Stars too close?

I was flying at night in VR (Reverb G2) for the first time. I believe the stars are not located in the 3D space as they should be at the infinity, but much closer, like 10NM. I perceive their location much closer than the hills surrounding the airport (LOWS).
Moreover the stars should be a point light sources (just a single pixel) while they are a kind of rectangular blobs in the sim, way too big.

Probably a reason for it, like antialiasing, resampling, VR downscaling etc, but you are right, stars should be single sharp pixels.

or earth is flat and stars are just projected against the dome… :joy:

3 Likes

Filed this bug a while back, but no response. The ‘squareness’ is likely just due to downscaling though.

Yes, very annoying, in special because its soo good implemented in 2D.

Please fix this!

1 Like

I vote for this topic too!

I don’t believe they are, on the contrary and here is why:

  • FS2020 is using a texture projected on a dome.
    .
    It is clear you can’t have enough pixels in the projected texture otherwise it will be massive a texture size. This approach to night stars is typical to games.

  • Because it is a texture it doesn’t take in account magnitude either.
    .
    In a simulator like X-Plane stars are point lights and the magnitude is simulated as well, so that you only see what you’d see IRL depending on the ambient luminosity too… To each his own.


For those wondering, and Asobo, the XP11 file with the data is plain text:
X-Plane11\Resources\default data\earth_astro.data

It has about 25000 stars in the form:
Ascension Declination Magnitude [name]

The file starts like this:

I

740 Version - build 1795, metadata StarXP740 Copyright © 2004, Robin A. Peel (robinp@mindspring.com).   This data is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.  This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU General Public License for more details.  You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program ("AptNavGNULicence.txt"); if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.  

 6.752569 -16.713143  -1.43 Sirius
 6.399192 -52.695718  -0.62 Canopus
14.261208  19.187270  -0.10 Arcturus
14.661361 -60.835147   0.01 Rigel Kentaurus A
18.615607  38.782993   0.03 Vega
 5.242298  -8.201639   0.18 Rigel
 7.655149   5.227508   0.38 Procyon
 1.628542 -57.236660   0.45 Achernar
 5.919525   7.407036   0.45 Betelgeuse
14.063735 -60.372978   0.61 Hadar
 5.278138  45.999029   0.71 Capella
12.443317 -63.099056   0.77 Acrux
19.846301   8.867385   0.77 Altair
 4.598667  16.509762   0.85 Aldebaran
 5.277851  46.006709   0.96  
13.419890 -11.161245   0.98 Spica
16.490130 -26.431946   1.06 Antares
 7.755379  28.026310   1.14 Pollux
22.960785 -29.621837   1.16 Fomalhaut
12.795366 -59.688732   1.25  
20.690532  45.280334   1.25 Deneb
14.660942 -60.839471   1.34 Rigel Kentaurus B
10.139572  11.967195   1.36 Regulus
 6.977096 -28.972089   1.50 Adhara
12.519425 -57.112569   1.59  
17.560146 -37.103748   1.62 Shaula
 5.418852   6.349735   1.64 Bellatrix
 5.438194  28.607873   1.65 Alnath
 9.220067 -69.717472   1.67  
 5.603559  -1.201917   1.69 Alnilam
 5.679312  -1.942578   1.74 Alnitak
22.137188 -46.960616   1.74 Alnair
 8.158876 -47.336612   1.75  
12.900454  55.959843   1.76 Alioth
 3.405375  49.861243   1.79 Mirphak
18.402874 -34.384315   1.79 Kaus Australis
11.062177  61.751119   1.81 Dubhe
 7.139857 -26.393208   1.83  
13.792374  49.313303   1.85 Alkaid
 8.375240 -59.509538   1.86  
17.621979 -42.997822   1.86  
 5.992158  44.947435   1.90  
16.811074 -69.027635   1.91  
 6.628528  16.399415   1.93 Alhena
 7.576668  31.888636   1.94 Castor
20.427458 -56.734881   1.94  
 2.529743  89.264138   1.97 Polaris
 6.378330 -17.955917   1.98  
 9.459792  -8.658683   1.99 Alphard
 2.119524  23.462777   2.00 Hamal
10.332823  19.841860   2.01 Algieba
 8.745055 -54.708568   2.02  
 0.726452 -17.986684   2.04 Diphda
 1.162166  35.620830   2.05 Mirach
18.921088 -26.296594   2.05 Nunki
14.111479 -36.368696   2.06  
 0.139769  29.090828   2.07 Alpheratz
 5.795941 -9.669602   2.07 Saiph
14.845110  74.155476   2.07 Kochab
22.711093 -46.884566   2.07  
17.582224  12.560576   2.08 Rasalhague
 3.136147  40.955651   2.09 Algol
 2.064978  42.329848   2.10  

format is: Astronomical data (astro.dat) File Format Specification - X-Plane Developer

You can even edit this file in any text editor and add your own geometric figures… I never thought about this one until now :joy:

1 Like

Is this issue already adressed?

I had a flight in VR this evening, and was surprised to see the stars in front of the clouds. And looking crazily close. Very distracting, and clumsy looking.

I have experienced the same, stars are in front of the clouds. It’s really annoying.
Furthermore the Moon is much bigger in VR than is real world. There is another topic about this.
If you agree with me, please vote there too: Moon is too big in VR - #19 by Neo4316

The funniest is that planes in the sky are BEHIND the stars. This is a real brainfu** in VR. :sweat_smile:

I also saw the Moon behind the stars. Just tried one time and that was with SU4.

I hope this gets fixed soon. Really annoying in dark VR nights. :scream:

Lets give it up to the Night Sky in MSFS :wink: (image may or may not be retouched a bit to make a point)

Can we get some more votes to get a starlight magnitude slider into the game? I

Bump…luve how msfs jars some topics and prevents users from mentioning it og bringing it to light by deleting posts about the matter that are more to the point… what a joke… anyway… still here, still trying to drag this topic up from the bottum of the sea :slight_smile:

1 Like