Have been loving FS2 and its photorealistic scenery, but the lack of Australian scenery has been a major disappointment. So the only thing to do was create some myself. I looked at all the tutorials available and gave it a go. After a very steep learning curve and some help from the forums, I managed a grid from Byron Bay in the south to Noosa in the north and Toowoomba in the west. After creating all the textures I have also used the excellent Fscloudport to create some individual airport buildings, runways and static aircraft for Toowoomba, Sunshine Coast and Redcliffe. The textures for the whole region are suitable for flying above 3000 feet and I have added higher quality textures around the airports for lower air work. The textures look great from the air but the appearance is a bit flat at ground level, so the Fscloudport detail at airports brings it back to life. Any texture colour variations are a result of the available imagery.
I still have to add airport buildings to Gold Coast, Caloundra Airport, Archerfield, Caboolture and Amberley. All airport details will be limited to that available from Fscloudport (due to my skillset and inclination). Brisbane airport itself is unlikely to have significant building details added due to the complexity of the terminal, but will do hangers etc. After that I'll start working my way north towards Cairns. The texture size is about 320MB for the main area textures for the area, between 40MB to 120MB each for the detailed textures for airports. The Fscloudport buildings etc are a quite small download with Sunshine Coast airport coming in at only 5MB The finished airports are already available for download at Fscloudport, but they don't include ground textures. Haven't thought about how I might distribute all this yet.
It really is impressive when you can pick out your own house as you fly over, so naturally my own place is in one of the high detail areas, but more by good luck than by good planning.
It is still very much a work in progress but thought I would share some screenshots for those Aussies out there hanging out for some Australian scenery for FS2.
Sunshine Coast
Maroochydore
Sunshine Coast Airport - buildings created with Fscoudport
Amberley Air Base - textures only
Gold Coast
Mount Tamborine
Brisbane from 35000 feet
'Redcliffe Airport - buildings created with Fscloudport
Toowoomba City Aerodrome - buildings created with Fscloudport