Hey guys, you may have seen my post on r/fightsim, or my recent collaboration with Ry4nFlint on Machmell. I just wanted to give a quick update on the progress with Niagara since people have been asking.
First of all, though I had planned to use photogrammetry from Google to make this more easy, upon looking into licensing further and finding that I couldn’t reasonably follow Google’s guidelines, I have decided to do the necessary modelling myself.
This decision, of course, comes with some advantages and some drawbacks. The first drawback is that it’s going to take longer than expected. I wasn’t exactly fluent in 3D modelling before this so I’ve had to give myself a crash-course. That said, I think the results are good enough for what I need to accomplish here. The main advantage to making these models myself is that I can more easily get them to mesh with MSFS and the scenery that is already present. However, with how much time I’ve put into this I’m heavily considering making it payware (still very cheap, like $1, let me know if you guys would be alright with that).
Alright, with all that out of the way, here are some screenshots to show my progress. This is by no means the final product and I’m doing my best with the SDK to get everything to blend nicely, that said, this is a before and after of what it looks like with some simple masking and dropping in the current versions of my models.
This community - the MSFS community, specifically - never ceases to amaze me. Experts in coding, design, navigation, liveries, flight plans, etc, etc… It really is quite impressive. Can we get an expert working on the water-masking issue, too? Don’t worry; I’m just being cheeky. Great work on Niagra, btw - looking good!
I was hoping the marketplace would not be dominated by only by large companies but also individual developers looking not only to contribute but also make some money on the side.
I would buy your finished product in the marketplace.
Excellent work on Niagra. Looking really forward to this when it you release it… But I need to give you a hint of advice… Now that you are able to accomplish this with Niagra, I really think you are not thinking big enough… Don’t go for a $1 payware for Niagra… Think rather about creating a product called “Waterfalls of the world”. Look for say the top 50 waterfalls in the world and model those… Then you can charge $15-$20 for the whole package!!!
I think you will have the whole community eating out of your hands!!
Top waterfalls that come to mind are
Niagra
Victoria falls
Iguazu falls (south America)
Angel falls etc…
Here is a link to the top 10 out there… Would be awesome if you could consider this… Awesome for you financially and amazing for the flight sim community…
By the way, is there a way to animate the water falling?
I’ll think about what you said about the larger package. on animating the waterfalls, unfortunately I haven’t found a way to do that with the default SDK. It may become possible down the road with a plugin for example, but as of right now I don’t think so. However, I think something that is much more attainable and will make these look better is particle effects, such as mist at the base of the falls. I’m looking into this and it seems achievable, so that’s the direction I’m headed in.
I agree, mist would look much better than the hard white smooth textures at the base of the falls. At the moment I think the base looks too harsh and breaks the emmersion and needs to either be more textured to look like moving water or otherwise lots of mist particles to soften.
Hope you will think long and hard about my suggestion of Waterfalls of the World… … It’s a clear gap in the sim right now, just waiting for someone to seize the opportunity.
A guy did a thing like this back in MSFS 9or FSX, can’t recall. Amazingly it was freeware and he corrected and animated dozens of waterfalls all over the globe. There was Niagara Falls, one in Venezuela called Angel Falls, etc.
The animation included the water moving over and down falls along with spray at the bottom.
Take my suggestion for what it is but contact Asobo and see about getting this either as a core fix to the sim or allowing you to be on their marketplace and get an official release. I think you will be better in the long run based on their business model.
I’ve applied to be a marketplace partner, but based on my limited portfolio I doubt I’ll be approved. the fact is these types of fixes have always been provided by community add-ons.
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