• Which the release of FS2020 we see an explosition of activity on the forun and of course we are very happy to see this. But having all questions about FS2020 in one forum becomes a bit messy. So therefore we would like to ask you all to use the following guidelines when posting your questions:

    • Tag FS2020 specific questions with the MSFS2020 tag.
    • Questions about making 3D assets can be posted in the 3D asset design forum. Either post them in the subforum of the modelling tool you use or in the general forum if they are general.
    • Questions about aircraft design can be posted in the Aircraft design forum
    • Questions about airport design can be posted in the FS2020 airport design forum. Once airport development tools have been updated for FS2020 you can post tool speciifc questions in the subforums of those tools as well of course.
    • Questions about terrain design can be posted in the FS2020 terrain design forum.
    • Questions about SimConnect can be posted in the SimConnect forum.

    Any other question that is not specific to an aspect of development or tool can be posted in the General chat forum.

    By following these guidelines we make sure that the forums remain easy to read for everybody and also that the right people can find your post to answer it.

FS2004 Falcon 900

No progress on the aircraft itself, although I may ditch the idea of the "older" tail intake design. There are a few planes imaged online that show a flat top to the intake but then, from another angle, the shape changes to something more curved. I still have my sense that the earlier (900/B/C models) had a slightly less contoured intake, but I'd no longer put too much money on it.

I still have the shadow model to make (otherwise you get the odd shadows of all the tail aerials combined, in low sun, better to have none at all).

Presently since it is too hot to remain indoors (for some unfathomable reason it has got hot this summer) I'm sitting in the garden listening to the birds and devising some semi-accurate flightplans for the aircraft (all the bases will be real - as far as I can make them - but the destinations will be fanciful). Won't be doing this a second time, though! I'll be on this rotten task for another 60 hours, I'm guessing. I could have built a TB-9 and 10 in the time I have taken composing these plans.

No screenies, since I haven't fired up the sim in 2 weeks. They will be a September project before the real-life work hits again.

Just FYI.
 
Looking forward to that one. AI aircraft suitable for the 1980s are few and far between.
 
Which ones? The TB series I mentioned?

Although they are a way off in the distance, the Comanche, Twinkie and Aztec are also on my long list. I might stop releasing these on the main sites though, depends if someone wants to host them on some smaller site instead. I'll see how that goes when the time comes.

The good news is that the first cut of the flightplans is finished (as of about 10 minutes ago). I now need to alter a few of the bad airports to nearby "good" ones and then get back to the shadow model. These bizjets take up a lot of time...
 
I was referring to the Falcons, but I certainly wouldn't mind a few timeless twins as well. ;)


You could get yourself a Google account and just use Drive to publish models. Or Mediafire. Or similar.
Bonus: You won't have to do a whole homepage.
 
Hadn't really thought of doing a Google drive thing, I have access to a Google email address (a communal one for a group of friends that develop odd bits & pieces - e.g. Abu Dhabi) and that probably gives us a "drive" capability. I should look into that option.

I like the look of the Falcon 50, I think because its a bit disharmonious, the tail's a bit big for the skinny fuselage and the wings are a direct forebear of the F2000/F900 wings which are identical in the F900 and F2000S (the other Falcon 2000s lack the inboard slats). So it does have that slightly less refined look that earlier aircraft tend to acquire over time, like earlier models of cars that have "old looking" headlight clusters etc. but which are otherwise the same as the "new" one we're all told by the marketeers is "so great". What was once cutting edge ends up with olde worlde charm instead, thatched fuselages, porch lanterns, etc.

I think the "timeless twins" are important to me because they were the mainstay during my flying training years. Its why I've released older designs until now (except the DA-42 which was the first thing I created - and could use a re-work). I find it hard to consider modelling something I can't take seriously as an aircraft (eg the Raj Hamsa X'Air and things like that - basically kites with a ceiling fan stuck on the front). For AI purposes it's also be a nightmare to accommodate traffic that flies a little above walking pace and in which the pilot could fall asleep on long final, even the AI pilot. That's really complicate the animation "head sags to chest, wait 3 seconds, head snaps up with a start and looks from side to side in panic".

Found an interesting thing with the Falcon 7x (another not-really-pretty plane, IMO) which is that the fuselage is basically the same cross-section as the F2000/900, which is weird since the aircraft looks so large - although it does have a fairly good span. I'd probably try to animate wingflex for that one too (another reason to put it off as long as possible) since the shape in the air really begs that flex (a bit like the A330, which in flight tops the B787 (8 & 9) and A350 in looks, for me at least, particularly the A332). So the 7x would take a lot of work to look right.
 
Last edited:
Here for the Beer said:
Hadn't really thought of doing a Google drive thing, I have access to a Google email address (a communal one for a group of friends that develop odd bits & pieces - e.g. Abu Dhabi) and that probably gives us a "drive" capability. I should look into that option.
Click to expand...

You'll have 10 GB of space available for your stuff, which should be plenty.

That's really complicate the animation "head sags to chest, wait 3 seconds, head snaps up with a start and looks from side to side in panic".
Click to expand...

Air line pilot models have that one as standard. :D

Found an interesting thing with the Falcon 7x (another not-really-pretty plane, IMO)
Click to expand...

Yes. The F50/900 lived from its era-appropriate looks and three engines and a cruciform tail just don't fit wildly and smoothly curved cockpit windows and winglets.

I'd probably try to animate wingflex for that one too (another reason to put it off as long as possible)
Click to expand...

Wingflex will only give you grief. It's also not really noticable from the POV of another cockpit anyway.
 
Yep, the curved windows would really rack up the polys for that area, getting the look right. It's the part of the F2000/900 that I had to experiment with the most. If I did more specular shine in these models it would be even more critical.

With the wingflex, yes, I can see the problems of attaching sections of a wing and then giving them all relative animations from each other as linked objects and still having it look smooth (although the pivots would be easier to align and place than for things like slotted flaps or slats), and the fine-tuning of the XML to achieve the right effect. I just think it is something I need to try for myself (even if it just gives me an aversion to wingflex). It may come to the point where I make something intended to be flyable from the outset and then knowledge like that is useful. I also get a sense that to create something using the same techniques day after day does end up feeling a bit like a production line and the fun gets sapped out of the hobby, so there always needs to be an element of discovery just to keep the interest levels up. I would guess that the limited output of the various groups over the years has something to do with that sense of production line work.

I should take to "Matthew Ministry" about this Google drive thing (he can be very hard to reach) since he has some amazing sceneries that really ought to see the light of day. Sadly he's been put off by the various sites re-uploading his files and doesn't really go public with it anymore. He has lots of stuff routinely stolen from him in real life (musician), so I guess he's understandably sensitive even about this free FS stuff. I guess I sympathise.

+++

Presently still "sanding and planing" the flightplans. For some reason the military airfields got included in the plans and I have to reassign those airports to nearby civil ones. I obviously boobed on my auto-generation routines. I will still miss a fair few.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top