FSX | FSX-SE Scenery Design Forum - How To

Hi all! Good to be back designing! Been away for awhile since I am in Iowa on a consulting gig. Just got a nice powerful laptop so I can get back to building. Been reading the forum for the past few weeks and could not wait to get working on some of the new techniques such as Slartibartfast! Well I started a project and everything compiled fine. Created my BGL,VTP and LWM files along with the _patch.BGL s. Removed the BGLs referenced in the compile result. Now I have tried putting these new BGLs in Addon Scenery/Scenery and also tried another folder in the main FS9/Scenery folder called Manila Bay/Scenery.Problem is I cannot see the new coastlines! Hehehe. I can see…

Greetings,I am currently working on ww2 era scenery for the state of Pennsylvania for CFS2. Is there an expedient way to place radio towers (or other such objects)statewide in one bgl? Or must I make a bgl for each tower or grouping of towers? Any help on this is greatly appreciated.Regards,Joe

You know what they say, better look silly than stay ignorant:-). I've been working (working ? hmmm)on placing objects for a couple of weeks now with the help of the manual and of you guys but there's still something which mystifies me. What is the biasXYZ function ? Granted, english is not my first language but I thought I knew what a biais was. I read the manual, I read posts but cannot comprehend what is the use of it ?Any good soul ?Dominique

I'm really tempted to buy this thing because there are lots of little generic things I'd like to do, and a few sceneries I'd like to download and use that have utilized FSE.However, it's generally few and far between that it's required, which makes me wonder how many people own it and how many people release scenery that relies upon it.Also, are there any users here that use it often?I have to admit, a big plus for me is the WYSIWYG nature of it - the objects look well-designed, too.One BIG BIG MINUS for me is that a user cannot create FSE-compatible objects.Any thoughts appreciated.Thanks,Andrew

Hi All- In designing the structures for my airport, I would like to make them as frame rate friendly as possible. 1.If you had two walls both the same size; the first is a single large rectangle with ten windows drawn on it; the second wall is the same size but made up of ten individal rectangles with a window drawn on them. Which wall is more frame rate friendly? 2. Is a simple rectangular building,with textures only on the outside of the walls, more frame rate friendly than the same building with textures on the outside and the inside of the walls?[i'm thinking of a hanger with the doors open so you can see the inside]. 3. When moving past a building,are the frame…

Hey guys, finally starting to get GMAX down and now I am trying to get my scenery to export into FS. I have read the scenery SDK and have all the plugins, installed a fresh version of BGLComp (used it before with cellgrid and the Coastline editor) and have the MDL file and the XML file I created in the same folder as BGLComp, yet when I drop it into the BGLComp.EXE I get the quick DOS window, but no BGL. I can complie the sample ones included, but not mine. I checked it against the example in the SDK and they match, except for my object data. Any ideas what I am missing?Regards, MichaelKDFWhttp://www.calvirair.com/mcpics/PBTMCa.jpgCalVirAir International VACalVirAir Inter…

Hi, does anyone know what directory I would put a .bgl and an .api file for blue taxiway edge lights. Also is there anyone who knows where I could get the active runway hold short lights like this file on avsim file library wigwags.zip except for fs 2004? Thanks a lot. Tyler

I'm new here! This forum definitely needs a FAQ, as I'm sure this question gets asked by every new person here, so sorry!Anyway, the area around my FBO in FS2004 is just random autogen stuff. I'd like to upgrade the area with actual satellite imagery, add some roads, and add new buildings at the FBO (which just renovated).I downloaded the scenery SDK but I just don't have the time to futz with text files (I do that for a living as a programmer).I'd be happy to BUY a good visual program that lets me add satellite scenery, roads, trees?, and buildings, and ideally allows me to add custom textures to the buildings too (I'm planning on taking photos of my FBO). Can someone re…

I want to recreate cities placing buildings in the exact place and with the exact position. I thought the Autogen SDK would be a great program to do this, as I don't know much about scenery design and using "already made" buildings wouldn't give me problems. But I've found it too difficult and I didn't make any progress with it.I am looking for scenery design programs, easy-to-use and that have a library of buildings and objects wich are already made. In other words, a program that I just have to place the buildings or objects using coordinates or through flightsim2004 position.Any suggestions will be welcomed.Albertovolador

Hi All,A simple question first of all... is it possible to make a realistic PAPI object in GMAX, that can be placed as a library object.I have looked thru some of the fs2004 sdk's, but cant find anything that would give me a clue where to start.Thanks,David.

Hello to everyone,I have downloaded recently the Autogen SDK from Microsoft and I have tried to create my own autogen scenery for Spanish towns. It's the first time I make an attempt to build a scenery like this and I find a few problems. First of all, I would be grateful if you tell me how can I locate the BMP file wich corresponds to the coordinates I want. Is there anything I can use to capture the coordinates and use them in the Autogen Annotator to find the appropiate BMP?Thank you all for resolving my doubts as a rookie in the scenery design.Albertovolador.

Dear all,Jan tried to help me over the weekend, but I'm still stuck getting slarti to use a Terrascene2.1 generated watermask, I'm hoping someone will be able to point out where my error is occurring.First, I have used TS2.1 to create watermasks by setting the background color to 120 (on a 0-255 scale), thus making water black and land within the range of 98-127 as defined in the slarti docs (p.23). I also turned off all non-water lines (as roads were white by default) and enable streams to be rendered as black with a 1 pixel width, no antialiasing. I then decided to create quarter globe tile regions, as the entire globe tile created a targa image that was greater than …

I'm adding some taxiway signs to an AF2 file. As an example, for taxiway "F", should the sign read "F->" or "FOXTROT->" ?George

Hello all, I am trying to create a heliport at my local airport. My problem is that there is a tree growing in the middle of my taxiway. I created the heliport using AFCAD 2, is this the best way to create scenery, or should I be using a different program? Any help that I can get would be appreciated. Thanks in advance,Brett

Hi folks,today looking deeply into my scenery.cfg i noticed some Exclude strings that are very different: the first four group with period after decimal. And second group without any period.Which is the correct syntax? Hope they both work OK as some of the first group come directly from payware sceneries...Thanks in advance for helpingLuigi ;-)Exclude=N2 45.5,E101 42.0,N2 43.5,E101 44.0,objectsExclude=N22 19.67,E113 53.13,N22 17.50,E113 57.30,objects, vorsExclude=N14 32.22,E120 59.32,N14 29.52,E121 2.11,objectsExclude=N45 41.54,E009 39.00,N45 38.00,E009 43.76,allExclude=N40 44 00,W74 11 21,N40 38 00,W74 09 25,allExclude=N41 52 30,E12 00 00,N41 42 00,E12 27 30,all

I have been trying to wade through all of this scenery deign mess - downloaded several programs that I have seen in FAQ's and forums. Hoping this would all make sense sooner or later, I have realized i am not as computer saavy as I thought. All i want to do right now is start small and put a building in where there isn't one with the default MS Flight Sim 2004 scenery.I have gmax, creatsign, terrain sdk, afcad 221, msxml, and maybe a couple of others. Can someone point me in the right direction in some plain english? Right now I do not have a clue. I appreciate any help, and believe me, I tried to do my homework.

Howdy,I was having a problem locating scetions of a river I had drawn in order to move it over a bit since it was oozing up the hillside. I couldn't get the exact location and finally drew a couple of LWM polys in the shape of an arrow to narrow the location. After making the river corrections I deleted the two polys. They disappeared from Ground2K4 but continued to appear in Flight Simulator. I finally returned to an earlier bgl file that I had fortunately saved in order to get rid of the polys. This problem occurred previously with a bridge that I had drawn and wanted to remove. Has anyone had this problem? If so, how did you eliminate it?Thanks.Wil

Hey Guys.First off guys i was wondering how to change runway numbers? for example just recently a local runway change from 04-22 to 03-21, i was wondering how to implement that in FS. And is it possible to get Canadian Runway markings in Fs2004 for all canadian runways??Thanks for your time,Ravi

Guys,Did anyone play around with the autogen transmition lines? I'm trying to use them without luck.Object is supposed to be vtp,1211 on layer 4Regards,Jay

Hi - Well, I'm happy with my new installation of XP but I missed backing up my notes for what programs (other than the image editor itself, e.g. Photoshop) are necessary to edit the default FS textures in 2k4.Any help appreciated!Thanks,Andrew

Hello,I thought I'd have a go at using AutoAsm to import coastline information from http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/mgg/shorelines/shorelines.htmlI downloaded the dat file and copied it to the AutoAsm main directory. I then wen to the Editor panel and loaded it up there. However, the screen main screen doesn't show anything. I guess I must either be doing something wrong or I need to do more steps. I'm not sure which though.

Hello,I've found an AreaFill that is still in the TDFMacros.inc that comes with Ground2k. It is well known that this command causes CTDs (Crash to Desktop) in FS2004. Does anybody know if Ground2k4 V5.33 still uses it?It is so confusing because a betatester of my scenery complained about CTDs in a very complex area made using Ground2k.Best regards,Sasa

Hi,maybe this has been discussed before, but I could not find a reference. If you look at the .asm files produced by Ground2k4 if you used the exclude tool, you will notice that code lines like VTPDataArea 4, 0, 3, 21together with Cellv_453_169 EQU VTPCellID 0, 453, 169do not conform to the rules in the MS SDK, which I quote: struct VTPDataArea { enum{ MaxLayerCount = 31 }; UINT16 wLayerCount:5; // The number of layers in this area up to 31 UINT16 wAutoCalc:1; // Must be set to 1 UINT16 wU:5; // Must be set to (VTPCellID::m_dwU | 0x1F) UINT16 wV:5; // Must be set to (VTPCellID::m_dwV | 0x1F)};because 453 (= 0x1c5) AND 0x1f would …

dear Chris - Horst;just a quick question -after my coastline project is setup and ready for compilation - i hit the 'Write Lwm' or 'Write Vtp' autoasm return Error 53 - File not Foundwhat is the file autoasm is reffering too??tx for clarificationsmarc

Hello,I'm just curious if anbody has had any success with the Novasim dynamic macros. I downloaded them off the website a few days ago and tried them out and was dissapointed that the dynamic macros didn't work correctly, they would not respond to the correct frequency unless you tuned another frequency and then you'd see them quickly snap into place and slowly retract (or close in the case of the hangar).Has anybody else had this problem? I'm thinking about purchasing NovaSim - but not if my dynamic scenery ends up looking like this... Brandon