Posts by kazam

    Thank you Almdudler.

    Here is another video from yesterday, this time of Malibu:

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    I took quite a few photos but matching them up with the Aerofly FS2 counterpart wasn't so easy. The altitudes and location were very close to the same. You should be able to see Santa Monica airport in the video in the first post. It wasn't easy to take photos of every tricky spot because the airspace can be congested. While we were flying at about 1,500 over the beach, another aircraft was parallel to us at 750. We were both under ATC control and had each other in visual but it is tricky because meanwhile under 500 you have search and rescue helicopters patrolling the beaches.

    I went flying in a Cessna 172 over Los Angeles yesterday in what were perfect conditions (no clouds, smooth as glass over the ocean, 60 mile visibility). Using the same airplane, location, flight path, altitude (restricted to 2,500 asl due to LAX ATC zones and a lot of events in the city that day), at the same time here are the results:

    Aerofly FS2 - Canyon fly through to Malibu:

    Real (notice you can see the Catalina chain in real but not in sim...also notice the windy road near the top peak in both photos. Quite good comparison overall):

    Aerofly FS2 - Seaside hills

    Real:

    Aerofly FS2 - Near coast line

    Real:

    Aerofly FS2 - Malibu

    Real:

    Aerofly FS2 - Santa Monica

    Real: Notice the visibility with downtown about 30 miles away very clearly visible as well as buildings mountains twice that distance.

    Aerofly FS2 - Santa Monica pier:

    Real:

    Sorry about the noise near the end of this video, the air vent was open right on the camera mic. But I still can't get over the visibility that day and the vivid colors and signs of life. You can see tons of people walking the boardwalk.

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    Overall thoughts: Aerofly FS2 did quite a good job except sometimes visibility is greater in real than the best settings in the sim. Obviously the feeling of the environment being alive (cars, other aircraft, waves, etc.) are nonexistent in the sim (so far) but vivid in real life. I have a video I will try to upload later to show. The colors are much more vivid in real life. The water had a translucent blue green quality and you could see depth through it that is hard to explain. In a still image, it isn't quite there even in the real photographs but when you were flying, you could clearly see the underwater contours and shapes below the surface and could tell there was depth to it.


    I don't know if it is ever possible for a sim to treat water the way it behaves in real life in how the colors change depending on the angle you view it (in addition to waves and depth translucency). Notice the almost Caribbean colors from this angle.

    One important point - Safety first! No photographs were taken while I was at the controls. I was with a licensed flight instructor who had the controls when I was taking photos.