Creating terrain heightmaps

Hi Ian,

Of course, I also like to use the same source material for compiling all levels, that's the ideal case when you can handle the necessary amount of data.

This is especially true with orthophotos : Geoconverting low levels from source A orthophotos and high levels from source B orthophotos would result in source B textures popping up in front of the aircraft while flying, with associated radical colour/quality changes.

Your heightmap case is slightly different though. I provide again my AFS2 LOD resolutions table.

AFS2 LOD level 7 corresponds to a mesh resolution of approx. 150m, thus even if you have differences between 2 sources the transition has good chances to be smoothed.

I don't know what source dem resolutions you can get, but I would use a wide area source to compile at least a level 7 and maybe level 9 base, and see if compiling a local high resolution mesh in upper levels causes interface troubles or not.

Trial and error, as usual, to find the best compromise.

Cheers

Antoine

Thanks Antoine - that's a very useful table.

It looks as though I may be able to get 10 m and 50 m resolution data from the Norwegian site - but I haven't tried yet. The 10 m data would certainly be good enough for both levels 7 & 9. The 50 m data may not be quite good enough for level 9, though good enough for level 7. Having said that, the default Aerofly resolution is worse than 50 m (not sure?) so maybe it wouldn't be any worse than default?

I have noticed that there is a fearsomely deep crevasse in the sea just off the west coast of Norway where my current data ends. It is about 100 m wide at the top and appears to extend hundreds of metres below sea level. It is genuinely scary in VR, especially if you lower the helicopter into it! I'll have to have a play around and see what I can do about it.

Cheers

Ian

Quote from Ian C

Thanks Antoine - that's a very useful table.

It looks as though I may be able to get 10 m and 50 m resolution data from the Norwegian site - but I haven't tried yet. The 10 m data would certainly be good enough for both levels 7 & 9. The 50 m data may not be quite good enough for level 9, though good enough for level 7. Having said that, the default Aerofly resolution is worse than 50 m (not sure?) so maybe it wouldn't be any worse than default?

As far as I understood, there's no more mesh north of N60? If that's the case, then a 50m mesh (Level 8 may also be compiled) is definitely an improvement.

I don't know how far north the AFS2 World can be modelled.

And a good 10m mesh already may provide very satisfaying results.

Cheers

Antoine

Quote from Trespassers

As far as I understood, there's no more mesh north of N60? If that's the case, then a 50m mesh (Level 8 may also be compiled) is definitely an improvement.

I don't know how far north the AFS2 World can be modelled.

And a good 10m mesh already may provide very satisfaying results.

Cheers

Antoine

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Last year I tried to add airports in Norway above the 60th parallel and was able to add a few but as I went further North I got a series of weird and distracting vertical lines from the surface to infinity.

Regards,

Ray

Quote from Trespassers

And a good 10m mesh already may provide very satisfaying results.

Yes of course - I was forgetting - 10 m is actually a very good mesh. It produces excellent results in the USA.

And yes as far as I'm aware there is no Aerofly mesh north of 60 deg. I certainly can't see any mountains to the north in the distance. I can see them to south because Bergen is only a little north of 60 deg.

Cheers

Ian

Quote from qwerty42

if you used your own data to convert level 7 too instead of using the AeroFly mesh

Be VERY careful duplicating Aerofly mesh levels.

I recently experienced a nasty problem that took quite a while to sort out.

I encountered major "rendering disruptions" that appeared to be repeatable at a specific location (with some variation with altitude and speed). In the ASG29 there was significant warping/rippling of the display for several seconds. In the R22 it was fatal. There were the display ripples plus the cyclic started oscilating wildly ignoring joystick input, resulting in eventual death spiral.

At first I thought it was some cultivation issue since I was experimenting with dense forest generation.

Eventually I tracked it down to custom elevation mesh. It turns out there was a tile that for some reason (I blame my evil twin) had level 9,10 and 11 TTH as well as 12, 13 and 14

Removing the duplicate TTH files eliminated the disruption. It may be that the revised scenery load algorithm worked harder to resolve and render the duplicate mesh. The R22 flight model is more sensitive than the ASG29 so the negative side effects may be amplified.

In any case duplicating TTH files seems to be a bad idea

/Stu

This was well inside the area with custom mesh. The TIFF data looks clean (no spikes or walls).

It was quite reproducible .

Duplicate 9-11 mesh => problem.

No duplicate mesh => no problem.

If nobody else encounters this problem then good.

I just did not want anyone else to spend a day or two chasing down the same issue.

/Stu

Currently I am putting my elevation (TTH) tiles here .....

C:\Users\ian\Documents\Aerofly FS 2\scenery\elevation

Is there any reason why I shouldn't put them here .....

D:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Aerofly FS 2 Flight Simulator\scenery\elevation ?

Obviously I would put them in a separate folder so that I could move them if necessary. The reason I ask is that my C-drive is rather small in capacity. The D-drive would be a much better place for them.

Another question ..... I created a base layer of level 7-9 TTH tiles for a level 7 area north of 60 deg in Norway using 10 m data from Høydedata. Initially I put them in the C-drive location above and found that they didn't show at all in Aerofly. The terrain was completely flat - i.e. it was the default terrain at that latitude. It was only when I transferred them to the D-drive location that I saw the terrain as it should be. I noticed that the default terrain tiles on the D-drive are levels 7-10 only. I assume therefore that levels 7-10 have to be on the D-drive anyway to show up. Obviously it would make sense for me to put all levels (7-14) on the D-drive.

i want to try and do a 5m dem of anchorage but i discovered it is not in .img format do you know how to do it ?

Thanks for your reply qwerty42. I was aware that I could specify an additional folder for scenery - I wasn't sure that I could do the same for mesh tiles. However since I would probably put them on the D-drive anyway I was thinking that I might as well put them with the default ones that come with the Aerofly installation.

Like you I have levels 7-14 in the USA and, as you say, there's no easy way of telling whether the lower ones are showing up in that case. However in Norway (> 60 deg) it's very obvious because the default terrain is flat and at sea level.

I've beeen experimenting with different locations for my elevation (TTH) tiles, and I've found that if I put my level 7-10 tiles here .....

D:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Aerofly FS 2 Flight Simulator\scenery\elevation

or here .....

D:\aerofly_aux_folder\scenery\elevation

..... Aerofly takes ages to load and eventually crashes. (Actually, to be more precise, I can put a few level 7-10 tlies in those locations but when I add more I get a crash.)

If I put the level 7-10 tiles here .....

C:\Users\ian\Documents\Aerofly FS 2\scenery\elevation

everything seems OK (almost), The problem I reported in a previous post seems to be just for one one particular set of level 7-10 files that don't show up in Aerofly when I place them on the C-drive. Those particular tiles only show up on the D-drive. Another set do show up on the C-drive. I can't explain that.

As for the level 11-14 tiles .... they don't cause a crash in any location and do always show up.

In summary: I've partially solved my storage problem because I can keep my level 11-14 tiles on my D-drive, but it seems I have to have my level 7-10 tiles on my C-drive.

Quote from qwerty42

Weeeeird... I have no clue why it would behave that way. Have you tried having steam do an integrity check on your base AeroFly install? I wonder if something is corrupted with one of the default tiles...

Edit: Just had a thought... do you have any extra 3rd party DLC? Like ORBX stuff? I wonder if the load priorities on those are dealt with in a different way and could be conflicting?

I'll try the integrity check thing - thanks for the tip.

I do have ORBX True Earth Netherlands - so I guess that could be causing the problem. Also I moved the Netherlands scenery tiles - I don't know whether that's of any significance. I never touched the Netherlands TTH files however.

What does deleting the "main.mcf" do? I have it at the back of my mind that it's a cure for some types of problem - but I can't remember which!

Cheers

Ian

Quote from qwerty42

It stores certain preferences and configuration settings, and if it's gone I think AeroFly generates a new one when it starts. I can't remember if joystick mappings are stored in there, so if you try it you might want to back up your old one. Also you'll have to manually re-enter your auxiliary folder location back into it if you regenerate it. I doubt it will make a difference to what you're seeing, but it's so fast to check it's worth a try.

OK thanks - I might give it a go.

i have forgotten how to do height maps for Australia con someone please link me to the instructions?

thank you

coxo2436

Quote from coxo2436

i have forgotten how to do height maps for Australia con someone please link me to the instructions?

thank you

coxo2436

As per Kloot's post on page 2 the site for Australian height map downloads is http://elevation.fsdf.org.au

Using this site, I draw a box around the area I need better height maps for and then select the box next to the "1 Second Digital Elevation Model" to then download it*. It emails you a ZIP file that contains the ready-made GeoTiff file and also contains the co-ordinates that you need to use when editing the .TFW and .TMC files. Refer Qwerty42's good video instructions contained in his post for how best to edit and then relocate these files ready for processing into heightmaps by the Aerofly FS2 Geoconvert tool.

*I found that while 1 metre Digital Elevations Models available on the http://elevation.fsdf.org.au site are higher quality and much larger files, the resulting GeoTIFF file often has missing large sections of data in your selected area. Missing data results in big visual corruptions in the converted tiles within Aerofly FS2 so you need consistent coverage. I find 1 Second files generally cover the entire drawn area selected and work a lot better within Aerofly FS2 as the height map tiles are complete and consistent. So give 1 Metre models a go to obtain best quality, but if the TIFF file you load is only partially complete, go with the 1 Second models, which are less detailed but generally deliver a more consistent result.

As suggestions, these new user-generated height maps really improve mountainous areas like the Glass House Mountains in Queensland, Blue Mountains in Katoomba, Uluru, and the whole Illawarra escarpment. I've now posted some screenshots using my user-made Australian height maps in Aerofly FS2 in the gallery.

Thank you SOOO much for your help