MSFS24 Object View Distance Limits

[=Hollywood=]

I'm working on a project I've been dreaming about for 20 years and while I can technically place the object, I'm wondering if the render engine has limits in MSFS.

I need to place the object at around 500km away, I'd need to size it so at that distance it does have enough size to be at least a few pixels on screen (i.e. doesn't switch off due to LOD logic).

The size of the object would need to be about 1km or 10km in size.

There is a method for this madness and if there's hard coded limits for objects I may need to ask Asobo for a special functionality..

 

[mamu]

I'm sorry for your dream but at the moment is
Impossible, there is an hard coded limit of 30km

For your own fun you can override it by using the debug Lod limits

Debug LODs

docs.flightsimulator.com

 

[=Hollywood=]

I'm sorry for your dream but at the moment is
Impossible, there is an hard coded limit of 30km

For your own fun you can override it by using the debug Lod limits

Debug LODs

docs.flightsimulator.com

Thanks Mamu. It’s not a total loss. There’s another approach I can implement as a plan B. And I can always use it in the film world.

I may pitch the functionality to Asobo. I may be able to work within that limit creatively. Once adobo sees it may help.

I also need to do a deep dive through the VFS Projector to see if I can find what a certain system has been changed to.

 

[GaryGB]

Hi Dean:

Dick, Arno, and others here have previously posted that attaching large invisible Faces (untextured or with mostly transparent invisible extents) works.


Robystar used to refer to "Inverse / Reverse" MIPMAPs, but IIRC, he was citing the mechanism I cited above to"fool" FS LOD switching / display culling.

IIUC, he may have meant changing the number / size of visible versus invisible / transparent pixels used to texture large Faces to 'fool' FS LOD display.


Perhaps this might 'jog' your own memory of various old work-arounds for 'fooling" the FS display engine(s) ?


For example, in your own work with Terrain Mesh, you independently discovered the dreaded FS "Reverse Display Priority" of terrain mesh LODs.

Holger shared his discovery of this, stating that larger LODs loaded first and were preferentially retained for display at higher priority.


If we loaded far away from an airport, a larger LOD "extent" (lower LOD number, but larger extent on ground)) would load and predominate within the display engine.

If we made a smaller extent local high resolution terrain mesh (higher LOD number, but smaller extent on ground), as we flew into the vicinity of the high resolution terrain mesh, it may not be toggled into visible display ...unless we 'spawn' the flight local to the high resolution terrain mesh.

A work-around suggested by Holger and Dick has worked for Spitz, and for me in one of my own projects; a discussion of this work-around is here:

https://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/threads/flattens-inactive-under-specific-circumstances.438192/


So even if Asobo's modified MS "Fuel" game engine code adds different code to MSFS' functions compared to FS2Kx, AFAIK this still works ?

GaryGB

 

[=Hollywood=]

Thanks Gary.

Oh yeah I did that with my YBAF Cone and Gable Markers. You just gave me a crazy idea but it may break the sim lol.

Now I know what I’m facing I’ll share what I’m doing as I want to make it freeware.

For 20 years I’ve dreamed of moving satellites through the night sky. That meant converging NORAD TLE data and calculating it as lat/lon/alt/spd/hdg that could then be used in FSX/P3D/MSFS.

I’ve finally been able to do that the last few days (still needs streamlining).

I’ll work around the limitations as necessary and should be able to have something up next week.