Military Ops

[MCDesigns]

"I own an island, leased it from the government, spared no expense........."(in the words of John Hammond(Jurassic Park), LOL)

I really enjoy military flying, even if it is a civilian flightsim. I also enjoy designing scenery, especially military ones. One of the main issues with designing scenery is there are too many variables around your scenery that take the fun out of developing, different meshes, different textures, compatibility with other addons, etc and it just gets worse daily. So I found an island and started a fictional scenery where I don't have to worry about compatibility and can focus on design.

(BACK STORY)The island is leased from the country of Yemen and falls under United Nations jurisdiction. A covert segment of the U.N has a special forces base and an all nations training facility on the island with it's primary function focused on dealing with the piracy threat from Somalia.

FEATURES so far - the whole island is done in .50 cm per pixel photoreal with autogen, water masking and night textures. FSGenesis mesh brings out the mountains, but I have asked someone to see if they can do a higher def mesh, so we shall see.

The airfield is all custom ground poly with hires textures, including a runway for smaller jets, cargo aircraft. There is a heli area with eight landing pads. I have a quality static C-130 and Harrier II with the possibility of a Hind or Apache, haven't decided. I am also working on a drone or two with the possibility of having them be AI, but that would mean adding an AFCAD and I suck at those, LOL.

Quite a few custom objects, including several Humvees, watch tower, hangers, cargo, palm trees, camo netting, an APC, an MTVR truck, tents and various people, some animated. With all the detailed objects having LODS.

There are also 2 different landable destroyers around the island, static for now, but want to make them work in AICarriers.

I also have a drivable Bradley APC and a working armed zodiac for water patrols.

Thinking about a civilian area at the other end of the island for non military simmers and a place for R and R , we'll see.

Still lots to do, but wanted to put this out there to see if anyone was interested. I am open to any suggestions, but can't guarantee anything. Here are a few images to get an idea.

http://imageshack.us/a/img191/8540/u0q4.jpg
http://imageshack.us/a/img802/6668/9d93.jpg
http://imageshack.us/a/img51/2285/fj18.jpg
http://imageshack.us/a/img708/6747/fnr2.jpg

[DaveWG]

Looks great to me Michael, nice work :applause:

[roger-wilco-66]

WOW!!!

[Firekitten]

Whilst scenery development is certainly a fine art, that is just creativity at its best... Great work :)

[Dino Cattaneo]

Very interesting indeed.

If you are into the military side of FSX, I suggest you have a look at VRS Tacpack.
Current public release only works with the VRS Hornet, but this will change in the near future.

I have been given access to the SDK and I am integrating my F-14D and the F-35 to support it.
It is a wonderful implementation, and it is much more realistic than what most people believe.
Other devs are integrating their projects too... only jet fighters at the moment, afaik, but there is no reason why the SDK it cannot be applied (at least partially) to helicopters or other vehicles.

[Dino Cattaneo]

...I just realized I forgot saying that I totally envision this scenery to be a multiplayer arena for Tacpack multiplayer matches!

[MCDesigns]

Thanks all, appreciate the replies!!



...I just realized I forgot saying that I totally envision this scenery to be a multiplayer arena for Tacpack multiplayer matches!

Hi Dino, good to know about the TacPack, been interested in it myself. Would LOVE for it to work with helis and other objects. With the location of the Island I can envision this also. I had a few MP flights with a friend and we did just that, few times in the F-35, LOL

[Dino Cattaneo]

At the moment I am writing, the F-35 can already fire the cannon and launch/drop sidewinders, slammers and dumb bombs (Mk82,83 & 84). GBU-10; -12 -32, AGM-154 and AGM65 (although no guidance yet...) and they are already working and can damage SimObjects (too bad this works only in the developer's version!!!)

Tacpack is great IMHO - once the "non-Superbug only" version is out, given the quantity and quality of aicrafts available in FSX it will be a big thing (if a little too late).
If anything is, obviously, a little USN oriented... European or Russian weapons are not supported, as of today, but I am sure this will change soon.

[Roger]

Looks absolutely fantastic Michael!:applause:

Is it likely to be Dx10 compatible?

[dhazelgrove]

European or Russian weapons are not supported.....

I was just wondering if US weapons go bang in a different way from others - perhaps with a Southern accent?

Sorry.

Dave

[Dino Cattaneo]

What I meant is that the Tacpack weapons list can be expanded only by the VRS team, which in turn grants a quite realistic and balanced behavior (much more realistic than what people may think).
But at the moment, only USN weapons are supported - but this is because the Tacpack is originally designed fro the Superbug. So, for example, no proper weapons for a Su-27 - for the moment.

[ST0RM]

Nice scenery. Very crisp and laid out well. Just needs a Reaper/Predator UAV tucked away under a shelter or two.

-Jeff

[stovall]

Wonderful stuff Michael, please keep us posted as to progress. It will definitely be a sticky when finished. I would love to see your Africa scenery also. Thanks for what you do.

[flaviossa]

Very nice work! :applause:
Suggestion: how about placing a weapon test range with targets for shot practice with air/ground weapons? :icon31:

[letourn]

looks great will be fun to fly

[HvyEng]

Awesome! This looks like a perfect tactical "playground," Thanks!

[TheGrunt]

Looks amazing!:applause: Just one suggestion would be some sort of town/city in "Mogadishu style" on the coast with harbor, a place where some helo flying would fit nicely.

[MCDesigns]

Looks amazing!:applause: Just one suggestion would be some sort of town/city in "Mogadishu style" on the coast with harbor, a place where some helo flying would fit nicely.

Sorry, no cities exist on the island in real life so it would look odd to add any on top of the photoreal, but I want to create some FOBs around areas of conflict in that area and Somalia is right next door.. I picked this island because it has lots of different landscapes for both rotary and fixed wing. There is one area where you can come in low from the water, thru a tropical valley with mountains towering right in front of you, pretty cool.

Mark just sent me the mesh he did and WOW, it is amazing, check it out.

http://imageshack.us/a/img819/3504/3b96.jpg
http://imageshack.us/a/img854/8121/rwzy.jpg

[Sundog]

That looks great! I always thought if I was to do something similar, it would be to create one of those floating airfields the military has been talking about made from the base sections of oil rigs linked together. Then, I could just position them anywhere where the water isn't too deep. Edit: Something I just happened to think of that you could add to the island. A Target/Bombing Range. Obviously placed as far from the airfield on the island that you can get it, but they're going to need to train. You might also consider adding a port for the Navy. You know, in all of your spare time. ;)

[Mithrin]

Very cool. I really enjoyed your scenery (libraries) for fs9. This ought to be fun!

[strikehawk]

I can see pilots from the FSX Miramar Flight Club forward deployed here, especially if the annoy the Gunner. And I see it could share Diego Garcia's motto, "There's A Woman Behind Every Tree".:icon_lol:

[JimmyRFR]

This looks really nice, will be a lot of fun to fly from. The one suggestion I'd have in place of a city would be a small 'fake' training town. Seacans with a few buildings tossed in - would have the advantage of having such scenery on top of photo-real looking sort of artificial to start with. Be great for practicing heli drops.

Regardless of what you do with it though, it does look seriously great.

[MCDesigns]

Looks absolutely fantastic Michael!:applause:

Is it likely to be Dx10 compatible?

Roger, I am like you, I fly in DX10 mode always, so if there are any issues, I will see them during designing. Usually the old FS2002 ground polys have issues, but so far they are displaying fine.

[MCDesigns]

This looks really nice, will be a lot of fun to fly from. The one suggestion I'd have in place of a city would be a small 'fake' training town. Seacans with a few buildings tossed in - would have the advantage of having such scenery on top of photo-real looking sort of artificial to start with. Be great for practicing heli drops.

Regardless of what you do with it though, it does look seriously great.

That is a good idea, will look into it. The more I think of scenarios, the more I wish TacPack was ready for helis, LOL. I have several mobile missile launcher objects, and would love to find a way to control a firing from one, even better to a target. I already have a scene ready with a stopped tanker and two boats of Somali pirates circling it, perfect for a missile strike, heli weapons, or long range ordinance

[MCDesigns]

Just a little update for anyone interested. Progress is going great, got lots done including redefining the coastlines down to the pixel almost in photoshop (my wrist is killing me), cleaned up the photoreal a bit and added autogen, got over half the objects done, started work on animated ones, have possible locations for FOBs in Yemen and Somalia (I believe if you are going to make a scenery you also need to include a point B place to fly to, plus with the objects done, they won't take long) I am also working on some AI aircraft and ships (See the Mil-8).

Anyhoo, had the day off today, worked hard on it this morning so I played a little after and took some pics (sorry for the compression/quality), enjoy.

getting ready for a tactical training flight around the island

http://imageshack.us/a/img600/4438/hdol.jpg

Pretty coastlines and even autogen, LOL
Notice the ship beyond the reef?

http://imageshack.us/a/img703/1683/fuvo.jpg

The U.N Mil-8 is getting ready to fly some free rice out to Somalia, see the animated forklift guy working hard, LOL.

http://imageshack.us/a/img268/4764/m72u.jpg

I couldn't decide on a Hind or Apache static object, so I did both.

http://imageshack.us/a/img38/3517/dqi9.jpg

[JIMJAM]

I was going to say spare no expense since its taxpayer money. Need a nice rec area and a pool.

Looks great and a fun idea. I did something simular in Fs9 at Area 51. I built it up and added other secret landing strips around the area. I then had a place where I could fly my 'black aircraft" in mostly Alphasim cold war era planes.

[rdaniell]

Michael, that's looking better and better. Maybe one of these days I can borrow some of your people and put some civilian clothing on them for use in some of my sceneries. I could also put some old fashioned OD on them for the 4077th.

RD

[Flyboy208]

Michael, this scenery of yours looks great, so glad you are making it. Mike

[JimmyRFR]

Oh, that's looking awesome. Great stuff!

[MCDesigns]

Thanks all, much appreciated

RD with your progress on scenery, you will surpass me in no time!



I was going to say spare no expense since its taxpayer money. Need a nice rec area and a pool.

There's an ocean right in front, LOL. I do have a volleyball setup I can add, but I think I'll use that for the topless beach scenery I have planned, LOL. :running:


Well the financing came thru, the base now has 2 armed UAV drones thanks to the U.S. and France. :pop4: :salute:

[Obie311]

Yep a volleyball court would be good, some pogeybait machines, Conexes, and a few Hescoes and you'd be set. I can't wait for this one to post. Great staging area.

Obie

[Francois]

Great stuff MC !!! :wavey:

[roger-wilco-66]

Hey Michael,

that scenery looks extremely good!
Now we need some naval pirate AI traffic off the coast of Somalia for some interdiction missions!

Cheers,
Mark

[kilo delta]

Great work, Michael. :applause:

[MCDesigns]

World Press - Militants, claiming to be aligned with Al Shabaab have taken over the small coastal village of Bereeda, located in the Horn of Africa, Somalia. A U.N. relief worker helping at a local clinic in Bereeda managed to get a short message out to the U.N. headquarters in MOGADISHU before the line went dead.
After several meetings with world leaders, Secretary-General of the U.N. Ban Ki-moon, gave the go ahead to the U.N./NATO special forces group stationed nearby to assemble a strike force and use any resources necessary to neutralize the threat from Al Shabaab in the area and secure the village and it's inhabitants.

Ay least that is the scenario I had in mind when developing it, LOL.

I give you the tip of the Horn of Africa, Somalia, in 30 m/pixel photoreal with HD localized mesh by Mark.

I wanted to extend the coverage area but due to crappy source data, the large file sizes and just plain common sense I limited it to this area, which works great for heli ops and isn't to bad for fixed wing. The terrain is amazing and Marks mesh really brings out the details. I blended the photoreal nicely around the edges so it isn't to bad of a transition to default depending on what textures/landclass you are using. I could have recolored the photoreal to match better, but that would have ruined it and with FTXG released I have no idea what default textures or landclass people are using (mine are default/default). Plus Marks mesh extends a ways past the photoreal adding more to a better transition. Logistically, this ties in well with the island, but due to the file sizes will probably make two packages. I would kill to have all of Africa in this detail, it would be a blast to explore.

in the heli image, you can barely see a staging area along the beach to the left with a custom, old runway and scenery. I got the F-35 in there as well as a C-130 with no issues and the view is amazing from the ground and water (Deltasims Arleigh Burke destroyer) also.

Anyhoo, just keeping you guys in the loop, it's coming along nicely, should have it done sooner than later. I was testing it in the Apache and lost track of time flying nap of the earth thru those small valleys, LOL. Makes me wish for weapons as I wanted to add a few old trucks with terrorists in them along the valleys and have some target prectice.

http://imageshack.us/a/img4/805/0el1.jpg
http://imageshack.us/a/img822/2087/o0ay.jpg

[trucker17]

Looks AWESOME Michael

[MCDesigns]

Looks AWESOME Michael

Thanks! One last one to show the staging area

http://imageshack.us/a/img826/4843/vdvm.jpg

[Dimus]

That looks impressive Michael. I wonder if Tacpac would identify the static objects as targets. It would not harm to have a few bad guys to shoot at with a fully armed Superbug.

[Mach3DS]

Is this Freeware/Payware? Is it just personal scenery....will it be available? (Please say Yes... :) )

[roger-wilco-66]

Great stuff, Michael. I love that look of the cracked tarmac on the runway above. Great work!


Cheers,
Mark

[MCDesigns]

Thanks guys, especially you Mark, your mesh is outstanding!


Is this Freeware/Payware? Is it just personal scenery....will it be available? (Please say Yes... :) )

Freeware and it will be available. I just want to make sure I have included everything I want in it.

[hae5904]

Hey Michael,

Any news about this project? Downloaded and installed your Acton scenery, and must say awesome work mate !

Cheers,
Hank

[MCDesigns]

Thanks Hank, appreciate it. Yep, still going. Acton was a distraction so I didn't get tunnel vision, LOL. It also opened my eyes on distribution issues since I love photoscenery and this tends to be a file size issue. I may have to have separate sceneries/d/ls on this one.

My problem is I start a flight to check things and then other options opened up. In keeping with the theme, I thought about an airfield leased from the Saudis and found a cool spot North of the Yemen border. One thing lead to another and the next thing you know the photoscenery is down and.............:isadizzy:

Will post some new images once I get further along.

[Francois]

LOL........ a phenomenon aka Project Crawl.........

[robertorizzo]

Lovely!!?

[letourn]

Michael did i miss the release of this scenery or its not finish?

Thanks

[Montie]

I am wondering if this great looking scenery has progressed any further?

[Wizard]

Yes, Indeed, curious minds want to know! :eagerness:

[Scratch]

Nice job!!!!!! Looks a lot like Oman.

[MCDesigns]

Wow, had forgot about this thread, thanks for bringing it back up. two things have kept me from finishing this to date, one was I got a freelance job at a games studio that took me away from FS for awhile and two was a HD crash (i of 3). I had files backed up, but not current, so there was/is quite a bit more I have to redo.
Good news is that I have been making good progress and thanks to some new techniques and a few apps I got while working at the game studio, I feel better about the quality and the performance of the new models.

My goal was always to have my island with the military base on it and a few other areas around the world with bases or FOBs that used the same scenario and the same library and try and keep to reality as much as possible. In testing the new objects I started using a small military airfield in Saudi Arabia, Ras Al Mishab. I picked it for 3 reasons, one was that in reality the U.S. and allies used it for awhile during the 1990 Gulf War, so not to far fetched. Second was that the photoreal part looked pretty decent so I did a big chunk of it and third was location in terms of conflicts around the world that might invlove NATO or special forces (been doing sorties into Iraq when not testing, LOL). While the main purpose is for testing objects, I figured I would release it as a scenery also.
Here are a couple of teasers.

I am very close to switching to P3D, but will finish this before even though Mark says I shouldn't have any problems with transitioning to designing between the two

I have some vacation coming up in a couple of weeks so hopefully can get quite a bit done then. Rest assured I am working on it and appreciate the interest

10886 10887

[JimmyRFR]

Looks great; I'll be looking forward to it's release!

[Wizard]

I would very much like to make it live in the NEUWUC world. I could plan a major exercise using the scenery - make the tanks, missile launchers, etc. autonomous platforms that shoot back, etc. (see http://navalengagement.net for an overview of NEUWUC).

[trowelmaster]

Yes, Indeed, curious minds want to know! :eagerness:

How come you didn't mention how well this scenery could be implemented into Naval Engagement ? As it stands now we have KNFL scenery active with live SAM sites, I dare anyone to attempted a bombing run there and NOT get shot down or at least receive some damage . I made the run successfully in the Mig-21 only with the assistance of (SALTY) in his Prowler jamming everything ahead of me.

Oooops never mind spoke to late!

[Scratch]

Woo Hoo!! I landed at Ras Al Mishab in a hovercraft. Looking forward to a trip down memory lane.:applause:

[Montie]

Is Michael still around?

[dougal]

Tried 3 different browsers, but only seeing 'place holders' and no pics in this thread. See pics in all other threads.

[Montie]

Tried 3 different browsers, but only seeing 'place holders' and no pics in this thread. See pics in all other threads.

Well it is an old thread, so that might be it.