Model Scaling and Visibilty

[Wolf Rider]

luminance comes from more a 3D (in a 3D vision, as opposed 3D projected onto a 2D screen) environment... not an artificially bland background and Airfix model like object lighting

[PFunk1606688187]

That is the math, to get propper (realistic) size of the image of the object in sim, you need to match in-game FoV with that of your monitor (calculated from your eye(s) distance from monitor and monitor width). Once you get right FoV and objects apear at right sizes, then to get more realistic visability (I think) would be to get all LOD's with proper lighting properties (specular / light reflection), I don't see what is wrong with that aproach.

 

The problem with that approach is that, unlike in a race car, you have serious issues managing your awareness of the game world.

 

Take the existing zoom, put it to a level you think is close to "true" FOV and then try to use a clickable cockpit, fly formation with another aircraft, and prosecute a ground target or try to dogfight an enemy.

 

Its madness, even with TrackIR.

[Mad Dog 7.62]

I think an option to have scaling, and to be able to adjust it through the options menu, would be a great addition. It would help overcome the handicap of trying to spot targets with the limited resolution of a computer screen compared to the human eye.

[Wolf Rider]

yess... but this is a DCS forum, and it would be of value to see how it all plays out, considering the thread title and problems mentioned.

 

Something to keep in mind for next time, perhaps? just sayin'

[NineLine]

Please dont post vids from other sims, they are not relevant to ED and the DCS Engine.

[Why485]

Please dont post vids from other sims, they are not relevant to ED and the DCS Engine.

 

They are relevant to the discussion as they provide examples for what people are looking for.

[NineLine]

They are relevant to the discussion as they provide examples for what people are looking for.

 

They are not relevant because what works for one engine might not for another... and you can describe what you want, not what another did.

[SkateZilla]

They are relevant to the discussion as they provide examples for what people are looking for.

 

then post a video of DCS Doing it, since it can.

 

I abuse the Zoom Axis that I bound to Zoom In/Out Slow keys on my CH Throttle, and then to the Extra Axis on my Warthog Throttle.

 

It helps wonders on 1 screen or 3.

 

IE:

Edited April 23, 2015 by SkateZilla

[Why485]

then post a video of DCS Doing it, since it can.

 

I abuse the Zoom Axis that I bound to Zoom In/Out Slow keys on my CH Throttle, and then to the Extra Axis on my Warthog Throttle.

 

It helps wonders on 1 screen or 3.

 

IE:

 

Believe me, I abuse the zoom axis to no end, but I really shouldn't have to the way I do. It shouldn't be so difficult to spot planes in the air, or tanks on the ground. It's not uncommon for players to lose visual of something that is literally maybe a km in front of them and that's ridiculous.

 

We have reports from both civilian pilots and actual combat pilots, many of them, that say it is much more difficult to see objects in simulators than in real life. DCS should simulate what the pilot can see, as that's what's most true to life. If that means you have to make small compromises in rendering, then so be it.

 

Why is DCS literally the only combat flight sim on the market both present and in the past that has no solution or no accounting for this problem? Think about that. Literally every other combat flight sim addresses this. All of them. Hell, even more casual games like War Thunder or combat flight sims on consoles (Energy Airforce/Over G Fighters) address this. If this was such a total nonissue as seemingly only the ED testers suggest, why would so many developers come up with solutions to it?

 

DCS is simulation of flying combat missions in combat aircraft. Visibility is very large part of that, and it is in my opinion the area that DCS lacks the most. Above all other of its problems, it's the biggest one that prevents the game to be played the way it should be able to. It wasn't such a big deal in the LOMAC/FC days because all the planes involved had advanced radars to help work around for most of these issues, but now that DCS is featuring WWII, Korean era, and other aircraft with limited or no radars, being able to maintain visual on targets in a realistic way is more important than ever.

 

What should the solution be? There's plenty of ways to tackle it and they've all been covered in detail in this thread. I have implemented distant scaling and dot systems for my own personal projects, as it's a subject that I am very passionate about. Frankly, I don't care which way ED decides to go because doing anything will be a huge improvement over what we have now.

 

The last I heard, ED has finally changed their stance from "working as intended" to "we might maybe possibly consider thinking about wondering if we should do anything... but only after EDGE." At least it's progress, but this thread should show you that a great many people, the overwhelming majority if the poll is to be believed, think this is a real issue.

Edited April 23, 2015 by Why485

[Wolf Rider]

here's a reasonable example (I hope the originating author doesn't mind)

 

 

 

[SkateZilla]

Believe me, I abuse the zoom axis to no end, but I really shouldn't have to the way I do. It shouldn't be so difficult to spot planes in the air, or tanks on the ground. It's not uncommon for players to lose visual of something that is literally maybe a km in front of them and that's ridiculous.

 

We have reports from actual combat pilots and civilian pilots, many of them, that say it is much more difficult to see objects in simulators than in real life. DCS should simulate what the pilot can see, as that's what's most true to life. If that means you have to make small compromises in rendering, then so be it.

 

Why is DCS literally the only combat flight sim on the market both present and in the past that has no solution or no accounting for this problem? Think about that. Literally every other combat flight sim addresses this. All of them. Hell, even more casual games like War Thunder or combat flight sims on consoles address this. If this was such a total nonissue as seemingly only the ED testers suggest, why would so many developers come up with solutions to it?

 

DCS is simulation of flying combat missions in combat aircraft. Visibility is very large part of that, and it is in my opinion the area that DCS lacks the most. Above all other of its problems, it's the biggest one that prevents the game to be played the way it should be able to. It wasn't such a big deal in the LOMAC/FC days because all the planes involved had advanced radars to help work around for most of these issues, but now that DCS is featuring WWII, Korean era, and other aircraft with limited or no radars, being able to maintain visual on targets in a realistic way is more important than ever.

 

What should the solution be? There's plenty of ways to tackle it and they've all been covered in detail in this thread. Frankly, I don't care which way ED decides to go because doing anything will be a huge improvement over what we have now.

 

The last I heard, ED has finally changed their stance from "working as intended" to "we might maybe possibly consider thinking about wondering if we should do anything... but only after EDGE." At least it's progress, but this thread should show you that a great many people, the overwhelming majority if the poll is to be believed, think this is a real issue.

 

An Average Human has 160 to180+ Degrees Field of View,

An Average Gamer with a 22' Inch screen positioned 24-30 inches in front of them is now seeing about 40-80 Degrees FoV of Rendered space inside of an actual 10 Degree FoV of the Screen.

 

When You cram a WIDE FoV into a 22 Inch Box in front of you, is when objects feel smaller than they are supposed to be and make them harder to spot.

 

It's present in every game, it's not a DCS Specific issue.

 

Smart Scaling isnt the answer, and has it's fair share of side effects.

 

The best option with the least amount of side effects is to tweak the Zoom/FoV to a point that is comfortable to you.

 

I Zoom the FoV to the point where it feels "Realistic" (ie not squished into my screen(s)), and then use trackIR to look around.

 

Likely wont be an issue with VR.

Edited April 23, 2015 by SkateZilla

[NineLine]

We have reports from both civilian pilots and actual combat pilots, many of them, that say it is much more difficult to see objects in simulators than in real life. DCS should simulate what the pilot can see, as that's what's most true to life. If that means you have to make small compromises in rendering, then so be it.

 

They have SME's testing their products all the time, I am sure they have had the conversation on this before with people well beyond our qualifications. I am not sure why people dont think about that... and why they think that fixing this issue in an engine whose days are numbered isnt a little silly.

 

Why is DCS literally the only combat flight sim on the market both present and in the past that has no solution or no accounting for this problem? Think about that. Literally every other combat flight sim addresses this. All of them. Hell, even more casual games like War Thunder or combat flight sims on consoles (Energy Airforce/Over G Fighters) address this. If this was such a total nonissue as seemingly only the ED testers suggest, why would so many developers come up with solutions to it?

 

Old engine, old core, DirectX9... etc etc... are we getting it yet?

 

The last I heard, ED has finally changed their stance from "working as intended" to "we might maybe possibly consider thinking about wondering if we should do anything... but only after EDGE." At least it's progress, but this thread should show you that a great many people, the overwhelming majority if the poll is to be believed, think this is a real issue.

 

I believe that opinion was on scaling, I dont think that opinion has changed, but I am not that deep in the loop either...

[silentconvo]

I'm not sure why people are so keen on having a scaling solution right now on an engine that will soon be obsolete. Resources spent on putting scaling into the current engine will go to waste as soon as EDGE comes out and it would be time and effort that could have been spent on features for EDGE or getting it out sooner....

[shagrat]

Hmm, the discussion does not necessarily limit addressing this issue to the old engine.

I'm not sure if ED devs already fixed this in test builds, added a better solution etc.

A few pages ago the discussion took a direction towards "everything is fine as it is, just buy a 58" 4k and you can spot much better".

Actually, we had a lot of constructive ideas how to address the spotting issue in general (not limited to quick fix the current engine). E.g. we could simply enhance the current labels by adding alpha blending and enforce the same settings in MP with a "sync" feature.

That would be a cool optimization and even if we get it earliest in DCS 2.0 it is an enhancement and worth looking into.

Smart scaling also is a pretty good idea to look at.

Again, not necessarily to fix 1.2.x, but as a possible way to make DCS (1.2 or 2.0) better.

If the devs found another way to ensure aircraft and vehicles show at least one pixel independent from resolution at a reasonable distance, I'm fine.

If this is still an issue in current test builds, that's not as useless a discussion as it seems.

And Sithspawn is right, videos from other Sims won't help much as it is a complete different environment rendering. Just a little example, a white backdrop from snowclad Russia makes it easier to spot the targets and that is not taking into account other shaders, different LOD, haze simulation, texture resolution etc.

It shows "that" you can do it different than DCS, but nobody doubted that.

 

P.S. ...about that whole "cheating discussion: how does anybody ensure that people don't just replace the ground textures against a light green plane with no features and deactivate the cloud shaders with a mod? OK, would ruin your cool graphics, yet you would be able to spot the dark planes much easier.

Oh, and of course cheaters would deactivate the HDR effect in menu to have no sun glare...

Nope, I rather fly with all bells and whistles and enjoy the sights. :D

[Wolf Rider]

following on from silentconvo...

 

Why? ... dunno

One thing for sure... a (real world) target certainly isn't going to stand there and wiggle its cheeks at ya

 

 

@ Shagrat...

 

just have a look at the example video - its fine - no need to keep hassling for "scaling", just a need for the player to learn how to go about it, would be the go

Edited April 23, 2015 by Wolf Rider

[shagrat]

following on from silentconvo...

 

Why? ... dunno

One thing for sure... a (real world) target certainly isn't going to stand there and wiggle its cheeks at ya

 

 

@ Shagrat...

 

just have a look at the example video - its fine - no need to keep hassling for "scaling", just a need for the player to learn how to go about it, would be the go

Nope, if the current engine decides (calculates) a plane is not visible it is not visible. Zoom makes the scene bigger, but not changing the calculated distance when to draw a pixel to represent the plane, it just makes identification of planes possible IF they show up... At least, last time I checked.

[skendzie]

OK, at the time of this post I didn't consider other options. If I could change it to "How big do you think the problem of visibility in DCS:W?" I would. To everyone saying, why come up with solutions for an old engine: EDGE hasn't come out yet and won't for awhile. It may or may not have the same problems. It is nice to discuss solutions to these problems if the do exist.

 

It is very clear that visibility needs work in ED. It is also clear that the community wants ED to do something about it. I know from my own experience and seeing other comments that the visibility problems have hurt ED's revenue. At the end of the day, DCS is a game that is played on many different displays and machines. And if you want people to buy said game, it needs to be fun. Improving visibility would drastically improve the fun factor in DCS:W which would increase sales, which would increase future development.

[Wolf Rider]

@ Shagrat...

you haven't noticed (and obviously haven't looked at the video... yet, you could say you have, but I doubt very much you have) the target is "light" against the ground and "dark" against the sky... all your hi-falutery about 1x pixel/ 4x pixel is a herring.. a red one at that.

It (DCS) already goes out to 1x pixel... all Flight Sims do

 

 

 

~

 

~ It is also clear that the community wants ED to do something about it

 

~

 

 

 

no Skendzie... only some do

 

and "fun" is for PS/ Xbox, realism is for DCS

Edited April 23, 2015 by Wolf Rider

[skendzie]

Not feeding the troll.

[shagrat]

@ Shagrat...

you haven't noticed (and obviously haven't looked at the video... yet, you could say you have, but I doubt very much you have) the target is "light" against the ground and "dark" against the sky... all your hi-falutery about 1x pixel/ 4x pixel is a herring.. a red one at that.

It (DCS) already goes out to 1x pixel... all Flight Sims do

Oops, sorry, thought you were referring to that IL-2 video... My bad.

Yep, coloring/lighting is another way to improve spotting ability. Absolutely.

I'm not saying my ideas are the best. Just ideas...

My biggest issue currently is that when I can clearly spot a target on my 4k it not necessarily shows up on the screen for a fellow wing man, with a FullHD resolution.

I take whatever solutions ED would offer in DCS2.x if they work.

And I would like the labels enhanced in a way that you can better adjust them (showing over cockpit, no alpha etc.) especially to force synchronize label settings and detail to clients in MP.

[superostrich]

Just reset my password on an idle account to throw my vote in; this is a major problem that I hope will be considered for EDGE. I've purchased 2 WWII, and 2 Korean War era modules so far, and while they're a blast to fly circuits and aerobatics in, they're terrible for combat because of this issue.

 

There are a lot more gunfighters on the horizon that I'm excited to fly, but I doubt I'll be buying any more until this is resolved.

Edited April 23, 2015 by superostrich

[Wolf Rider]

Registered just to throw my vote in; this is a major problem that I hope will be considered for EDGE. I've purchased 2 WWII, and 2 Korean War era modules so far, and while they're a blast to fly circuits and aerobatics in, they're terrible for combat because of this issue.

 

There are a lot more gunfighters on the horizon that I'm excited to fly, but I doubt I'll be buying any more until this is resolved.

 

 

Join date Jan 13... and you've "Registered just to throw your vote in?"

[superostrich]

Join date Jan 13... and you've "Registered just to throw your vote in?"

 

Reactivated long-forgotten, idle account. Posted edited. Either way, I just idle here for news and mods, but this issue is important to me.

[Wolf Rider]

Reactivated long-forgotten, idle account. Posted edited. Either way, I just idle here for news and mods, but this issue is important to me.

 

either way... the threats of "holding one's breath until they have achieved their way" - just ask any parent what usually happens :)

Edited April 23, 2015 by Wolf Rider

[[DBS]TH0R]

@ Shagrat...

 

just have a look at the example video - its fine - no need to keep hassling for "scaling", just a need for the player to learn how to go about it, would be the go

 

:doh:

 

In short you and a couple of others are fine with it. No wonder why we haven't seen a solution to the problem from you - since you don't seem to have one.

 

 

no Skendzie... only some do

 

and "fun" is for PS/ Xbox, realism is for DCS

 

Funny how "some" equals the vast majority. It has already been established that what we have now in DCS is not realistic. So where is your point?

Edited April 23, 2015 by T}{OR
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