Wake Island.....for FSX?

[Navy Chief]

It would be cool to see Wake Island scenery done for FSX...WW2 period, maybe? A minor modification was done by Tony Arnold in '07, but would be neat to see a more involved overhaul.

Wake Island, for the most part now (I believe), exists as a trans-pacific refueling stop for military aircraft.

I had the fortunate opportunity to spend 8 glorious days on that island in 1996. Many years ago, there was a fairly large USAF presence on the island, but that's gone. I found the following information about Wake:
.
Wake Island is a possession of the United States under the control of the Department of the Interior. It is a U.S. Army launch support facility operated under a caretaker permit from the U.S. Air force and administered by the U.S. Army Strategic and Missile Defense Command – Huntsville. Additional use is allowed on a case by case basis to support U.S. interests. The launch facilities and all associated support on-island are maintained by USASMDC

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[orionll]

There's this: http://simviation.com/1/search?submit=1&keywords=Wake+Island+Diaphenous&x=0&y=0.

Edit: Also saw this: http://simviation.com/1/search?submit=1&keywords=Wake+Island+Scenery+Dude&x=0&y=0.

[Navy Chief]

Thank you for that! I had not been to Simviation in quite a while. NC

[jeansy]

im pretty sure i got mine a few yrs back from flightsim.com or avsim

[roger-wilco-66]

hmmmm would be interesting to check if the exisiting photoreal scenery could make a basis for a historical scenario....


Cheers,
Mark

[mal998]

The photo real scenery by Diaphenous is an excellent basis for Wake Island in the early 1940s. I tried a couple of times to clear the modern scenery but have yet to master ADE in order to replace it with WWII scenery. Maybe I 'll have another go at it.

One problem I'm having with this scenery is the elevations vary on different parts of the island. I'm not sure how to flatten the areas with incorrect elevations.

"FSX Wake Island Photoreal (Wake Atoll)
This is the scenery package for Wake Island in the North Pacific.
The package contains photoreal ground textures and lots of default autogen. Included is also a construction kit
for those who want to rework the complete airfield with ADE since the default FSX airport coordinates are of incorrect.
Texture resolution 60cm/pixel, LOD16.
by Diaphenous"

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[Navy Chief]

The photo real scenery by Diaphenous is an excellent basis for Wake Island in the early 1940s. I tried a couple of times to clear the modern scenery but have yet to master ADE in order to replace it with WWII scenery. Maybe I 'll have another go at it.

That would be awesome!

Wake Island is beautiful. I wish I could have stayed longer than 8 days, but I will never forget the experience. You can still walk the beach, and pick up .30 cal shell casings from the historic WW2 battle between the Japanese and the Marines. NC

[mal998]

Chief,
Do you recall if the elevations were different on different parts of the island?

[Navy Chief]

Chief,
Do you recall if the elevations were different on different parts of the island?


Hmm, good question. And I really do not know. Seems like, however, that I remember the elevations being consistent. I mean, I don't recall any hilly areas. Maybe a search of some forums might provide more information. A couple of the pictures I posted last night were taken by a professional photographer who visited Wake not long ago. Perhaps if I emailed him, he could share some information about that, and maybe even send me some pictures of the rest of the island?

Pete

[Navy Chief]

I emailed the photographer. Hope to hear back from him!

[mal998]

From what I can see so far, the biggest problem will be correcting the runway elevation and then replacing it with the WWII type runway, either coral or asphalt or macadam. At this point I have not had any success doing that.

Taking out the modern objects and replacing them withh WWII era scenery objects should not pose a problem since there are quite a few scenery objects for that time frame. Maybe we can get some guidance from someone who knows their way around photo real scenery.

[Navy Chief]

From what I can see so far, the biggest problem will be correcting the runway elevation and then replacing it with the WWII type runway, either coral or asphalt or macadam. At this point I have not had any success doing that.

Taking out the modern objects and replacing them withh WWII era scenery objects should not pose a problem since there are quite a few scenery objects for that time frame. Maybe we can get some guidance from someone who knows their way around photo real scenery.

Unfortunately, that wouldn't be me!

[roger-wilco-66]

I had a look at it and concur with Mal. I'd try to lay a high-res ASTER mesh beyond it (if it has no anomalies) to give it the little elevations it has and put a new airfield and installations on the island; elevation of the airfield is not a problem. I think the biggest problem is the photoreal image, which depicts the modern layout. It would have to be regressed carefully by manually redrawing it. Actually, the redrawing is the only problem. Scenery objects --> Solomon, it's all in there.

Cheers,
Mark

PS:
found some nice maps and images of the island in 1941, when the US was still there.

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[mal998]

what I don't understand is why there are different elevations mostly around the runway.

why wasn't it done at one elevation, then we could just lay a new runway over the photo real one.

the rest would be fairly easy.

[Navy Chief]

Mal998 and Mark....thanks for your interest in this! Ever since getting into flight simulation, I've wanted to see Wake Island "come to life", and maybe some day it will!

Thanks.

Pete

[mal998]

Here's another possibility. The well known John Stinstrom has a scenery for Wake that was done for FS9. I plugged it in and it works pretty well. If I can get his permission we might be able to remove some of the library objects and replcae them with other scenery objects. I will shoot him an email to see if he would allow me to modify and use his scenery. We'll see.

[Navy Chief]

Here's another possibility. The well known John Stinstrom has a scenery for Wake that was done for FS9. I plugged it in and it works pretty well. If I can get his permission we might be able to remove some of the library objects and replcae them with other scenery objects. I will shoot him an email to see if he would allow me to modify and use his scenery. We'll see.

Please tell John that I (Pete Ward) said hello! I have beta tested a lot of his FS9 scenery over the years. In fact, I helped him create the NAS Cecil Field scenery for FS9, by providing him a lot of photos....

[mal998]

What I really need to know now is how to flatten and lower the entire island so that it's all one elevation without high and low spots.

Mark if you have any experience with that please let me know.

Changing the runways from concrete to coral is easy and so is deleting modern objects and adding period objects. We just have to get the island flattened and lowered.

[Tako_Kichi]

You should be able to flatten and lower the island using ADE9X which can also be used to add/remove buildings too.

Several years ago I also used it reshape a coastline and river estuary by an airfield so you should be able to get the island the right shape too.

[mal998]

OK, thanks for that. I'll have a look at that program.

[roger-wilco-66]

What I really need to know now is how to flatten and lower the entire island so that it's all one elevation without high and low spots.

Mark if you have any experience with that please let me know.

Changing the runways from concrete to coral is easy and so is deleting modern objects and adding period objects. We just have to get the island flattened and lowered.

Hi,

I would need to have a close look at it, but I think blending the airfield into the mesh does not require to flatten the whole island. You just need to blend the perimeter of the flattened airfield to the elevations. Tom does a real good job at Iwo Jima right now just doing that, and it's a bit more complicated there. In ADE, as Tako mentioned, this is fairly easy to do, and if you try it, remember that you can assign elevations to vertex points.
I'd like to lend a helping hand here, but I want to finish my Solomon libraries first so I can release it, and they could be used for Iwo Jima and Wake (and others...). I carefully estimate that I won't have time for it until the end of January, since I'm 5 weeks in Southeast Asia soon.
Is someone here who has experience in redrawing photoreal scenery? Would be nice if we could use the photoreal texture as background, but I don't have experience with this as of yet.

Cheers,
Mark

[Bjoern]

Oh, the fun hours I've had on Wake...shooting down Wildcats with Zeros...bombing or strafing the airfield...running a destroyer aground to use it as a gun platform...shoveling the OPFOR...


Wait...wrong game.

[mal998]

yeah, I wish we had some of that in this game.

I think I'm going to attempt to create the photo real background of the island myself. There are a couple of programs that supposedly can help to do that easily...we'll see.

If I can make a photo real terrain bmp of the island, it will not be hard to create the coral runways and gun emplacements and hangers etc.

[Tako_Kichi]

Just a word of caution....be careful where you get the photo-real imagery from. If it's a satellite image it will be covered by copyright and while it might be OK for your own use you most certainly cannot upload a scenery package to share with others that contains images covered by a copyright unless you have express permission to do so from the copyright owner.

Falcon (Ed) was a making a bunch of photo-real sceneries about a year ago but had to pull them all because of the copyright issue on the satellite images he used.

[mal998]

good point, thanks.

[mal998]

I've spoken with John Stinstrom, who has been gracious enough to allow me use of his scenry as a basis for a re-work of Wake-1941. It remains to be seen if I can figure out how to flatten the basic photo or mesh or whatever it is in order to proceed with placement of period correct objects. He has also given me permission to use his WWII vehicle library and static aircraft from another package. So if I can get the elevations of the island flattened I can proceed with object placement.

Any help on the elevation issues will be appreciated.

[roger-wilco-66]

Mal, pm me if you have problems with the mesh and the airfield, I'd be glad to help out.


Cheers,
Mark

[Navy Chief]

It's been a few years. Just wondered if any progress was made on this? Thanks. NC:encouragement: