Hello from Bad Raven

Hi, I'm Dave, a retired engineer from the currently quite soggy SE UK. My user name is the letters of my name rearranged, BTW. You'll also see me elsewhere as "Bravedan", again a Spoonerism, but that only resulted in me being called Dan, even with a signature at end, and Raven is the english meaning of my surname.........   

Used to be a prolific freeware content creator for Microsoft Train Simulator, then played around a bit with Clearview and FMS. Hoping P5 lives up to the hype and you really can make things.  

I have done quite a few sceneries, some from Creative Commons Panoramas, some converted for my own use only from other Sims (which I own).

The process for basic scenery files I have been using is to take a commonly available 8k x sub 4k rectangular Pano, add to the base to get the full proportions for Phoenix horizon at 50/50, then use Leo's Flight Sim to convert to 6 view cubic, then put that into Creator and add the contact planes and objects. Pretty crude but all I had time for really!!   

Dave, I want to create a 3d panorama for my clubs patch. I made a panoramic head and im in the process of trying to find some time to get there and take the pictures. Im aware about parallel axis issue and the camera is setup correctly so the pics won't distort while I take the pictures to stich them together. I'm planning to use huggin to stitch the panoramic pictures. This is as far as I know and read in phoenix guides regarding up to v4. I was wondering if you can please help a bit with what I need to do next? I read about this alpha channel but
Have no idea what the heck this is..

Well, hello and welcome to you, too............     

Don't worry about alpha channels yet, you have other things to take account of, and we don't yet know how P5 will change things!!

Firstly, it is VITAL that you choose good lighting conditions, no haze, sunny but no deep black shadows, and conditions that will maintain as unchanged as possible for the duration of the picture taking.

Does your club patch pilots position face square down sun, at least, at a time you can shoot when on-one else is around?..........FAR too many of the Phoenix sites are "into sun" so the plane is a silhouette and the contrast is shot, avoid that at all costs!

Someone did a set for one of my clubs patches, but the day chosen was as flat and uninteresting as a cold pancake, it made everything else double difficult and the end result was disappointing.

Getting a decent balanced set is harder than it looks!! Good Luck.

Nice to meet you Dave, welcome aboard, and thank you for taking part in helping us out with your knowledge.