Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 Photogrammetry
The Curse of Photogrammetry
Photogrammetry is a process of laser scanning 3D objects and using that data to model those objects.
Great idea in theory but in the context of Microsoft Flight Simulator... terrible!
I am in the process of labelling all the missions in MiGMan’s World Tour which fly over photogrammetry. This will help you decide whether to turn it on or off before flight.
Why it breaks the immersion
- It looks terrible up close.
- It is a FRAME RATE KILLER. I can't say that too loudly. The auto-gen scenery works extremely well and is relatively light on the data.
- In most cases photogrammetry never completes loading,
- Data. To put it in perspective, the data loaded for just city in PG would load every lighthouse in the entire world using the perfectly good 3D models. And in practice you only NEED to load one lighthouse at a time.
Examples
Olympic stadium and grounds, Munich.Guess which stadium is rendered by photogrammetry and which is a 3D model?
Telstra Tower in Canberra, Australia. Photogrammetry ON.
Telstra Tower in Canberra, Australia. Photogrammetry OFF. The POI is still present.
Federal Parliament in Canberra, Australia with photogrammetry on.
Photogrammetry off. In this case it turns out that the building was PG, not POI.Turn it off?
- The sim doesn't substitute autogen at the same level as is present in non-photogrammetry areas.
- Asobo's beautifully hand crafted 3D models also disappear. | EDIT: 2023 It turns out this is NOT the case, PG is already decoupled from POI.
Or at least delay the implementation of PG into the sim until the hardware and infrastructure is able to cope with this massive data impost.
The year 2063 would be good (Microsoft Flight Sim's 80th anniversary).