New military airport in work in Hawaii. Fully operational on first cut, but will be improved over time.

  • This is superb work. And might I be bold to say I fine community effort :)

    Once the airport is finished, do share it by submitting it to our downloads section. For those wanting to make the imagery around it you can always add in the data specific files and instructions on how to get the images :)

    IPACS Development Team Member

    I'm just a cook, I don't own the restaurant.
    On behalf of Torsten, Marc, and the rest of the IPACS team, we would all like to thank you for your continued support.

    Regards,

    Jeff

  • Ray,

    With a bit of work in graphic software, we can match the USGS tiles to the other one so it is seamless. Saturation and brightness are different but that's the kind of things that can be adjusted, and we probably can find a software that can batch it (i.e. we find the value on one tile, and then run all of them through the same filter)

    If you could send me a FSET tile, and a USGS tile (like the one that cut through a patch of forested area) so that I run some tests, that'd be great. Just bear with me on timing. Send me the tiles pre final conversion.

    Hartman already did something similar and posted somewhere else, here. I don't have photoshop, but I'm sure I have or can find software that have a similar process.

    He speaks also of water blending. I want to try an alpha channel weathering/air spraying with opacity gradient to see if FS2 can handle it, I don't see why it couldn't since it can process alpha channel.

    On other news, we're progressing really nicely with Dave on the 3D conversion of objects (Ford Island), soon I'll be able to produce objects that can be inserted or help Dave in creating his airports and other scenery by sharing the load of creating buildings and such.

    Michael

  • Hello Michael,

    This is all very welcome news. I tried to increase the green colors level of the 4 tiles using GIMP but it didn't do very much to match the others. I can also do more USGS tiles for the area. I have access to all of them, as do everyone else, using the links in Rodeo's tutorial. I made a makeshift grid of thumbnails of the bay area to see how it compares to the FSET version. Other than being bluish vs greenish they are about the same but USGS comes with no strings attached so if I did download and process, say all 24 tiles for the bay, we would have a totally free of copyright scenery to upload and download at IPACS.

    Take a look at the individual tiles shown in the attachment for the Kaneohe Bay. btw Ford Island is available from USGS at a much higher resolution if we decided to use it also.

    Maybe Dave W could just use the USGS tiles for his 'ground' and we could shift everything over to the USGS scenery with no clouds in the area. Just a thought.

    Regards,


    Ray

  • What we really need for full Hawaii development is someone to automate the individual tfw files that are so tedious. All the info in there in links, it just has to be gathered and processed (to about 15 decimal points). All the islands are available afaik.

    I read someplace that a formal request to IPACS for a higher Hawaii Islands mesh is about to reach Torsten's suggestion box.

    Regards,

    Ray

  • Have you guys tried GeoConvertHelper ? As far as making TFW files, it does it automatically:

    aerofly.com/community/filebase/index.php?file/66/

    It doesn't even know what USGS is. The Helper is for FSET only.

    Regards,

    Ray

  • Let's ask admoore63 if he can help us. What files with USGS have the NW-SE and number of pixels info?

    Each USGS tile has an associated xml file associated with it. This xml file has all the particulars like coordinates for each of the four corners, including the x y pixel count for the size. You need a tfw file to connect every tile using all four coord, then you use to most upper left and most lower right tile coord for the tmc file that you need for the overall image. The download folder also has a small jpg image so you can see the coverage area. I used the small jpgs to make the 24 time image of Kaneohe Bay.

    There is some math associated with calculating each of the 4 points for every single tile vs the pixel count. (12 - 15 decimal places) I use excel to keep track of my calculations.

    Take a look at the tutorial for the USGS at the AF2 wiki site for a good feel of how it is done. The math is different, of course, for the 1m vs the 1 foot. Rodeo lead me through the maze and over the hurdles.

    Regards.

    Ray

  • Ray, on my Mac I would use a photo retouching software, rather than gimp. I'm pretty sure gimp can do the same process but I don't think gimp is set up to do batch processing. Typically some photo retouching software are, you set it up for one picture, and then batch apply it to a folder, or a set of pictures, much simpler, much easier. The harder part is fine tuning the original "retouching" needed.

    I started work on some Kaneohe buildings that I will send Dave. As usual the texture work is the most tedious and difficult, so that will take me some time. Here is WIP. Done the new tower, need the old one. Dave's job was great but while I'm at it making all the other buildings, the towers really don't take much time anyway. I like that square building, very distinctive, that one took me the longest so far about 10mn. The long rectangle in front, that's the jetty.


    Michael

  • Hi there,

    let's summarize it a bit.

    1. It would be good to replace all FSET images by USGS. No legal problems anymore and we gladly give credit to the authority for their images.

    2. We look for a batch tool to modify graphics: Input more green and make the colors more vivid. If we add fixed values to all images we hopefully don't need another adjustment.

    3. We need to convert the metadata of the USGS images from XML format into TFW or even better AID (the IPACS coordinate files).

    The XML content is different between the 1m and the 1foot imagery. We should aspire a solution for both sizes.

    I suggest not to combine the small 1foot images into larger ones before processing. It is more variable from 1 to hundreds, when we stay with the separate image files for geoconvert.

    Regards

    Rodeo

  • The USGS tiles arrive as JP2 type images. We can convert them to either bmp or tif type files and perform any color matching or modifications. Once happy with these images, we can calculate the tfw file info and process with the GeoConverter for AF2 use.

    We must be careful to keep the images the same size during the color matching process.

    For our Kaneohe Bay project I suggest we use a download level 1 @ level 14 FSET image.

    We might wish to choose from the 24 tile thumbnail image a few more USGS tiles for better line matching. Any suggestions?

    Are we planning on asking Dave W. to remake the 'ground' image for the placement of the 3d odjects?

    Regards,

    Ray

  • Ray, on my Mac I would use a photo retouching software, rather than gimp. I'm pretty sure gimp can do the same process but I don't think gimp is set up to do batch processing. Typically some photo retouching software are, you set it up for one picture, and then batch apply it to a folder, or a set of pictures, much simpler, much easier. The harder part is fine tuning the original "retouching" needed.

    I started work on some Kaneohe buildings that I will send Dave. As usual the texture work is the most tedious and difficult, so that will take me some time. Here is WIP. Done the new tower, need the old one. Dave's job was great but while I'm at it making all the other buildings, the towers really don't take much time anyway. I like that square building, very distinctive, that one took me the longest so far about 10mn. The long rectangle in front, that's the jetty.


    Michael

    Great stuff here. Thanks a million. I am packing up the images to send you this morning.

    Regards,


    Ray

  • Not intending to dilute the ongoing work, or muddy the waters, but if someone has the talent and is interested in making some elevated sections of the H3 interstate highway it would be a neat 3d object when flying around the area.

    Rodeo has somewhat committed to adding lights along the highway for us.

    Check out these images.

    Regards,

    Ray

  • One more look at the entrance. This is an online low res grab from online - photo is copyrighted by Mark A Johnson Photography. I have requested he join our efforts with some free use of his photographs, but have not heard back from him.

    Regards,

    Ray

  • I will be glad to update my ground image if required. The 4096x4096 image that I currently use looks like this and I would want to reuse the exact NW-SE corners so I don't have to move the models around. I include a snapshot also of the portion that I used - the AC3D - model so that the area shown with the AC3D model is the only area that stays flat.

  • I will be glad to update my ground image if required. The 4096x4096 image that I currently use looks like this and I would want to reuse the exact NW-SE corners so I don't have to move the models around. I include a snapshot also of the portion that I used - the AC3D - model so that the area shown with the AC3D model is the only area that stays flat.

    Great. Did you use Google Earth for the image? This might just turn out to be way to much effort to get rid of a cloud or two. :rolleyes:

    Regards

    Ray

  • Elevated H3:

    Seems easy enough to create, and I'd love to, BUT here is the catch:

    - I don't see the ground in the pictures, so length of pillars will probably not be right (also I don't have reference per say (square axis and reference origin), but I think I may be able to cunningly work around that)

    - I don't know how accurate the elevation map is, and I assume AC3D or FS2 would use it as a base. Maybe I make every pillar much longer (so they would protrude underground) and we set the whole highway at a single specific elevation. As I'm not familiar with the integration mechanics, I'm not sure what the best process is.

    On all other stuff it's all flat on sea level, easy enough.

    Michael