FSaltitude

[AlisterC]

Check this out, it is looking very promising! Hopefully something covering NZ will come available, I'm not much of a Europe flier.

http://www.fsaltitude.com/

[Alex]

Looks good - I wonder how it stacks up against normal textures when closer to the ground though...

Alex

[AlisterC]

QUOTE (Alex @ May 17 2008, 08:32 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Looks good - I wonder how it stacks up against normal textures when closer to the ground though...

Alex

Bit complicated for me, but this kinda makes sense:

HOW DOES IT WORK ?
Microsoft FSX uses several layers of generic textures in order to cover the surface of the globe. These textures have been adjusted altogether to generate a random repetition to infinity. These repetitions can hardly be perceived when soaring at a low altitude but become very present above 20 000 feet (6 000 m).

The primary objective of FS Altitude is to replace these repetitive textures very few realistic by real photo–textures. The second objective remains the cohabitation of this low-resolution photo-realistic texture with all other components of the Flight Simulator, such as the default textures, the airports, 3D objects, and autogen. The low resolution of the photo-realistic texture used can not provide a sufficient visual rendition at low altitude, it deactivates by leaving the place to other Microsoft FSX default textures or any other add-ons previously installed.

FS Altitude is able to manage this notion of “priority” by exploiting the multi-resolution display system of the graphic motor of Microsoft FSX: the level of resolution displayed depends on the distance of the aircraft (that is your point-of –view) according to a given point.
It means that you can represent the textures of FS Altitude as a “coat” covering the entire terrain, except one “cone” of several kilometres of diameter right under the aircraft. Within this round drawn by the cone on the ground, it is FSX default that is displayed as if FS Altitude did not exist: autogen is displayed, high-resolution textures are displayed as well as all other add-ons previously installed.

The idea of this scenery is to simulate the view in the distance as seen from an airliner window (ie, you can't look straight down)

[Alex]

Wow ok - quite complicated...

Alex

[Timmo]

Not really- One of the benefits of a 'round earth' model is that you can use georeferenced images which will curve around the earth...similar to an aerial photo but lower ground resolution covering a larger area of the globe

There is a 'world image' which becomes visible when you zoom out on the globe, so Id imagine they are just replacing this.