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New Scenery Idea...

L

letsgetrowdy

Charter Member
Some us may have watched the LWT show in the 80's called "Piece of Cake", which was based on Derek Robinson's book of the same name. It followed the lives of the ficticious RAF "Hornet Squadron" in France, and then the South of Britain, through 1938-40, particually noting the "Phony War".
I bring this controversial series up, as after watching the series on DVD recently, I was inspired by the location for the airstrip in France, which was a beautiful chateaux in the countryside, with a couple of grass runways. In the series, the chateaux was used as the officer's mess and looked terrific with six Spitfires on the lawn outside.
The actual location of this site was Charlton House/Park in Wiltshire. It was not really dissimilar from Longleat House, and has three grass runways.
If, in time, an FSX scenery became avialable for this Chateaux (freeware or Payware), what eye-candy that would be with RealAir Spitfires parked up in front of the house!
Have a search for Piece of Cake on youtube, I think user "vulcanfanman" has uploaded a few clips from the series, and you'll see what I mean about it being a beautiful place, especially in evening light.
Here's a screeny from Google Earth showing the estate now, with its tree-lined grass runways.

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Falcon you want to do it? i know you like your scenery creation now, i'm a bit busy on the Zivko Edge 540 :icon_lol:
 
I'm already doing something not dissimilar, but need to actually make myself the stately home to go at the end of the runway, so there may be a few things similar to this around eventually...

Although my French field will have a farm at the end, not a chateau. The stately home will be the British end of my operation.
 
it beats my idea i'm sketching down, an ace combat style superweapon, complete with an airbase inside a 'tunnel' :icon_lol:
 
Smoothie said:
Falcon you want to do it? i know you like your scenery creation now, i'm a bit busy on the Zivko Edge 540 :icon_lol:
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Yep, but this deserves more than I have talent for. The actual buildings should be modeled and I have no desire to do 3d modeling, I've tried it numerous times and found it boring and time consuming. This needs someone who has the desire to see it through to a full completion.
 
How about if I make a stately home, you make him the photorealistic grounds as I haven't got a clue how to do that? :)

It'll be a while before I'm [LINESTRIKE]stupid[/LINESTRIKE] brave enough to try and make an entire stately home, though. The farm'll be done first!
 
I love that series - even bought it on DVD. It's a good idea for someone who has the time to do it justice.
 
IanP said:
I'm already doing something not dissimilar, but need to actually make myself the stately home to go at the end of the runway,
I suggest that use use the FSX Acceleration default scenery for Longleat House, for your statley home, as it could represent any house, and looks remarkably similar to the Pice of Cake house.
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Aww. But you can do photoreal ground textures Falcon, something I am spectacularly incapable of achieving. ;)

And you could use Longleat, although that would only work for those using Accel.

The whole point of mine was for me to learn and do all the modelling. It's also similar too, not based on the situation you're describing, instead being based on something I wrote after spending far too long playing Battle of Britain II and making dead stick landings after being shot up. It's based around the premise of a Spitfire Mk.I being able to land, engine out, along the access road between an avenue of trees although had he looked a bit harder, the house's owners actually had a far easier landing strip around the back of the house. I got that far, but the landing run is a bit short, as can be seen from the screenshot below and the house (behind shot, out of view) is currently one of Ted Andrews Officers Mess buildings. So now I just need to model a summer house, the main house, the grounds and, oh, pretty much everything except four rows of trees and an access road, really!

Out of interest I do have and have read Robinson's books (at least the one being discussed here and the Bomber squadron one), but I don't like his writing style so wasn't that fond of them. I'll happily accept being in the minority there. I can't stand the Dirk Pitt books, either, which is apparently a cardinal sin. ;)
 
well if i do the photoscenery base and give it to falcon maybe he'll be nice and autogen it up for us :kilroy:
 
Smoothie, can you locate the photoscenery texture for Charlton House Park and add it to the scenery? If so, what a result!!! search it on google earth/maps and you'll see it.

In the past, I have used Longleat as a Piece of Cake-like-set, but it has only one runway . The house on the other hand is magnificent, and will, on its own, display in FSX without Acceleration. Could one not simply just use that house instead of creating a new Charlton House?
 
You have to have the scenery library BGL for Longleat to display, rowdy. That BGL file is part of the Acceleration pack, which is why people without the expansion pack wouldn't see it. It's not a default FSX object - indeed I can't even find the library that contains it right now.

The other problem is that it isn't just the big house - there's a lot more to the complex, if you look to the North of where you've clipped off your shot. Sticking down the house would take twenty seconds. Creating an AFD file for Spitfires to fly from it would take anywhere between ten minutes and an hour or so. Placing autogen trees and putting something on all the other building positions that are missing from your rotated shot would take considerably longer!!!
 
Ok thanks for clarification Ian. I am unexperianced with FSX scenery, and know little about how it all works, or doesn't :d
I understand that it would take a considerable time and effort to create such scenery.
 
I don't know:confused:
I didn't expect to get so much enthusiasm for the idea, and I'm quite delighted that people here are keen on it. I thought that this thread would drift into the background without any posts, and be gone forever.
As I'm not a scenery creator (once I'm past repainting, I'm lost in FS world), so I cannot say who will do what, as I do not have authority to command construction of this scenery set, I'll keep quiet and see what goes on!
 
Well apart from anything else, I'd seriously download SBuilderX and ADE. Take a look at doing scenery design because to the level that I do, for my stuff for example, it's really not that hard at all. It's primarily drag and drop or selecting from menus.

When you do what falcon does and start doing photoreal backgrounds, then it gets harder and when you get up to doing what people like Bill Womack do then it's an entire job in itself, but at the basic level, it's pretty easy and you can learn and achieve a lot quite quickly.

I'm investigating creating photorealistic backgrounds again right now, but off the top of my head, I'm not sure anyone is doing much beyond me plodding on with mine between WW2 fields. ;)

I'll take a look, but you won't see anything from me in the immediate future because right now it's above my skills and knowledge level. I do like the idea though.
 
Very interesting thread. I had a look also at the photoreal part and was unable to get a good image, hopefully Ed will have better luck if he tries.

Ian, to be honest, the photoreal part is easier than adjusting the ADE/Afcad file, it's the modeling that takes time.

Look forward to what you guys come up with
 
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