A little something I've been working on...

[professorkhaos]

Hi all, this is probably a bit out of the normal aurora air service area but thought I'd share anyway.

Farallon Islands off the coast of San Francisco, CA were missing in the default FS2004 scenery. Actually, they weren't exactly missing. They were just little hills of water (no landclass info). Also, what was there mesh-wise wasn't detailed enough to do the job any justice whatsoever.

So, with that being said, I decided to create my own.

I tried creating the islands using landclass info and shorelines, but it really didn't do much good, even when I used Ground2K4 to modify the elevation mesh, so I decided to create the island as a scenery object instead (it's a relatively small island)

1st version has been available for a few weeks now on www.avsim.com under the name of 's_farallones.zip'



Comparison to real islands:


I'm currently working on a second, far better version using detailed topo maps to achieve a more rugged look:

[TomH]

Looks great Professor! What are you using to develop the land mass?

[professorkhaos]

I use a program called trueSpace (www.caligari.com). It's a complete modeller/rendering solution that also supports animation. I've been using it to model stuff for years but have only recently applied my skills in the FS2004 arena. I can export models as .x files or .3ds files and then use GMax or makemdl directly to convert them into scenery objects.

The technique I use can be followed in a wide variety of modelling programs and I suspect that GMax would do as well.

Basically, I work off a topo map and draw the shoreline curve first. Then I extrude the curve upwards by whatever the increment is between contour lines and reshape the new upper edge to match. After a few such operations, I've got a complete landscape.

Get's a little tricky when an island has more than one mountain peak, but the work in those cases is generally more tedious than difficult.

Prof K.

[professorkhaos]

update...

[clmax]

WOW

Looks great Prof K!!!


-Greg

[professorkhaos]

Thanks Greg!

On to the big island...




Not much more work to go... unless you count texturing this beast.

Prof K.

[professorkhaos]

Pretty much have the model done... still have some textures and some buildings/objects to place.

Check against the topo map for distortions (lines should be reasonably horizontal)

Base texture. Any details I add will be on top of this.

Some personal pics supplied by Wedge were a definate help in getting the overall feel of the textures correct to begin with.

Prof K.

[professorkhaos]

Forgot to mention, I'm looking for a few beta testers...

[professorkhaos]

I just uploaded the latest version to www.avsim.com as a beta version. Search for 's_farallones_v2.zip' and you should find it.


Prof K.

[professorkhaos]

Got the other islands in the chain completed. Now on to architecture and fauna...

[TomH]

Hey professor!

It looks great! I just got it downloaded from avsim and will get it installed for a flyover!

Tom

[professorkhaos]

By the way, sorry about the non-AAS liveries. These are generic project pictures I've shared with a few different sites.

[Frank Seigler-KE5ETD]

Don't worry about the non-AAS Livery. That only matters on PIREPS for company flights.