Yeah. I noticed something keeps the clouds from touching the plane. I could be wrong.
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I fly small airplanes (mostly Cessnas) in real life, and the thing i like doing is ācloud-surfingā cumulus, or better, TCUs, turning around those gigantic clouds is a delight!
So i tried doing it in VR with graphics pushed to the max.
What a disappointment!!!
In my optinion, it might be worse than FSXā¦
From upclose, the clouds have texture, like cotton, itās a complex and moving giant ball of cotton, while in MSFS, itās a transparent nothing that disapered as you come closer -_-
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Just wanted to say, everything still remains the same about clouds rendering in live weather since su7 arrived:
this is supposed to be a sky full of max density cumulous. Before metar implementation this would have looked almost perfect.
Asobo please!!! 
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Above post moved from Bug Reports
is this ever going to be implemented? i think its almost a neccesity for realism
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We need one dedicated Dev QA that addresses all these points individually one by one.
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Agree, but the problem is that Asobo do not create the data that is rendered in the sim. Meteoblue creates that data. I think someone at Meteoblue should be invited and answere those questions together with Asobo. Meteoblue answeres questions of the data accuracy and stuff like that and Asobo answeres the questions of the rendering process of that data they recieve.
We as users needs to understand itās not Asobo that creates the weather simulation, itās Meteoblue. Asobo should only make that weather simulation shown to us in the sim. I bet the issues we see in the sim is a combination of the data and the rendering process.
This is and example: we want higher level clouds to look like cirrus= cloud type 1
If Asobo recieves higher lever cloud data and Asobo fix that layer into a fixed cloud type that means we see the whole sky fixed in this state. 1111111111111111111=generic/canāt evolve like weather does depending on weather conditions.
Same thing happens with all of the layers MB sends. If Asobo tries to make the simulated layers into own fixed cloudtypes.
I know this is a topic of the opacity but i think they needed to tune down the density to make the fixed comulus type of clouds not shown as volcanic ashes. And that type of clouds is really repetive since su7.
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While I do appreciate that cloud density (and distant cloud drawing) has improved in the most recent SUs (since December), I am still so disappointed to see that live weather is so poor compared to how it worked prior to SU5.
At launch we were told about how the weather system supports up to x cloud layers (I canāt recall the exact number, but it was huge). I recall at launch the wonder of flying in a world with both amazing ground textures, and cloudscapes as well - it added a whole new dimension to the experience (and Asobo was clearly aware of this, as their weather discovery series video focused on how different the same spot in the simulator feels in different weather conditions).
All that has now gone, and I was only reminded of it today when I switched to weather presets for the first time in ages. Once Iād added several layers of clouds (and stratus-like low level clouds at that) the lighting and shadowing of the sim engine came to life, and made the world look entirely realistic ā something Iād not experienced in the sim in an embarrassingly long time.
I love this simulator, and what has been created. I use it almost daily, but itās really crushing to see one of the very best aspects of it at launch be a mere shadow of itself nearly three years after launch.
I understand that performance concerns likely led Asobo to simplify the sky scape, but please, please at least bring it back as an option for those of us who have the hardware to cope with it!
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Exact same feeling here. If not already done, check-out that other very good post in the wishlist to request better clouds in Live Weather: Improve clouds in Live Weather
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It should definitely be an option. This is not the game we had at launch. This is not the weather that has been advertised. I remember when I had my first flights to Greece (country that I love), I really had the feeling, the sensation, I was flying to that country. Now, wherever I flight, everything is likeā¦ Generic, empty.
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Could you notice better performance after su7 on xbox? Because i couldnāt notice better performance after su7 on pc. I canāt see the benefit of making the clouds worse because it didnāt increase performance at all for me.
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I couldnāt, nit that i had any major issues before su7 anyway 
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Would be cool to fly through the clouds and feel the effects on the wing.
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No - this situation is WAY more common than one might think.
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Piggybacking on all these posts, I wanted to show how the sim is actually capable of rendering AMAZING looking clouds, and if they somehow the āvolcanic ashā and perlin noisy look that these clouds get at density = 5.0, it would greatly improve the sim. Here are a few example video clips. These videos are all captured at 300 KT IAS with no speedup at a range of altitudes FL090-FL130. Ignore the clip artifacts as it happened when I did a merge of these clips on VLC.
MSFS Cloud Surfing Demo - Potential and Room for Improvement in Live weather - YouTube
Here are some thoughts on the clips:
- Notice how having the density at 5.0 and overcast clouds does not bring the sim to its knees. I am using a 3060Ti/9900k combo with 32GB RAM at 1080p so this is not a high end PC by todayās standards.
- We are able to get true IMC inside clouds, with some banding artifacts. The lighting model also makes it so that at certain times of day (mid-day and when the sun casts rays onto the cloud) the clouds start looking like volcanic ash. This is a previously reported issue ( Cloud Brightness Adjustment - Microsoft Flight Simulator (2020) - The AVSIM Community.
- Clouds density is heavily tied to the cloud top/bottom alts. This is seen in the end of that clip. I think cloud density should be a little less dependent on how big the layer is. Currently, live weather ends up getting translucent looking clouds during fair weather, and I suspect a lot of that is due to the estimated layer heights being injected directly from meteoblue data.
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Check this out. The problem is in the implementation. The engine itself is capable of achieving this, but live weather hardly ever gets you such visuals. The weather/cloud rendering system needs a major overhaul, which hasnāt come in 2 years. Simmers generally care more about this than new buildings and eye candy in random cities.
MSFS Cloud Surfing Demo - Potential and Room for Improvement in Live weather - YouTube
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Yep! Thatās true! And for the same reason we donāt get turbulence in live weather generated clouds!
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Thank you for sharing this video! This is how I remember the live weather clouds in the early months of MSFS, and is also most similar to any real world video of flying into and through clouds.
The concept of cloud density is misused in this sim. I believe they wanted to achieve the āwhispyā look, but the appearance of clouds, especially low and middle clouds, is pretty much binary. Thereās a cloud, or is not. The density could define the amount of liquid water and its effects to the aircraft performance, but visually, the clouds should be much more material than they are presently.
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Hey guys
I have made another, more detailed video describing the issues Iāve noticed in the weather depiction system. Thinking about posting this on other threads as well to get a convo goingā¦
Please check it out and let the devs know your thoughts. I really hope the developers see our posts and give their thoughts on these issues. Weather is super important, and I feel like the devs are so close to getting it just right.
Microsoft Flight Simulator Weather Depiction in 2023 - The Good, The Bad and Some Suggestions - YouTube
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