PDA

View Full Version : Hadrian's Wall



Bomber_12th
August 24th, 2020, 16:26
Here are a series of screenshots flying on the path of the ancient Hadrian's Wall, which began construction in the year AD 122. Several sections of the wall still remain big enough that they are recreated by the AI software and show up in the sim (though using building textures). There are also the sites of a number of ancient Roman forts to see along the path of the wall.

I started out at Carlisle Airport EGNC, near Brampton, which placed me close enough to be able to spot an easily recognizable section of the wall only several minutes after taking off. I then followed the remains of the wall heading east all the way to Newcastle on the coast.

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265308826_5649451fb2_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzLR6C)

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50264652193_cd39ddc90b_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzHtUn)

Banks East Turret below:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265308611_1efe1d22f1_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzLR2V)

The little building structure at the bottom along the path of the wall and road stands at the spot of Turret 49B, while part of the Birdoswald Roman Fort site can be seen at the lower right:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265308511_05ef5a7c9a_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzLR1c)

The Birdoswald Roman Fort site can be seen just off the right wing tip, and lower in the screenshot you can see the Harrows Scar Milecastle and the Willford Wall, turrets and bridge:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265489507_b4e7c691b1_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzMLNP)

Bomber_12th
August 24th, 2020, 16:27
Following Penine Way and remnants of one of the many Milecastles can be seen just to the right of the horizontal tail.

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265308266_90d34f3198_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzLQVY)

Great Chesters Roman Fort:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265489302_5432133392_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzMLKh)

Milecastle 42 low in this shot. Part of this section of the wall is reproduced in 3D by AI:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265489247_5dc9379b41_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzMLJk)

Passing over the site of Turret 41a:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265489132_2d9ac4417b_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzMLGm)

A bit more of the wall reproduced by AI (between the trees):

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265489017_1c5af114c0_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzMLEn)

Bomber_12th
August 24th, 2020, 16:28
Here, one of the largest surviving sections of Hadrian's wall can be seen recreated by AI, including a part of Milecastle 39:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265307706_44ba4fcb77_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzLQLj)

This is the site of the Housesteads Roman Fort with Milecastle 37 just under the left wing:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50264651083_b8b85326c1_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzHtze)

Milecastle 35 and several portions of the wall reproduced by AI:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265307436_a953aafae0_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzLQFE)

Some more sections depicted with 3D walls, near Black Carts Turret:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265488482_070d752b2c_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzMLv9)

The square enclosure in this shot intrigued me, but I couldn't find any information about it and it may be not so old:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265488397_3498189961_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzMLtF)

Bomber_12th
August 24th, 2020, 16:28
Chesters Roman Fort, museum, and bridge abutment:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50264650728_0d57e97281_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzHtt7)

Flying over the Portgate site:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265307061_a3f6ed6599_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzLQzc)

The path of the wall still clearly visible through the fields:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265488032_804d2d86eb_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzMLno)

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50264650268_907b43fe1a_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzHtkb)

Entering Newcastle and the A69 below:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50265487812_c24af9364a_k.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2jzMLiA)

Odie
August 24th, 2020, 20:21
That is so cool, John! One of my favorite History Channel series was on Roman leaders and they covered the building of the wall in detail. MSFS 2020 looks to have
some significant detail to discover. Thanks for posting these. Looking forward to getting it. :encouragement::encouragement:

Ganter
August 24th, 2020, 22:45
Excellent trip report Bomber.

One of my gripes - and don't get me wrong, I ain't complaining - is that ancient monuments, churches, cathedrals, historic buildings are autogen'd with commercial looking office and factory buildings which can cut through the immersion somewhat.
This is one of the first things I look forward to trying to fix.
Where's Object Placement Tool when you need it?

We need something like that so we can point and place and replace, etc.

FlyingsCool
August 25th, 2020, 06:50
Bomber,

I've noticed some things like, cars aren't routed properly around the rotary in Hudson, MA on Rt 62 (so they end up driving over a divider instead of staying on the road, and then some cars go the wrong way round!!! EEK!), the Sagamore and Bourne bridges over the Cape Cod canal aren't suspension bridges like they're supposed to be, and the train bridge I think is missing, or not right, roads are covered in grass rather than tar textures around KACK (actually a very common issue), the American Heritage Museum in Stow/Hudson is missing and the area is about 5 years old (it was basically captured 5 years ago as they were starting construction. The hangar is very nicely captured though!, well, as a photogrammetry construct and not hand built), The trees are too big at the end of the runway at the Collings Foundation, making landing difficult (doable, though), there's a tree in the middle of the Merrimack river on top of the Rt 113 bridge in Tyngsboro, MA (the bridge actualy looks ok, it's green and suspension as it should be, there's just a tree in the middle of it). The hangars on the north side of KASH are pretty annoyingly wrong (I used to have a hangar in there).

I've seen you say that you're reporting scenery issues. Can we do that? Where?

At what level of detail should we bother reporting? And what would we expect to get fixed? (i.e. I don't know if the Hudson rotary would get fixed, but the tree on the Rt 113 bridge should be, and the Sagamore and Bourne bridges would be nice with more detail).

Bomber_12th
August 25th, 2020, 07:55
Many of the Bing aerials are between 5-6 years old or more, but that will change over time. There are no railroad bridges yet (outside of photogrammetry), just as there are no cell towers, identifiable churches, or water towers yet outside of photogrammetry coverage either. I say "yet", because those are all things that Asobo do still want to add and plan to add - this extends down to even adding at some point things like migratory bird patterns depending on the region of the world and time of the year/seasons. As I mentioned before, they are looking at continuing to update and add onto the sim with monthly free updates for years to come (they have often spoken of a 10-year, or more, post-launch continued development).

There will be free World Updates released every 2-3 months (it looks like we will get the first one already in September, based on the development roadmap), which will focus on one individual region of the world at a time, and all of the Bing aerials/data will be updated in the sim for that region. More things will be adjusted/fixed in that region's scenery, more hand-crafted airports will be added in that region, more hand-modeled points of interest will be added in that region (churches, castles, lighthouses, unique bridges, buildings, and other landmarks), and there will be more landing challenges and missions introduced with each regional update to bring a focus on flying in that particular location in the world.

If there is a game-breaking bug, significant graphics problems, or you just want to provide feedback on some scenery issues (maybe more than just a misplaced tree, though), you can do so by filing a report here: https://flightsimulator.zendesk.com/hc/en-us

It will be marked "Solved" once the report is filed through their system, but it doesn't mean it is or will be solved in the sim.

Bing is always getting new aerials injected into the sim, but Asobo has no way of knowing exactly where any of those updated aerials are - it could be a 40x40 mile section out in the middle of some desert, for instance. The Asobo developers and their software programs can update the whole of the world with the latest Bing data in the course of only two weeks, but they would rather do it regionally, with a much more meaningful update every 2-3 months, than force us to download a huge update every two weeks.

Bomber_12th
August 25th, 2020, 08:11
BTW, I had always wanted to do a flight like this, finding Hadrian's Wall, after of course being a history buff for all my life. I always could have done so with payware photo scenery addons for FS2004/FSX/P3D, but it was always more than I wanted to spend to cover the entirety of the UK in photo scenery (usually broken up into 3 or 4 sections costing $40-$50 or more a piece). With this sim, spending $120 for the Premium Deluxe, I essentially paid for 30 top quality aircraft at $4 a piece (comparable to most of the best payware for FSX/P3D), and got the world scenery and everything else for free.

One of the Asobo developers in a Q&A a couple weeks ago spoke about how his son, who otherwise has had little to no interest in aviation, was however interested in the sim because with it he has been able to go out and explore various historic battlefield sites.

FlyingsCool
August 25th, 2020, 08:28
Many of the Bing aerials are between 5-6 years old or more, but that will change over time. There are no railroad bridges yet (outside of photogrammetry), just as there are no cell towers, identifiable churches, or water towers yet outside of photogrammetry coverage either. I say "yet", because those are all things that Asobo do still want to add and plan to add - this extends down to even adding at some point things like migratory bird patterns depending on the region of the world and time of the year/seasons. As I mentioned before, they are looking at continuing to update and add onto the sim with monthly free updates for years to come (they have often spoken of a 10-year, or more, post-launch continued development).

There will be free World Updates released every 2-3 months (it looks like we will get the first one already in September, based on the development roadmap), which will focus on one individual region of the world at a time, and all of the Bing aerials/data will be updated in the sim for that region. More things will be adjusted/fixed in that region's scenery, more hand-crafted airports will be added in that region, more hand-modeled points of interest will be added in that region (churches, castles, lighthouses, unique bridges, buildings, and other landmarks), and there will be more landing challenges and missions introduced with each regional update to bring a focus on flying in that particular location in the world.

If there is a game-breaking bug, significant graphics problems, or you just want to provide feedback on some scenery issues (maybe more than just a misplaced tree, though), you can do so by filing a report here: https://flightsimulator.zendesk.com/hc/en-us

It will be marked "Solved" once the report is filed through their system, but it doesn't mean it is or will be solved in the sim.

Bing is always getting new aerials injected into the sim, but Asobo has no way of knowing exactly where any of those updated aerials are - it could be a 40x40 mile section out in the middle of some desert, for instance. The Asobo developers and their software programs can update the whole of the world with the latest Bing data in the course of only two weeks, but they would rather do it regionally, with a much more meaningful update every 2-3 months, than force us to download a huge update every two weeks.

Exactly, I was wondering what level of detail they want to care about, and where to submit issues if they are accepting such information. If they never fix the issues I submit, I won't be bothered by that, they have the whole world to deal with. But if they fix a few, I would be happy :)

Perhaps they should have a format for people posting scenery issues, like, at the top, some sort of location field so they can sort by location, and maybe some sort of ranking by type of fix as well, again, so they can be sorted and acted on appropriately.

I can imagine what they'll be dealing with, having to sort through duplicates and inputs from possibly 10's of thousands of users (eek!).

IanHenry
August 25th, 2020, 09:57
Excellent trip report Bomber.

One of my gripes - and don't get me wrong, I ain't complaining - is that ancient monuments, churches, cathedrals, historic buildings are autogen'd with commercial looking office and factory buildings which can cut through the immersion somewhat.
This is one of the first things I look forward to trying to fix.
Where's Object Placement Tool when you need it?

We need something like that so we can point and place and replace, etc.

Yes, the town that I live in has a Castle in the centre, but it looks like it's been demolished and replaced with an industrial unit:eek:

Also taking off from Blackpool airport, they forgot Blackpool Tower!

fallenphoenix1986
August 25th, 2020, 10:29
Pretty cool idea for the flight.
I was at Birdoswald Fort about a year ago, think this is the first place I've seen screenshots of (aside from major cities) that I've actually been to.

Alan_A
August 25th, 2020, 10:56
Fantastic tour - thanks, John!

Fun article here, from a noted (and pretty entertaining) AI researcher, about some of the more, um, creative scenery the AI is currently coming up with, and why: https://aiweirdness.com/post/627344542828544000/planet-earth-from-above