Prop effects: realism vs visual effect

[SlabsFly]

I am curious as to people’s thoughts on the sometimes greatly exaggerated stroboscopic effect on propellers.

In real life, even at SLOW idle of 600 RPM, a piston engine aircraft’s propeller rotates 10 times per second. At normal operating speed of 2,000+ RPM, propellers rotate more than 30 times per second: definitely no stroboscopic effect to be seen! Because our eyes are continuous analog “devices”, we really do not see blurred, partially rotated prop blades in real life. At best we see a faint disk. In the sim, in the interest of conveying speed and action I suppose, they have decided to depict how a digital device like a camera would record and display a rotating propeller, with wider or narrower blurred blades being stationary or moving forward or backward, and sometimes even flickering, depending on the RPM.

I suppose this does have the advantage of showing some perception/depiction of speed, but it is not realistic. I must admit I have mixed feelings about this. There certainly is some advantage in this depiction of rotation, but sometimes it can be exaggerated and borderline jarringly unrealistic. Especially from inside a single engine aircraft at cruise, I do find this a bit distracting.

I suspect that people’s opinions and preferences on this topic are likely to be divided. Should there be a wishlist item for enabling or disabling prop effects perhaps? Or (highly probable!) am I being too nitpicky?

[N3wTarg3t]

I agree with you and it should be fixed. I have been using VR propMod-Multipass which helps.

[MortThe2nd]

I don’t like it either. It’s an artifact of film, should not be in the sim because I have eyes, not cameras.

[N316TS]

There are a few Wishlist topics for this:

Calculate rotational blur (propellers, turbine fans, wheels) in code rather than texture

Ideally the simulator should render the blurred versions of rotating propellers, turbine fans, and wheels itself, programmatically. Once, when the aircraft is loaded. (In case it takes significant time, which I doubt, the result could be cached of course.) Does not seem like rocket science, but maybe I am missing something? I mean what is described in the Blur Meshes section in SDK Documentation ., and the Propeller Still / Slow / Blurred Mapping section in SDK Documentation . That the develop…

Propeller "strobing" Animation Incorrect

The propeller animation in the simulator is incorrect. It is animated as seen through a camera lens hence the strobing effect. The propeller disc should look more or less solid without all the strobing effect as seen through a camera lens. Never understood why devs put in effects like this. It’s in the same category as lens flares. They are only seen through a camera lens! I’d like this simulator to simulate what I would see with my own eyes, not through a camera. Thank you.

[SlabsFly]

Ouch, my bad! Very annoyed with myself that I missed those. Mods are welcome to close/merge

[N316TS]

Hi,
I can close it, but I don’t have to.
Just a heads up that priority for these types of things is based on vote count. Right now, neither of these topics has any substantial vote count. I would suggest voting for one or both topics, depending on what interests you.

[N6722C]

@MortThe2nd

I don’t like it either. It’s an artifact of film, should not be in the sim because I have eyes, not cameras.

1000% … same goes for some of the other Film & Photo effects that seem to have crept into the motion in the simulator.
If you really see the Sim World with the chromatic aberration displayed in this Flight Simulator, you certainly should not be flying.

ie The upper windows in the Hangar !! etc etc

[s0cks182]

@MortThe2nd

It’s an artifact of film, should not be in the sim because I have eyes, not cameras.

What if I’m using drone cam?

Honestly, for me, I couldn’t care less. It would be at like the bottom of the pile.

[N6722C]

Even the cheapest of RL Drone Cameras, have minimal Chromatic Aberation, certainly not noticeable on any typical drone camera portable viewing screen.

Its just extra, unnecessary processing, and waste of CPU & GPU resources, to add it in as part of a simulation, when it should not be there in the first place.