Elevation for Water Poly on Default Ground?

[falcon409]

An airport I am working on has several ponds around it that are not represented in default FSX. I have used the background image of the area in SBX to trace the shapes and assigned them to Hydro Lake Perennial. Initially I gave the pond the elevation of the airport. That put the pond 500ft in the air. I gave it "0" elevation and that sent it 500' underground. Is this something that cannot be done this way? If it can be done, I'd be interested in knowing how to get it to set at ground level.

 

[falcon409]

Just as an aside, to my mind this is no different than the problem I made for myself outlined in this post:
http://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/threads/sunken-river.438040/

I traced a river system, set the altitude incorrectly (used meters initially) and the river sank. Once I recognized my mistake and set it to the correct elevation in feet it rose correctly and looks great.

Now I do the very same process, trace the pond coastline, tag it for Hydro Lake Perrenial, give it the airport elevation in feet and it soars 500' in the air. No matter what elevation it is changed to it never comes close to the ground elevation.

 

[GaryGB]

Hi Ed:

I'm on the road again this weekend, but just popped in to suggest trying "-9999" as the assigned elevation to make the hydro poly vertices 'terrain mesh-clinging'.

[EDITED]

Once you slew around the resulting water levels and contiguous shorelines to see which altitudes (derived from the underlying local terrain mesh elevation values) look best for those hydro line and hydro poly features, you can assign those altitudes to all vertices of the hydro polys and re-compile ...to get "flat" water surfaces ... as discussed in this prior post:

http://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/threads/sunken-river.438040/#post-751632

[END_EDIT]


Hope this works OK for your project !

GaryGB

 

[falcon409]

Hi Ed:

I'm on the road again this weekend, but just popped in to suggest trying "-9999" as the assigned elevation to make the hydro poly vertices 'terrain mesh-clinging'.

I will give that a try Gary, Thanks

Once you slew around to see which local terrain mesh elevation looks best, you can assign that altitude to all vertices of the hydro polys and re-compile ...to get "flat" water surfaces. ;-)

Hope this works OK for your project !
GaryGB

Gary that won't work I don't think, because I've already set it to the elevation of the airport and it rose 500' into the air, lol

 

[GaryGB]

I will give that a try Gary, Thanks


Gary that won't work I don't think, because I've already set it to the elevation of the airport and it rose 500' into the air, lol

Hi Ed:

I edited my post above in an effort to impart greater clarity to the described work-flow:

http://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/th...er-poly-on-default-ground.438221/#post-753397


CAVEAT: The FS SDK internal default units for terrain elevation is Meters; one must bear this in mind when using various FS scenery utilities which may offer the option of displaying cursor and dialog box values in "Feet", as such utilities may- or may not- internally perform the conversion of requested unit values for elevation from Feet into Meters ...when source files are submitted to the FS SDK compilers.


BTW: To pre-visualize elevation values associated with real world terrain and water features which might be located within scenery areas in question, one may use Google Earth and note the "Elev" readout on the bottom status bar.

For even greater precision when pre-visualizing elevation values which will be associated with FS run time rendering of terrain and water features which are located within scenery project areas in question, one may use FS SDK TMFViewer with one's FS local terrain mesh BGL loaded under the intended FS CVX vector content BGL and note the "Value" readout on the bottom status bar, which is actually the "Elevation" in meters.


The custom photo-real aerial imagery for ones project can also be loaded into that session of FS SDK TMFViewer, and then enabled / disabled via the View menu pull-down to verify physical location of features as needed.


Hope this helps a bit more !

GaryGB

 

[rhumbaflappy]

-9999 will set the water poly to -9999 meters. You don't want to do that.

I think you are confusing feet and meters. SBuilderX needs all elevations in decimal meters. TCalcX run concurrently with FSX will give location, heading and ground elevation (in meters).

 

[GaryGB]

Hi Ed:

Sorry for the editing error above; I've worked quite a bit lately in FS9 with LWM vector BGLs and forgot to mention use of a "-9999" elevation value is primarily with the 'iHeight Fraction' when creating vector content with the FS2004 SDK.


Perhaps Dick would be so kind as to clarify whether there still are "No_Data" fallback values which may be used for setting elevation to become "mesh-clinging" at '0-Meters AGL' with vector objects in the FSX / P3D SDK ...as is done with the FS2Kx SDK and in GIS applications ?


Perhaps Dick would also be so kind as to clarify whether the modified Terrain.Cfg he co-authored with Luis Feliz-Tirado (which is installed by default with SBuilderX) still confers the option to utilize the above cited "-9999" elevation value with a "Legacy_LWM_Water_NoFlatten" hydro poly ?


// Legacy_LandWaterMask_Water_NoFlatten
[Texture.381]
Name=Legacy_LandWaterMask_Water_NoFlatten
Color=FF638AC2
guid={5835459A-4B8B-41F2-ADC1-DEE721573B28}
Textures=OCEAN_SEA_LARGE_LAKE_0
FlattenMode=none
LandClassRemapType=none
ExcludeAutogen=Yes
RenderToTexture=Yes
RenderPriority=80000
Water=Yes


...as George referred to here:

http://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/threads/sunken-river.438040/#post-751624


...and as indirectly mentioned in the context of working with CVX vector BGLs compiled by FSX SDK SHP2VEC ...here:

http://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/threads/cvxextractor-exporting-vector-data.432918/page-3

http://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/threads/bglviewer-for-fsx-bgl-files.432840/page-3



Additionally, perhaps Dick, based on his familiarity with legacy FS2Kx and FSX / P3D vector objects, would reply as to whether that object type is actually compiled by ex: SBuilderX via the legacy FS2004 SDK ...or instead via FSX SDK SHP2VEC ?

http://library.avsim.net/esearch.php?CatID=fsxscen&DLID=93289

http://library.avsim.net/esearch.php?CatID=fs2002sd&DLID=19772

http://library.avsim.net/esearch.php?CatID=fs2ksd&DLID=19208


PS: I've had my requisite 3-shots of Espresso now; (my first post above was "de-caffeinated")!


Back on the road again...

GaryGB

 

[falcon409]

Gary, I assumed that by changing the SBuilderX.cfg file to read Measurementmeters=False that any future "Resamples" would be done in feet, hence my reason for setting the elevation of the Hydro poly to the elevation of the airport "in feet". However, as I found, that was not the case. Setting the elevation to meters was the cure. Apparently that config setting has nothing to do with how the resample program reads the information for the poly.

I should probably make that a post-it note on my monitor, as I've made that same mistake multiple times and still haven't learned.

 

[GaryGB]

Hi Ed:

Indeed, there are many "gotcha's" working with the FS SDK and with 3rd party FS utilities.


BTW: It is good to have FS utilities such as Dick's TCalcX-003 available for use.

However, IIUC, since you 'probably' DO want to maximize your productivity with less intermediate steps in your work-flow, my guess is that you'd prefer to capture the FS terrain elevation values (aka "Ground" Altitude) directly into your FS scenery utility of choice when creating poly-lines and/or polygons.

Thus, you may be interested in this discussion of ways to log "Ground" Altitude data for FSX / P3D CVX vector content creation:

http://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/threads/elevation-capture-for-sbuilder-x.436879/



PS: I still have a hunch that it may be possible to utilize "No_Data" fallback values for setting elevation to become "mesh-clinging" at '0-Meters AGL' with CVX vector objects in the FSX / P3D SDK ...as is done with the FS2Kx SDK and in GIS applications.

But, it may be a while until the FS development Community finds a way to do so (unless Dick might once again be inclined to "throw us another bone" and share some more of his considerable insights, thereby saving numerous people countless hours of joyless striving ...rather than exercising his option to not answer direct- and/or inferred- un-resolved questions in the forums !


Somehow, I don't think prior NDA's would still apply to Dick (or Arno), since MS Game Studios has been given their pink slips over 6 years ago, and the future of the entire FS franchise now lies with a different set of MS icensing ventures with non-MS 3rd parties. .


But maybe that's Okay; I prefer to think that Dick is just too busy because he is still out there actively petitioning the developers of FS du jour ...to enhance the SDK for FSvNext !


Hope this helps a bit more !


GaryGB

 

[rhumbaflappy]

// Legacy_LandWaterMask_Water_NoFlatten
[Texture.381]
Name=Legacy_LandWaterMask_Water_NoFlatten
Color=FF638AC2
guid={5835459A-4B8B-41F2-ADC1-DEE721573B28}
Textures=OCEAN_SEA_LARGE_LAKE
FlattenMode=none
LandClassRemapType=none
ExcludeAutogen=Yes
RenderToTexture=Yes
RenderPriority=80000
Water=Yes

FlattenMode=none

This is how mesh-clinging water is made. There isn't any magic elevation set as null. This is the Aces definition, not mine or Luis'.

 

[GaryGB]

Many thanks for that additional clarification, Dick !

[EDITED]

So, IIUC, all those new retro-compatible entries added to Terrain.Cfg via your modified version of same, will have to be compiled via SHP2VEC ...if one does not instead wish to use FS2Kx format LWM and VTP scenery BGLs to create such legacy format vector scenery content that can be displayed in FSX ?

[END_EDIT]

GaryGB

 

[rhumbaflappy]

Compare the terrain.cfg files (Luis' vs. FSX) and you'll see what Luis and I added. The 'legacy' entries are from Microsoft.

Here's something most simmers don't know... you can use the FS2004 vector files in FSX.

FSX Vectors:

And FS2004 vectors in FSX:

So if you want retrograde vectors, just add them in (after excluding the FSX vectors).

 

[GaryGB]

Many thanks again, for that further clarification, Dick !


BTW: IIRC there was a scenery discussion thread at AVSIM years ago wherein you had identified and explained ACES' ongoing use of FS2Kx legacy format VTP scenery within a isolated area (of Siberia or Mongolia ?) in FSX RTM; however, I could not find that discussion again after AVSIM forum software updates changed the URLs for my hundreds of 'bookmarked' threads.


Thus, I'm compelled to ask:

* Must one exclude the FSX format CVX vectors in order to use the FS2Kx legacy format LWM / VTP version of vector scenery within the same Geographic area; in other words, does the FSX terrain rendering engine tolerate only one format of 'vector' BGL (either FSX- or FS2Kx-) ...to be rendered at a time for identical vector object "types" ?


* Do I remember correctly that use of the FS2Kx legacy format LWM / VTP version of vector scenery in FSX is subject to similar rules as with FSX CVX format vectors, in that one is required to NOT intersect or overlap nearby vector objects of the same "types" and/or VTP layer numbers to avoid 'excluding' them, regardless of whether such objects are FS2Kx or FSX format (...or a combination of both FS versions for the same object "types") ?


* Can both FSX and FS2Kx BGLs provide vector scenery content of the same "types" to be rendered concurrently within the same Geographic area from their own respective native FS version BGL formats ...as long as the vector object intersection / overlap 'exclusion' caveats are observed ?


Thanks in advance for any info on how (2) FS versions of such BGLs may be utilized in the same FSX Geographic area.

[EDITED]

BTW: Your screenies at C59 remind me of good times I had flying IRL to "Lake Lawn" with my colleague years ago.

We also once had to divert our intended "straight-in" approach when a twin engine aircraft suddenly took off south bound from C59; turns out that the CTAF frequency had been changed a year earlier, and that particular "infrequent flyer" had not done any flight planning to encounter info on the new radio frequency to be used at C59.

But that was only one of several near-misses I've had with twin engine aircraft pilots who were not paying attention.

[END_EDIT]

GaryGB

 

[rhumbaflappy]

Here's some FS2004 lines and polys in FSX (1 vtp poly, 1 vtp line, 1 LWM poly at -9999 elevation):

It doesn't seem to be interfering with any FSX vectors.

 

[GaryGB]

Thanks for that excellent "worked example", Dick !

It's good to know we still have multiple options and methods to create "vector" scenery compatible with FSX.


Hmmm... time to refresh my memory for using the special features in both SBuilder for FS9 and SBuilderX !

GaryGB