Martin wrote: > I think the risk of doing harm by "rating" aircraft and their cockpits > after just a quick test is rather high compared to the potential > benefit - especially when you're too unfamiliar with some of the > respective real-life references. To put in into different words: By > assigning too many inappropriate ratings, you're putting the entire > effort at the risk of not being taken as seriously as you would expect. > > If I were you, I'd refrain from posting ratings as 'delicate' as this > one. (...) > My own ego is not affected in any way, last but not least because I > didn't model any of these aircraft. But I do know some of the > respective real-life counterparts (mostly single engined aircraft) > pretty well because I'm flying these as PIC or at least as co-pilot and > for almost all of them I'd end up with a different rating.
Hm, I gather you don't like my idea (this seems to become a habit with us...). But I can't really figure out why. One interpretation I have is that you really want to say that I can't judge the level of visual detail by looking at a cockpit, I'd have to have real-life flying experience in the airplane. But it doesn't seem likely that this is what you mean, because for example I don't need to ever have entered an YF-23 to know that the cockpit of the Flightgear model has no visual detail - that's just obvious to me. The other interpretation I can think of is that you somehow mix up a rating of visual detail of the cockpit model (which I did) with a rating of aircraft realism based on a real life comparison (which I did not). But that also doesn't seem likely, because I set down a clear description of by what procedure the numbers are obtained, so you'd then call a rating 'inappropriate' because it is derived according to my (published) standards rather than your (unpublished) standards, and that doesn't make too much sense to me either. So I am a bit lost as to what you are actually criticizing, sorry. Curt wrote: > 2. The rating could be broken down into 3 (or more) subsections and the > overall rating could be a combination of the parts. 3 broad categories > I see are: (a) cockpit/interior, (b) exterior model, and (c) flight > model (how well does the thing fly, not to be confused with how hard the > thing is to fly.) We could also talk about sound effects, systems > modeling (electrical system, hydraulic system), fault modeling, night > lighting ... and on and on. I have the idea of a scheme in which in addition systems and instrumentation (0-10) and FDM (0-10) are rated, and I would absolutely love the idea of having that info along with the visual detail. The problem is time - my optimistic figure to get a rough idea of the flight characteristics is something like 2 hours (certainly more to appreciate the fine points of high-level FDMs, not including research). Applied to the aircraft database, that's 800+ hours of work. Given that it took me 3 weeks to complete the project so far, it's simply not something that I can see is done in a systematic way for all aircraft we have. But in a more limited scope, there is some information out there about realism of FDMs (see the recent p51d discussion) - and even on the limited level of what FDMs are the favourites of people here, I think that would be very useful information to have out and to counterbalance the inherent bias of the visual detail rating. So if anyone wants to comment on what good FDMs are, please go ahead! James wrote: > Sadly, I agree with both Tim and Martin - judging people's work > is pretty risky, especially when they don't know it's coming - > but we do make it really hard for casual users to find out aircraft > that suit their needs. Hm, see my comment in the forum - it's not that I am completely unaware of things... *** First, it seems to me there is a fundamental (and unfair) mismatch between what a developer wants and what a user perspective (from which ratings are done) does. A developer usually wants some appreciation for hard work. A user wants a finished product which looks and feels great, and if it does suit his fancy, he expresses appreciation. Here's the problem: I spent the better part of 5 months coding work to make something disappear from the weather system. Now it's largely gone and doesn't bother me any more - but do you really think that any future user is ever going to express his gratitude that it's not there? Of course not - he'll never notice, which is just the point. He'll just notice that cloud texture X looks spectacular, which is nice, but that's 5 hours of work instead of 5 months. Also with cockpit design - it's obviously much easier to create a 'wow!' effect when you have a glider cockpit with 5 instruments, rather than the Concorde with 200. But a user simply isn't interested in the time it took to get something going - if I can't start a plane because it creates an error, I don't appreciate the hours gone into that plane. If someone spent 100 hours to get a nice cockpit, and the guy next door spent 1000 hours to get a great cockpit for the same plane, I will use the great cockpit and not appreciate 100 hours's work. From the perspective of a developer, that's not fair, but that's how it is, and once we can accept that users think that way, we can move on. *** Vivian asked: > Hmm - interesting. Are you sure you know what you are seeing? Your #2 is > the > Seahawk. It is a full 3d representation of the actual aircraft derived > from > the pilot's notes. There are no omissions from the main panel, although > there are some secondary controls missing from the cockpit sidewalls, > omitted in the interests of frame rate. The seahawk was rated 5, meaning I saw a complete 3d operational 3d cockpit without any glaring omissions of gauges or buttons, but without any fancy additions like metal texturing (most surfaces are just a single color), 3d effects (gauges look a bit like flat pictures glued onto the panel) or work on the sidewalls. Not an 'How nice!' or 'Wow!' cockpit, clearly not photorealistic, but good work. Would you disagree with this assessment, and if so, where? (I actually like to fly the seahawk very much... much better than the 5 would suggest). I'd like to stress again that this is in no way a judgement if the gauges are all in the right place or if the cockpit is complete down to the last detail - in order to do that, I'd need to acquire cockpit photographs which in many cases I don't have (and much more time). Cheers, * Thorsten ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Increase Visibility of Your 3D Game App & Earn a Chance To Win $500! Tap into the largest installed PC base & get more eyes on your game by optimizing for Intel(R) Graphics Technology. Get started today with the Intel(R) Software Partner Program. Five $500 cash prizes are up for grabs. http://p.sf.net/sfu/intelisp-dev2dev _______________________________________________ Flightgear-devel mailing list Flightgear-devel@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/flightgear-devel
