Terrain Data Exclusion

[Bernd Podhradsky]

Hi folks!

I'm quite new to scenery development and have a question regarding the exclusion of terrain data in FSX.

I know that all vector data is split up in QMID cells. But how do I know the coordinates of each of these cells? I tried to find out by using tmfviewer, but I don't know what BGL to load for the cells to show up.

And another question: how can I exclude all terrain data (mesh, coastlines etc)? I know how to do it in SBuilder, but I want to write my own "source file" and compile it with shp2vec - I couldn't find a proper example in the SDK, so if someone could give a short explanation of how to do!?

Thanks in advance,
Bernd

 

[igr]

Hello.
When I worked on "VFR ČR scripts" I was trying to organize scenery to little areas (single sceneries for regions) and I made a map for LOD15. Depends what naming technique uses the scenery you work with, but in case you got these from map2bgl LOD15 as source, I did a simple table for it. Because the file for CR are called like 15_17480_11120.bgl, where 17480 is X position in LOD15 grid and 11120 is Y position in grid. So all you need is to make such table, and then to load some part of scenery to tmfviewer. Then you know what you loaded if you compare the scenery with Google maps. And you can write information about it to your table. This is what I used when I was working on bgl maps for "VFR ČR".

 

[bilookhan]

^^ Actually i came across a similar concept being used by another designer (I think it was for FS2002) but it was an old article.

The guy managed to use LOD9 table for Santiago airport scenery.

Unfortunately I couldn't find that table anymore on the terrain SDK.

If its simple to create a table do you know how to do make one for LOD9 for example ?

 

[rhumbaflappy]

Hi Bernd.

SBuilderX creates ESRI shp files in the Shapes folder. Just make an exclusion bgl, then look in that folder for the shp fil created.

SBuilderX also identifies the default directory and filename in the status bar at the bottom of the screen.

That would tell you which default file contains the BGL you may be looking for... and can be loaded into TMFViewer. TMFViewer also gives information in the Status bar... set the QMID grid to 11 to help with exclusion info.

Dick

 

[igr]

If its simple to create a table do you know how to do make one for LOD9 for example ?

There is not any program that could help you to do it. It is very pity, that developers of TMFViewer did not include printing of file names of printing of numbering into ti tiles!

If you want to make LOD9 file map/table it should not be so hard as it is to do if you work with LOD15, because LOD9 is QMID level 11 and it is relatively small area. If you have fsx sdk installed, than open TMFViewer from terrain kit. Open your files. Select View Overlay transparency as you wish. If you have great scenery size, set Level of detail - LOD 6, than zoom as you wish, then select Level of detail - LOD9. Choose grid QMID level 11, select none LOD grid. Make sure Select high resolution of your screen. I would suggest to use the pinky grid (QMID). Make your screenshots. Edit them or cut. You can join them in raster editor or by imagemagick.

For imagemagick just use command like:

montage 0_1.jpg 0_2.jpg 0_3.jpg 1_1.jpg 1_2.jpg 1_3.jpg 2_1.jpg 2_2.jpg 2_3.jpg -geometry +0+0 mymap.jpg

(I did not use the ocmmand yet, but I just read about it and gonna use it)

You should have the pink grid on the photos. Then I used raster editor to add numbers of the files.

Or you can make such table in the Excel or OpenOffice, but this is without photoscenery. You just need to find logic of the file numbering and then write it to the table.