DCS WW2 - terrain

The National Collection of Aerial Photography (NCAP) has thousands of digitized aerial photos.

However it requires a paid subscription for high resolution images, which is 15 pounds/year.

It has about 900 photos of northern Normandy area :

http://aerial.rcahms.gov.uk/worldwide/France.php

(select upper normandy on the map to view the low res photos)

The national collection of aerial photography has many digitized aerial photos.

However it requires a paid subscription for high resolution images, which is 15 pounds/year.

It has about 900 photos of Normandy area :

http://aerial.rcahms.gov.uk/worldwide/France.php

 

(select upper normandy on the map to view the low res photos)

Excellent link!!

map spreading all over europe? or western Europe?

the question was about all over of Europe, and I allowed myself to make a joke. :)

And even the whole of Western Europe would require a lot of work.

It would take man years enough for a whole life I guess...

The only possibility would be to go the path of X-plane 10... To use OSM (Open Street Map) data to autogenerate the landscape. It does not look too bad from altitude at least... A bit worse down low unfortunately like all autogenerated landscapes...

Here is the plugin they use (with screenshots etc) - http://osm2xp.com/

The problem is naturally that OSM only works for 2013 scenarios :) But... If it would be combined with this OSM project it could work in theory (historical maps for OSM):

http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Historical_OSM

And... Crytek recently put up a reward for independent developers / students to do an OSM plugin for their engine:

http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2296020/crytek-wants-to-use-existing-open-street-map-data-for-video-game-environments

But the final comment regarding the work needed from them is:

However, he did add that this is still "a very long way away"

It's fun to dream - I do however realize the amount of work to get this working so it's more a bit of dreaming... Imagine DCS with a map that covers the whole world! For modern days it could theoretically be done ;)

EDIT - an image from X-plane with osm2xp auto generated scenery from Open Street Map. Not too shabby ;)

And Open Street Map seems well updated for the modern Normandy Area... If a plugin could be used against the historical OSM it's up to the community to remove a lot of modern highways then ;)

And a close up of central Carentan...

We can make a collision with trees. But we need to check how it will affect performance. Nothing more.

 

Hello!

How about making it an option for those who need it and are willing to sacriface performance? Or an option to enable it in the editor for given area needed for particular mission? I just wanted to point out DCS is about to get a lot of new modules, and current modules are stuck in old engine, we had to wait long time for EDGE, It'd be a shame if we would have to wait few years over again before we get that fixed. Not to mention we will get more low n' slow airframes into the game (helicopters in particular), You could easily win over whole rotorhead crowd if You pay attention to what we need.

Thanks!

PS. We already have simulators offering colidable trees with better performance than current DCS engine.

SiThSpAwN, thanks

The National Collection of Aerial Photography (NCAP) has thousands of digitized aerial photos.

However it requires a paid subscription for high resolution images, which is 15 pounds/year.

It has about 900 photos of northern Normandy area :

http://aerial.rcahms.gov.uk/worldwide/France.php

 

(select upper normandy on the map to view the low res photos)

Awesome link!

And the amazing thing is that most are shot the 6:th of June 1944... So to really know what it looked like exactly on D-day this is invaluable!

Edit again - it just gets better... Have you clicked the "maps" text below the images that expands the "Google Maps" link that show the exact image boundaries in Google Maps? So nice!

And triple edit - take some of my pledged $110 and get the team a subscriber license now ;)

Yes, all aerial photos are linked with coordinates to google earth.

They currently have about 12000 photos of Normandy and about 21000 photos of France, many of which are on 6th June 1944.

You can type the area of France you want to look at in the Search Bar above, and then push the "view records in Google Earth" tab, appearing above the results to have an overview of the whole area with all the photos in google earth.

For example, the results for Normandy are in this link:

http://aerial.rcahms.gov.uk/database/results.php?search_term=Normandy&QUICKSEARCH=1

and google earth shows this :

Every pin in the map is clickable and represents the location of the aerial photo.

Plenty of aerial photographs can be found using Google's search functionality.

A link with interactive (mouse-over for zoom) aerial photographs of (among others) Pegasus bridge and "the fortified village of Galmanche, near Caen";

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/interactive-high-resolution-aerial-images-from-the-second-world-war/article4233358/?from=4234394.

The field with abandoned Horsa gliders looks pretty eerie.

Pegasus bridge:

Galmanche (note the "field of fire cleared" mid-left-bottom):

The National Collection of Aerial Photography (NCAP) has thousands of digitized aerial photos.

However it requires a paid subscription for high resolution images, which is 15 pounds/year.

It has about 900 photos of northern Normandy area :

(select upper normandy on the map to view the low res photos)

Yes, all aerial photos are linked with coordinates to google earth.

They currently have about 12000 photos of Normandy and about 21000 photos of France, many of which are on 6th June 1944.

 

You can type the area of France you want to look at in the Search Bar above, and then push the "view records in Google Earth" tab, appearing above the results to have an overview of the whole area with all the photos in google earth.

 

For example, the results for Normandy are in this link:

 

and google earth shows this :

 

Every pin in the map is clickable and represents the location of the aerial photo.

Thank you, we know about this site. We're experiencing some technical problems with the payment. But I think we will solve them.

Plenty of aerial photographs can be found using Google's search functionality.

 

A link with interactive (mouse-over for zoom) aerial photographs of (among others) Pegasus bridge and "the fortified village of Galmanche, near Caen";

The field with abandoned Horsa gliders looks pretty eerie.

 

Pegasus bridge:

 

Galmanche (note the "field of fire cleared" mid-left-bottom):

It's interesting. Thank you.

Very need pictures in the format GeoTif(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GeoTIFF). These photos of the most comfortable to use.

FranceVFR and FSAddon Publishing have just released the FSX texture add-on "Normandy 1944", based on aerial photographs from 1946/47.

Product website: http://www.francevfr.com/product_fshnor.htm (comes with 4 period aircraft, among others the legendary Fieseler Storch)

How well this texture actually matches: http://avclassic.com/ww2glider/pinpointing-the-normandy-landing-spot/

"Scenery made from French Department 50 & 14 photo-realistic textures; original black & white dating from 1946/1947.

Ground textures: 1 meter / pixel resolution (black & white) from aerial photography, IGN period reworked for an optimal visual rendition in Flight Simulator X.

Mesh specific high definition: 4.75 meters (LOD13)."

Hope this helps a bit in getting started. Granted, the add-on color is grey (overlay made of aerial photographs), but the overall layout is nevertheless very good.

For ground scenery, I recommend the "After the Battle: Then and Now" book series.

Alternatively, here's a link that provides 200+ comparative photographs (then and now);

http://acidcow.com/pics/page,1,3,3772-normandy_1944_then_and_now_204_pics.html.

Thank you very much, these are very interesting links!!!

Finally an answer...

"RPS: If none of the stretch goals are reached will all Allied sorties start and finish in the air?

Ilya: No, of course not. Post D-Day the Allies built a huge number of temporary airfields all over the Normandy coast. That’s where the Allied players will be based."

Maybe not the best solution, but one that could be satisfying enough until the map is enlarged to include parts of England. It also appears they will have many more areas of Europe modeled. My question would be, Will there be a continuous map or a series of separate maps? If its a series of maps, are there any thoughts of combining to one big European map once computers are powerful enough to handle very large detailed maps?

Finally an answer...

 

"RPS: If none of the stretch goals are reached will all Allied sorties start and finish in the air?

Ilya: No, of course not. Post D-Day the Allies built a huge number of temporary airfields all over the Normandy coast. That’s where the Allied players will be based."

 

Maybe not the best solution, but one that could be satisfying enough until the map is enlarged to include parts of England. It also appears they will have many more areas of Europe modeled. My question would be, Will there be a continuous map or a series of separate maps? If its a series of maps, are there any thoughts of combining to one big European map once computers are powerful enough to handle very large detailed maps?

We can easily add new pieces to the terrain. Combining different maps is a more difficult question. Creating terrain for the all of Western Europe, I see it almost impossible. Because it is a very large area.

Also I hope that Airfields will be like DCS World and can be Red or Blue depending on the Mission builder...

I think nothing will change in this issue

We can easily add new pieces to the terrain. Combining different maps is a more difficult question. Creating terrain for the all of Western Europe, I see it almost impossible. Because it is a very large area.

 

 

So basically, any terrain you would create after Normandy would be like a scenario (or for that matter a chapter from a book) with a few aircraft (if not already created in a previous terrain)

Do I understand this correctly?

With news of the SDK release, I would like to see some information on your modeling work flow for buildings and other landscape models. What modeling formats are used? What is the typical poly count on ground items of interest? Will we see a forum dedicated to terrain editing?

We probably wont see that till closer to release of the SDK....

Awww, it would be so much more fun if they just handed out the SDK with a note that says "Don't forget to rest on the seventh day." :D

Need to wait for the release of SDK. Perhaps some documentation will be a little earlier.

Almazi

I was wondering about the bomb craters shown in llya's video yesterday. These are placed objects, will the craters caused by bombing remain, or fade away rater quickly during gameplay?

Almazi

I was wondering about the bomb craters shown in llya's video yesterday. These are placed objects, will the craters caused by bombing remain, or fade away rater quickly during gameplay?

this is static craters in terrain mesh from explosions of large bombs. but they are not forever. Some will disappear in a certain period of time.

Found this site: http://www.dday04.com/index.php

Although pictures are fairly recent they are taken from the air, might help with colours and the feel of your map. Some of those bomb craters are still there.

thanks