Rhumba"s Mesh Is Up

Re-read the thread- particularly this post by Rhumba where he explains about the absence of beaches, rivers and roads.

The VTP1 lines ( beaches, streams and roads ) are not done for any of these masks.
BTW did you find the link to my website under the picture in my signature?

Chris
 
MR,

I found your site and downloaded a few things. I will try it out later today if I have time.

As for the shorelines, it sounds like I'm out of luck. The mention of hand drawing shorelines sounds intense. Is there a way to do, for example, the island of guam with ground2k or something? If so is there a short tutorial?
 
Yeah the shorelines are a bit of a problem. But just for fun I am going to build some airfields in Rhumba's newly meshed and masked areas of the PTO anyway and build my own rivers, roads and shorelines just for the areas where I am working. I will use google earth to draw in the rivers and roads and then match up the images I save from Google earth as a second layer over my original shp file generated background map. Should work fine. Rhumba's mesh and masks' are a vast improvement over what CFS2 offers up default for these areas.

I have two airfields in mind that I will build first that will look spectacular.
 
Yeah the shorelines are a bit of a problem. But just for fun I am going to build some airfields in Rhumba's newly meshed and masked areas of the PTO anyway and build my own rivers, roads and shorelines just for the areas where I am working. I will use google earth to draw in the rivers and roads and then match up the images I save from Google earth as a second layer over my original shp file generated background map. Should work fine. Rhumba's mesh and masks' are a vast improvement over what CFS2 offers up default for these areas.

I have two airfields in mind that I will build first that will look spectacular.

Sound great!

Let me know how it goes. I would interested to know how you do that.
The mesh is really nice. I'm just starting to check it out.
 
Ransiki-Moemi Airdromes, Iryan Jaya, Dutch East Indies- bout 30 miles south of Monakwari.

I'm sure these two have been done before but I though I get started on version of my own- with the benefit of Rhumba's excellent Masks and Mesh.

Also, used his/SdC's VTP1 fix utilities.

Not much there so far just a place-holder runway at each location. I've been working getting the LC values to my liking as well as the roads and rivers, etc.. Using GoogleEarth to draw in accurate rivers and roads and then using the saved GoogleEarth image as an overlay for the SWBD shp file image worked quite nicely. While not perfect- the rivers follow the bottoms of the river bed pretty accurately. I put in enough coastline to cover the width of the scenery with plenty of room to spare.

Cheers,
Chris
 
Well first you need a program that will let you view SWBD shp files and to export image files from them. I use TatukGIS Viewer. Pretty sure its freeware. Here is the link:

TatukGIS.com

G2K requires a square backgound map for which you must supply the precise NW/SE corner coordinates out to several decimal places. TatukGIS Viewer allows you to export perfectly square images, covering as mnuch or as little area as you need. Along with the image it also exports a text file giving those NW/SE corner coords in the format required by G2K.

Next you need to get you basic SWBD (Shuttle Water Body Data) shp files for whatever patch of ground you covet. They are available thru NASA and are indexed according to the lower left hand corner cords of whole number 1 degree by 1 degree lat/lon grids. NASA has them divided into East longitude and West longitude sets. Here is the link:

NASA SRTM v2 SWBD

Thats about it. I also use EZ Landclass to do my simple LC and WC files when needed- since only under the most ideal and fleeting circumstances will G2K ever spit out LC and WC bgls. It will give you the raw LC and WC files no prob. EZLandclass can be got here:

Dirk's Software

Cheers,
Chris
 
Thanks for taking the time MR. I'm starting to get a handle on the jargon that you and other scenery designers use. Also in one of the links on your web page...a good explanation of polys this sim uses.
There is quite an amassing of knowledge to do this kind of work.
It also explains why, when asked, if you will update a certain airfield your answer is, well, what it is. :icon_lol:
The GIS viewer is nice...very nice.
 
Hi all !

Chris , I'm happy to see you come back in the scenery circle,there are a lot of things to do in this game for a better use of the new Rhumba's mesh and masks .
I think you've have planned to break the coastlines ,with some exclude areas ,between the streams and the sea ,exist a way to do it.
As overlay with swdb I use also a bmp extracted from the srtm3 height file ,we can get a nice 1200x1200 bmp with the Martin wright's tool FSTerrain 2002, resized to 4200x4200 ,the same swdb jpeg size ,i put them in photoshop as layers i add some GGH screens or ,and,an old perry castaneda wwII map ,all that give some good modulable(with psp) background bmp for g2k, the coord are simple, accurate and they are always squared cause I've find some no squared swdb files.for example as 4200x 3800 ...
to get the HGT bmp in Fsterrain 2002 :
SRTM/convert 3-sec HGT to FSTerrain project ...select the hgt file in the dialog box and name your .tpr file etc...a tpr file and a bmp will appear in the selected folder.

the link to dwld the srtm3
http://dds.cr.usgs.gov/srtm/version2/SRTM3/

and the link for the MW's tool(s)
http://fly.to/mwgfx/

@+

JP
 
Hi Jp. Its fun to be wriggling my toes in the muck again.

Yes, I am planning breaks in the shoreline- those are my own shorelines BTW. But am still playing around with best way to do it. The method you describe sounds like a good one. Last night, late, I did put some breaks in the shorelines. Attached is a screenie of my latest efforts.

Still not totally happy with the result though. When starting this scenery I used my SWBD image to remake the shoreline here. It doesn't fit exactly with Rhumba's mask. Rhuma's mask actually has the shoreline "scooped" out where the swampy areas surrounding the river mouths are located- I first attempted make the swampy areas out of LWM water polys behind the shoreline.

Last night I went back and redid the shorelines putting breaks at the mouths of the rivers.

I think I understand what you are saying and it sounds likes a good approach. What you are saying- I think- is that I can get a better fit for Rhumba's mask if I use an image extracted from the same srtm3 height file as Rhumba used for these masks? The I can use LWM land polys in the scooped out swampy areas instead of LWM water polys? Maybe that isn't what you are saying? :d

I'll give it a go this evening when I have a little time. I appreciate the suggestion.

Find attached a screenie of the current situation at Ransiki-Moemi.

Cheers,
Chris
 
Hiya, JP!

I think I did what you were talking about. I downloaded and installed (reinstalled as it tunrs out) Martin's FSTerrain 2002 and the relevant SRTM file.

Using FSTerrain I smoothed out the ocean data until the coastline was smoothed sufficiently to show a cohesive border between the ocean and the land. As it turns out the outline fit in nicely with Rhumba's mask.

So, then I exported the image to my editor- I use PaintShop Pro for this stuff- and selected just the part of it that I needed to cover the ransiki-moemi area shoreline. Then I pasted that squared image as a new layer into my ransiki-moemi working PSP. Resized it so that it fit with the underlying SWBD image then saved flattened and saved as 5000X5000 256 color bmp in my G2k Project background map folder..

Attached is what it looks like as a scaled down jpg file.

Notice the lighter colored area (yellow arrow). That is the difference between the further out SWBD shoreline and Rhumba's mask in that real swampy area surrounding the river outlets.

Not sure what my point is- I think it is that I haven't decided how to handle that swampy area- water polys carved into land or land polys set into open water. Whats a little weird right now is that some of the water off my current shore- which is further out than Rhumba's mask- is acting like land- its gives off dirt colored bullet hits.
 
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