No, just kidding, Germany is a beautiful country with lots of variation !!

I have worked over 20 years for a German company, have seen most of it and I like the country very much.

 

Regards Fred

[ozboater]

There is pretty reasonable correlation between the generated ORBX scenery and the Google Earth view. Whist technically a cartoon, ORBX provides a similar view to what you see in Google, if you set up the same view in each program.

I've been capturing Google Earth screen shots at various Norwegian locations at angles, elevation and magnification to match screenshots taken in P3Dv4. I am always surprised how an image generated from a finite library (ORBX) can satisfactorily match a GoogleEarth image.

Have a look at the Images page soon, and I'll post some comparisons from my latest ORBX infatuation, Kristiansund in Norway. It is life-like enough for me.

[NoLonger]

Well, it's back to Norway for me. Not only do I find Germany to be boring still, I also can't stand the obvious landclass which looks a LOT less obvious in Norway. In Germany the towns and villages look like someone took a scissor, cut up a map pretty roughly and then scattered the pieces over the farmfields: in Norway everything seems to blend sooooo much better. The difference is staggering imho. Norway looks absolutely real to me all the time while above Germany I am constantly reminded of the fact this is landclass scenery and fake. And the Norwegian scenery is much more diverse too. Besides all that: in Germany I have problems maintaining low 20 fps with seriously low settings while in Norway I can easily maintain 30 fps with a lot higher settings. If Orbx did refunds GES/GEN would have been one for me. But well, life is a gamble and sometimes you lose.

[Meerkat]

The more manmade features (vector roads etc!) and the higher the population density, the less fps you will get - so Norway naturally is much smoother. For best performance, try flying in NW Mongolia - there live about 2 people / km² (sheeps, goats and horses are much more, but then we'll have to wait for cattle flow ). The natural diversity depicted by landclass is quite high there, too, reaching from alpine glaciers to desert. But, alas, mountains often need photoreal areas to look plausible (or some advanced shader techniques like those found in FlightGear).

And yes, as the GE team made the effort to depict evey village, only the landclass polygon approach could be chosen, that in paces can look like pieces cut out and scattered over the fields. However, for me, the dense autogen in P3D4 conceals the hard edges quite well, and it's fun to fly VFR and be able to recognize every village and road (if you're familiar with the landscape, I have to admit).

[NoLonger]

3 hours ago, Meerkat said:

it's fun to fly VFR and be able to recognize every village and road (if you're familiar with the landscape, I have to admit).

 

Yes, as I said I think this scenery is most fun for those who know the place. Truth be told I also like FTX Norway because I've been there some 13 times (although that was decades ago and I don't recognize anything, really). But anyway, I now know I will have to stay clear from scenery that has a lot of manmade data.  If I could I would love to trade GES/GEN for something like Alaska!!! Pity there is no option for that.

[VH-KDK]

Try flying along the Ruhr and the Rhine especially The Rhine Gorge with all of its POIs.

I flew east out of a little strip Hutten Hotzenwold east to Basel then up to Kirchzarten.

All absolutely captivating for me and every flight is an adventure of discovery. 

I have never been to Germany but flying in GES and GEN gives me the impression of a very picturesque country along with the dramatic industrial areas.

Beautiful hills, mountains and also some very flat country, such diversity.

Bottom line is we are all different so what appeals to one does nothing for another.

 

[fabs79]

I'm from Southern Germany and for me it's one of the best regions orbx released so far. But I agree that for someone who doesn't know the area many places will be boring to fly over. In many areas Germany is a mixture of large rural areas (repetitive field textures in the Simulator) and huge urban areas (bad performance due to the number of autogen and vector data). That can make flying a little frustrating if you don't know where to find the best places. I'd suggest Bavaria close to the Austrian border, the Mosel Valley with its castles and rolling hills, the area around Lake Constance on the border to Switzerland and my home region, the Rhine Valley from my birthplace Freiburg heading north to Mannheim or even further, with the many industrial areas, ports and little lakes and small rivers on both sides of the Rhine. But even then I agree that regions like Norway or Southern Alaska are more beautiful to fly over. Maybe that's why Germans are travelling all the time. 

 

Regarding performance, I think I read somewhere that vector landclass polygons are one thing that has a heavy impact on performance, and Germany has a huge number of those because of the thousands of small villages dotted around the landscape. Add the huge number of roads, powerlines and wind turbines and you'll get in trouble with performance. But if you want to realistically depict Germany there's no other way except maybe photoscenery, but those available are outdated and low resolution. 

[paulb]

IMHO, certain regions 'tick all of the boxes'.   Notably the Pacific North West and Norway, but also Southern Alaska and New Zealand to a lesser degree. These regions have a beautiful coastline, majestic mountains and a great mix of rural and urban areas with large areas of countryside to explore. Physically, much of Germany - being inland, quite highly populated and relatively flat - cannot compete with these regions.

 

I currently own Germany North and intend to purchase Germany South.

 

Perseverance in key.

 

Like many here, I did not have a great knowledge of the geography of Germany. But, the more that I have explored GEN, then the more that I have enjoyed it. As mentioned in some of the posts above, there are some very scenic and beautiful parts of Germany - one just has to find them. Since purchasing GEN, I have spent time going online and researching both the geography and history of different areas of Germany. This has made my flying in Germany much more interesting and enjoyable.

 

So, I would suggest that both GEN and GES are excellent additions to the Orbx stable. One just has to take the time and effort to experience them to their best.

 

 

[JimNZ]

Well written, and you're exactly right Paul.  I've never been to Germany or anywhere close to it.  However, I knew that there were no grand canyons, massive mountains if I wanted that I'd have purchased the scenery that I knew contained it. But I wanted to know what Germany had to offer.

Read the posts from those that do live in that Country and there is obviously lots of things to see. That's the fun of flying, read these posts, and finding these places.

 

I like to start from cold and dark, the fun of taking off, exploring any Country in front of me, look for new airports/airfields, land there, then find my way back home taking in the scenery. If it's the same for many miles then so be it.  Add it all together and that's what I call a flight.

 

More boring to me would be flying for 'x' amount of time over the ocean.  That's me but as mentioned above we are all different.

Regards,

Jim.

 

[Misha_K]

Some varied scenic areas to explore in GES/GEN:

 

- Middle Rhine Valley Gorge north from Mainz up to Koblenz; it's a UNESCO world heritage site with about a castle every other mile. Upon reaching Koblenz, turn left down the Mosel valley for an even curvier river with more vineyards;

 

- Black Forest (between Freiburg and Stuttgart) for some huge forests on undulating hills punctuated only occasionally by small villages and castles;

 

- The vast industrial area of the Ruhr valley. You can spend hours exploring the steel mills, coal mines and other industry of the region. Good place to start is the freeware Hengsten Opherdicke from Bahrometrix which works nicely with GEN. Head north-nothwest over Dortmund, then east via Essen, Mülheim, Oberhausen, then southward to Duisburg and Krefeld. Lots of variety to see there. Huge cities with green spaces in between, industry, historic buildings, modern city centers. You can extend your trip past the limits of the Ruhr region and head further south to Düsseldorf, then Leverkusen (huge Bayer chemical plant), then Cologne. From Cologne you can head west to see two huge open pit bituminous coal mining areas;

 

- explore the islands of East Frisia. Take off from Borkum and head east. (Install freeware Global Ship AI traffic for extra fun ship spotting)

 

- explore Rügen and its white cliffs, then head over to the old town of Stralsund and check out the massive shipbuilding plant;

 

- explore the Allgäu: start in Friedrichshafen, take a look at Lake Constance, then head ESE to Oberstdrof, then NE to Füssen and onward as far as you like. You can keep going to Garmisch and explore the German alps

 

- the "wine route" of the Pfalz and romanesque Cathedrals on the Rhine: start in Bad Dürkheim, head south following the line between the vineyards in the east and the forested mountains in the west. You'll spot several castles along the way, including the Hambacher Schloss. Turn left at Schwighofen, fly east to Karlsruhe, admire the palace, then head north following the Rhine. You'll see the romanesque cathedral at Speyer, the Hockenheim car race track, the industry at Mannheim/Ludwigshafen (huge BASF plant) and just to the east, Heidelberg with its castle. A it further north is Worms with another old romanesque cathedral. 

 

- extinct volcanoes in the Vulkaneifel (near Hinterweiler airfield)

 

Just a few of many, many possibilities....

[KVSandleben]

I'd like to add the Southeast along the bavarian forest as a worthy area of exploration. It's my personal white spot on the map of Germany (never even heard of most of the names of the cities there. Cham?!) and I was surprised how beautiful it is.

[Misha_K]

6 hours ago, KVSandleben said:

I'd like to add the Southeast along the bavarian forest as a worthy area of exploration. It's my personal white spot on the map of Germany (never even heard of most of the names of the cities there. Cham?!) and I was surprised how beautiful it is.

 

Yes. One could even take the long route and combine it with exploring the Danube valley as well, starting further West in Ulm (see the tallest gothic cathedral in the world), follow the Danube down river to Ingolstadt (Audi factory), Regensburg (where the Regen meets the Danube - nice bridges, cathedral etc.), then onward to Deggendorf and Passau (where the Inn joins the Danube). From Passau the Bavarian Forest National Park is due north on the Czech border. 

 

So much to see.... 

 

Speaking of river valleys, here's another one for GES: follow the Main valley. Start in Nuremberg (EDDN), see the old castle, head due north to Bayreuth (see the cathedral), then follow the Main river westbound through the rolling landscapes of lower Franconia. You will get to Schweinfurt, where the river will head south before turning northwest again right before reaching Würzburg (big palace on a hill - Residenz). The river will do another couple of switchbacks before reaching Aschaffenburg. As you continue down the river, you will leave Bavaria at Seligenstadt and enter the state of Hesse. Now follows Hanau (big nuclear power plant on the right bank) and shortly after that the skyscraper metropolis Frankfurt (which Orbx really captured very nicely). The Main then empties out into the Rhine at Mainz. You can tour Mainz and its Cathedral and/or head north across the Rhine and see Wiesbaden, the capital of Hesse and an old spa town (the main old spa building - the Kurhaus - is depicted in GES). You can land at Mainz-Finthen, Wiesbaden AAF, Feldberg or Egelsbach. 

[NoLonger]

Thanks for the suggestions, specially Misha_K! I will give the suggestions a try the coming weeks! Since I have the scenery I might as well use it.

[NoLonger]

On 11-10-2017 at 4:17 AM, Misha_K said:

- the "wine route" of the Pfalz and romanesque Cathedrals on the Rhine: start in Bad Dürkheim, head south following the line between the vineyards in the east and the forested mountains in the west. You'll spot several castles along the way, including the Hambacher Schloss. Turn left at Schwighofen, fly east to Karlsruhe, admire the palace, then head north following the Rhine. You'll see the romanesque cathedral at Speyer, the Hockenheim car race track, the industry at Mannheim/Ludwigshafen (huge BASF plant) and just to the east, Heidelberg with its castle. A it further north is Worms with another old romanesque cathedral. 

 

So I finally had the time to give one of your suggestions a try and I have to say... I liked it! It was a very nice route and I even took some detours to check out things in the distance. I liked those forested mountains in the west and will go back there for sure. I also liked the variation along the route so thanks for this suggestion! I will be sure to check out the others too! Fps was still bad above certain area's but as long as you don't move your head too often it is fine.

 

I do have to add though that what also saved it for me was my purchase of PTA last friday but specially finding the preset called PTAbsolute Natural Less haze which makes things look a lot more realistic (unlike most other PTA presets which totally ruin the graphics imho!!!!!). (Take note that you can download a standalone version of that PTAbsolute preset so you don't even have to buy PTA... wish I'd known that before!!!) Imho things look a bit dull by default: it's the same greenish scenery from nearby all the way to the horizon. When I came back to this forum and looked at the banners for a.o. GES I immediately thought 'What a shame: everything looks the same from nearby all the way to the horizon'. It makes things dull and unrealistic. Don't get me wrong, I am NOT bashing the sceneries here but I am just saying that things can look a LOT better and specially realistic with some subtle shader changes. During this 'wine route' I had a feeling, for the first time, that what I saw out there was real! 

 

Let me post a screenshot. Nothing special, just a random one I took (I think north of Mannheim) which shows how the colors change reallistically in the distance, where everything gets a realistic blue tint and things don't have the same green all over the place. Imho this makes a WORLD of difference. Also notice how shadows are deepened and the sun seems to shine more where there are no shadows. Without the mentioned PTA preset things look the same everywhere. During my flight I was constantly thinking that everything around me looked like those real life pictures from real life pilots. Again, the banners I see of GES suddenly look a lot less realistic.

 

 

For those who want to also do this flight: here's the plan I made according to Misha_K's suggestions. Deparature and destination is EDRF in the top left.

 

 

One more shot to show off PTAbsolute Natural Less Haze. This is taken during my (not too good) approach into EDRF: notice how the shadows really make the hill in front of me stick out against the white clouds. Loving it. The differences are subtle (unlike most PTA presets) but really great. As I said specially that blue tint in the distance (which can't really be seen here) makes a world of difference.

 

 

Anyway, I am happy to see GE indeed has some very nice area's to fly above. The coming days and weeks I will give the other suggestions a try!

[NoLonger]

On 11-10-2017 at 5:57 PM, Misha_K said:

Speaking of river valleys, here's another one for GES: follow the Main valley. Start in Nuremberg (EDDN), see the old castle, head due north to Bayreuth (see the cathedral), then follow the Main river westbound through the rolling landscapes of lower Franconia. You will get to Schweinfurt, where the river will head south before turning northwest again right before reaching Würzburg (big palace on a hill - Residenz). The river will do another couple of switchbacks before reaching Aschaffenburg. As you continue down the river, you will leave Bavaria at Seligenstadt and enter the state of Hesse. Now follows Hanau (big nuclear power plant on the right bank) and shortly after that the skyscraper metropolis Frankfurt (which Orbx really captured very nicely). The Main then empties out into the Rhine at Mainz. You can tour Mainz and its Cathedral and/or head north across the Rhine and see Wiesbaden, the capital of Hesse and an old spa town (the main old spa building - the Kurhaus - is depicted in GES). You can land at Mainz-Finthen, Wiesbaden AAF, Feldberg or Egelsbach. 

 

I'll be doing this one this afternoon, or at least part of it: took my half an hour to figure out where you wanted me to go LOL Finally I could find most cities you mentioned (took me ages to find places using Google and then to find them again in Plan-G...!) and decided to take off from Bayreuth, fly towards the Main river and then follow it all the way to Wiesbaden. Which is over 200 nm if I follow the plotted route.  I will probably cut some corners.

 

EDIT
While flying this flight over the river Main I have to add a revelation I just had: having to search for cities on Google and looking at Google maps to figure out where you have to go and seeing a few real pictures really helps to make everything in the sim look not so generic! If you just take off, like I did at first, and look around, you have no idea where you are and it all looks the same somehow. But having looked at the map and having seen a few pictures of cities helps to immerse you into the simulated world: these aren't simply textures and fake cities you are flying over, all looking similar, but you get some sort of situational awareness that somehow helps to make what you see seem real! Right now I am not flying over generic landclass but over GERMANY! I now know WHERE I am and what I am seeing down there!

 

Does that make any sense? I hope you all understand what I mean to say. This GREATLY helps to enjoy the scenery, I have to say! The next time I am flying in Germany I won't simply click on two random airports and fly from A to B, as I am used to do, but I at least will have a good look at for instance Google maps to get a situational awareness so I know WHERE I will actually fly, and I will look for things like rivers you can follow etc. but also look at some real life pictures of cities. I am surprised how this kind of preparation helps to make the scenery look so much more real and not so generic and random!

 

BTW Would be nice if you could see within the same which city you are flying over. Think I will have to look for some sort of map that shows where I am. Never needed that for navigation but I now need it for fun. EDIT Never mind! I figured out how to use Plan-G for this! Cool!

[NoLonger]

Random shot of my current location, close to Wertheim. Things are looking awesome and I am having big fun!

 

 

EDIT

And this apparently is Miltenberg. I love situational awareness!

 

 

Aschaffenburg behind me, Frankfurt in the distance!

 

 

I suppose this is Kraftwerk Staudinger...? Frankfurt still in the distance. I REALLY am loving this LOL

 

 

Frankfurt, looking great.

 

 

Almost here (ETOU).

 

 

Well, that was great. One of the longest flights I've recently done and all that above Germany. Thanks again all your suggestions, Misha_K: they saved this scenery for me.

[Sniper31]

This is a very good report of your 'revalations' J van E, thanks for sharing. 

[Sascha Normann]

Attached KMZ shows some nice areas and interesting POI's.

 

Bests,

Sascha

GES_ScreenshotIdeas.kmz

[JimNZ]

J Van E.

 

Your pictures really are excellent.  Can you tell me please, did you use the P3D for this plus what flight planner are you using?

Jim

[KVSandleben]

4 hours ago, JimNZ said:

J Van E.

 

Your pictures really are excellent.  Can you tell me please, did you use the P3D for this plus what flight planner are you using?

Jim

He is using P3Dv4.1 and from the looks of it Plan-G for flight planning.

[NoLonger]

13 hours ago, Sascha Normann said:

Attached KMZ shows some nice areas and interesting POI's.

 

Thanks! (Will check it out once I find a way to open kmz's in my browser. Got it: nice! Will do a flight around some of those tonight!)

 

5 hours ago, KVSandleben said:

He is using P3Dv4.1 and from the looks of it Plan-G for flight planning.

 

99% correct! I am still on P3Dv4.0 though. And @Jim: take note I also use the PTAbsolute Natural Less Haze preset for PTA which makes a noticable difference when it comes to realism!

 

EDIT
Decided to fly around Thüringer Wald where there should be 'Impressive autobahn structures and scenic landscape' according to the KMZ. And yes, there were! Some very nice 'bridges' (not over water but valleys) and nice hige forests! Took off from nearby Erfurt, flew towards Suhl and plan to land near Bischofsberg. Every now and then I check Plan-G where I am exactly and the I Google for real world photographs of cities I am passing: really gives you the idea you are flying out there if you have an idea how things are really looking down there! And this is also why I now know that this is TREFF HOTEL Panorama Oberhof!

 

 

Looking back at Suhl with a few parts of those nice structures! I also like those entries and exits of tunnels.

 

 

 

[NoLonger]

Needless to say that I totally changed my view on the GE addons... And my apologies to everyone I may have offended in any way with my initial remarks!

 

(I wanted to add this to my previous post but my editing time was up.)

[cyberpilot]

J van E I have looked all over the place to download the PT Absolute Natural Less haze preset but can't find it.

Can you point me to the link?

Many thanks.

[NoLonger]

Here's the link: https://togapjcts.wixsite.com/toga/ptabsolute

 

If you own PTA download it using the button Download for PTA. Inside the zip there are (I think) three versions of the Natural PTA preset: I myself use Less haze. Not because it seems all that different immediately but because I simply like less haze because things are hazy enough as it is already.  Obviously you could try all three versions. 

 

You only need the ini's: you can forget the rest. Do however take note of the HDR settings that are advised.

[cyberpilot]

Thanks J van E.

[cyberpilot]

Ummm....

When I click on the link it says page no longer exists!

[paulb]

8 hours ago, cyberpilot said:

Ummm....

When I click on the link it says page no longer exists!

 

I think that could be because they are bring out a new version of Envtex shortly.

[NoLonger]

10 hours ago, cyberpilot said:

Ummm....

When I click on the link it says page no longer exists!

 

Bummer. I think this has to do with ENVSHADE. I could mail you the ini though if you PM me your mail address.

[Doc_Z]

They are replacing PTAbolute witrh Envshade along with an update to Envtex in the near future.