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Airport Lights with effect - another solution

Georg Aubele

Georg Aubele

Messages
535
Country
germany
We had discussed this topic already here:

http://www.scenerydesign.org/forum/showthread.php?t=830&page=2&pp=20

but some time went on and there are new infos to cope with.

The solution stated above has the following conditions:
:alert: Your are NOT allowed to place the light with the effect in an area where you set an exclude.
:alert: You have to attach the controller AND the effect to the GMAX-Model in order to have the lights shining when departing AND arriving.

As working on EDDF, I found another solution with the help of this forum - someone stated, that you CAN use effects in exclusions, when you place the effect via XML. I tried with this and this is what I got:

I use the same controller and effect file as in the solution above (so you can copy them).

1. When I place only the effect I have lights on, when starting on the airport, but light off, when arriving from more than 10 miles.
When I place the controller and the effect, I get the normal light when arriving, but the twice as bright light, when starting on the airport.

Therefore I tried only to place the controller - and that worked! I don't know why (according to what I know, it should NOT!), but with only the controller placed (referencing to the effect), the light works phantastically.

2. There was the problem of the parameters in effects - I tried a lot (like many others :o ) and my solution is to place a controller with parameter "NIGHT=1" and one with "DUSK=1". With that combination I get airport lights at night, dusk and dawn and also when arriving und departing!


Works for me
00000298.gif
 
Sorry, Georg, but what do you mean with controller? I simply place the fx - why use a controller? :confused:
 
Try to fly to your airport from another airport more than 10 nm away and you will see why!

The lights won't shine - don't ask anyone why they not shine - as far as I know, nobody can explane it ...

If your's shine - would you please give us the code of the fx-file? That would make work a lot faster ...
 
Hmm, I'll have a closer look - thanks. ;)

Do you use a simple controller like the ones for the FS-fireworks?
 
Hi Georg.

If I understand you right, you are attaching a light effect ( or it's controller ) to a gmax object?

I'd have to ask why?

Effects can be placed directly to simulate lights... and these effects are not eliminated by excludes. Excludes only eliminate gmax/attached effects. So it's much easier to just place effects separately from objects using XML code.

My placed effects show where I want them, and don't disappear depending on a start or arrival.

I know we've had discussions on the forum concerning attaching lights with gmax, but really, it is not needed.

=============

An exclude:
Code: 
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<FSData
   version = "9.0"
   xmlns:xsi='http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance'
   xsi:noNamespaceSchemaLocation="bglcomp.xsd" >
   <ExclusionRectangle
        latitudeMinimum = "42.6280689171738"
        latitudeMaximum = "42.6285670995999"
        longitudeMinimum = "-88.6011433856843"
        longitudeMaximum = "-88.6003384147812"
       excludeAllObjects = "TRUE" />
</FSData>

An Effect ( fx_MyCorona.fx ):
Code: 
[Library Effect]
Lifetime=5
Version=2.00
Display Name=MyCorona
Radius=50
Priority=0

[Properties]
Cockpit=1
VirtualCockpit=1
Spot=1
Tower=1
Map=1

[Emitter.0]
Lifetime=0.50, 0.50
Delay=0.00, 0.00
Bounce=0.00
Rate=1.00, 1.00
X Emitter Velocity=0.00, 0.00
Y Emitter Velocity=0.00, 0.00
Z Emitter Velocity=0.00, 0.00
Drag=0.00, 0.00
X Particle Velocity=0.00, 0.00
Y Particle Velocity=0.00, 0.00
Z Particle Velocity=0.00, 0.00
X Rotation=0.00, 0.00
Y Rotation=0.00, 0.00
Z Rotation=0.00, 0.00
X Offset=0.00, 0.00
Y Offset=0.00, 0.00
Z Offset=0.00, 0.00
Pitch=0.00, 0.00
Bank=0.00, 0.00
Heading=0.00, 0.00

[Particle.0]
Lifetime=0.00, 0.00
Type=19
X Scale=10.00, 10.00
Y Scale=10.00, 10.00
Z Scale=0.00, 5.00
X Scale Rate=0.00, 0.00
Y Scale Rate=0.00, 0.00
Z Scale Rate=0.00, 0.00
Drag=0.00, 0.00
Color Rate=0.00, 1.00
X Offset=0.00, 0.00
Y Offset=0.00, 0.00
Z Offset=0.00, 0.00
Fade In=0.00, 0.00
Fade Out=0.00, 0.00
Rotation=0.00, 0.00
Ground Normal=1
Shade=0
Static=1
Face=0, 0, 0

[ParticleAttributes.0]
Blend Mode=2
Texture=corona1.bmp
Bounce=0.00
Color Start=100, 100, 100, 200
Color End=100, 100, 100, 255
Jitter Distance=0.00
Jitter Time=0.00
uv1=0.00, 0.00
uv2=1.00, 1.00
X Scale Goal=0.00
Y Scale Goal=0.00
Z Scale Goal=0.00
Extrude Length=0.00
Extrude Pitch Max=0.00
Extrude Heading Max=0.00

An Effect placement:
Code: 
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<FSData version="9.0" xmlns:xsi='http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance' xsi:noNamespaceSchemaLocation="bglcomp.xsd">

  <SceneryObject lat="42.6283323522632" lon="-88.6007861051372" alt="10" pitch="0" bank="0" heading="0" altitudeIsAgl="TRUE" imageComplexity="NORMAL">
    <Effect effectName="fx_MyCorona.fx" effectParams="DAWN=1;DUSK=1;"/>
  </SceneryObject>

  <SceneryObject lat="42.6283323522632" lon="-88.6007861051372" alt="10" pitch="0" bank="0" heading="0" altitudeIsAgl="TRUE" imageComplexity="NORMAL">
    <Effect effectName="fx_MyCorona.fx" effectParams="DAY=0;NIGHT=1;"/>
  </SceneryObject>

</FSData>

Go to airport c59 at night and look at the effect.

FS9 seems to have a couple of bugs dealing with attached effects, so why not just skip the attachments, and place them directly?

Dick
 
Last edited:
Hi Dick!

No, attaching the effect to the object was the old way described in the other thread, I just did what you are now proposing. :rolleyes:
 
Wow! So I just have to ask before I spend hours redoing my gmax attached light effects... does placing only the effect with XML effectively cut the number of effects in half, therefore improving framerates??? (That is of course, if you were using the fx and the controller before...)

I'm starting to creep towards bad framerates at KBWI and need to start cutting back on some stuff to boost them back up.
 
I don't know about the frames ... I did not experience any improvements or degrades of framerates, but you are free to try :)
 
Last edited:
Im a bit new to making/using effects. Ive managed to edit current beacon effects to get desired effects, but how do you guys use effect for lighting? and by lighting, do you mean apron/flood lights? im interested if its better than using night textures for ground textures...thanx already!
 
Just take a look at the EDLM2005-project in the showroom an then in the object-market. ;)
 
Is there solution......

I am geting more and more frustrated with effects.
Here is my problem:
I have placed multiple effects to simulate apron lights (XML code was used) and add effects parametar NIGHT=1 and in separate .bgl I have the same position of effects and effect parametar DUSK=1.

When I start from the airport those lights seems to funcion perfect but when i arrive to the airport effects are not visible at all. Does anybody know why??

I have tried to add folloving combinations of effects parametars:
DAY=0
NIGHT=1; DUSK=1 in one .bgl
NIGHT=1 IN ONE .BGL, AND IN SEPARATED .BGL DUSK=1
I have even try to use different effects, diferent programs (Arno's OBJECT PLACER, SCENGENX, manual placement....) but nothing seems to work.
What am I doing wrong???
Can anybody help me?
 
Last edited:
Well, that's what this discussion is about, isn't it? :confused:

Due to a FS-bug you'll have to use a controller that calls the FX - just like Georg wrote above. ;)
 
The idea of placing an effect wthout attaching to an object has a lot of benefits; however, I tried to compile the "effects placement" code above using the FSX SDK2 and could not.

Was this strickly for FS9? Has anyone had luck placing an effect without attaching to an object in FSX?

My example is below:

<FSData
version="9.0"


xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance

"
xsi:noNamespaceSchemaLocation="bglcomp.xsd"
<SceneryObject
lat="33.678330705"
lon="-117.870510668"
alt="49.0M"
altitudeIsAgl="FALSE"
pitch="0"
bank="0"
heading="27.8"
imageComplexity="NORMAL">
<Effect
effectName="fx_lightObsRedFlash60"
effectParams="NIGHT=1; DAY=0;"
/>
</SceneryObject>

<SceneryObject
lat="33.678330705"
lon="-117.870510668"
alt="49.0M"
altitudeIsAgl="FALSE"
pitch="0"
bank="0"
heading="27.8"
imageComplexity="NORMAL">
<Effect
effectName="fx_lightObsRedFlash60"
effectParams="DAWN=1; DUSK=1;"
/>
</SceneryObject>
</FSData>
 
That code works fine for me.

Dusk flashing (off):



Dusk flashing (on):



FSX Acc SDK
 
Last edited:
There was a thread a while back where a tweak to the effect itself seemed to solve the problem of the effect not displaying when flying in from a distant location. The solution was to change the particle type to 25 as opposed to 19. As near as we could all tell it worked (I'm speaking of FS9, don't know about FSX). See this thread:

http://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6597

Jim
 
Hi Jim,

in that other thread you spoke about a possible frame impact ... did you experience anything like that?
 
Hi Georg, I couldn't honestly say because the scenery I was working on only had about 10 instances of the effect. No effect on frame rates at all that I could see. To this day I still haven't tried attaching the controller rather than the effect, but with so few effects in place I doubt whether that would have caused a frame hit either.

Jim
 
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