Cockpit glass scratches?

[scotchegg]

Something I really liked in Lock On was small scratches in the cockpit glass. Really helped the immersion. The glass in the COD cockpits seems too perfect, and I seem to recall they were added in a later patch in SOW.

Possible?

[furbs]

Yep, WOP also did this very well.

would love it for COD.

[Plt Off JRB Meaker]

Yes,totally agree,the scratches help the immersion for sure,the scratches in Lockon were superb,your right,hope youre reading Luthier.

[pupo162]

Something I really liked in Lock On was small scratches in the cockpit glass. Really helped the immersion. The glass in the COD cockpits seems too perfect, and I seem to recall they were added in a later patch in SOW.

Possible?

i remenber reading scratches were a result of aging glass. on a brand new, (days or week old plane) it would be unlikely for it to be worn out already.

[Das Attorney]

Maybe there should be more scratches as the 'Weathering' slider is increased.

[BigPickle]

Or maybe they should be added regardless of age of aircraft just for the immersion factor. Maybe its something that could be modded?

[Sammi79]

Before the realism police get in on this thread, I liked the look and feel of the scratches on wings of prey, but then, my car windshield is 6 years old now, and apart from a minor scratch on the passenger side from a loose chipping there are no physical marks visible on it anywhere. It gets dirty mind, but I don't think scratches are very realistic.

[Plt Off JRB Meaker]

Maybe there should be more scratches as the 'Weathering' slider is increased.

What a top idea Das.

[Flying Pencil]

Before the realism police get in on this thread, I liked the look and feel of the scratches on wings of prey, but then, my car windshield is 6 years old now, and apart from a minor scratch on the passenger side from a loose chipping there are no physical marks visible on it anywhere. It gets dirty mind, but I don't think scratches are very realistic.

Maybe there should be more scratches as the 'Weathering' slider is increased.


Aircraft "glass" is typically plastic, except for armored glass.

Plastic is easy to scratch, and would be awesome to have.

Armored windows is glass, and scratches, even nicks and spider chips, would be very unusual because rocks off of tiers do not fly up to 12,000 ft! ;)

[Timberwolf]

Armored Glass - scratches Plexiglass - Swirl marks

Wax and glass cleaner was used in 1940

I would rather hear a real engine of a 109 or spitfire then side track luthier on scratches

[Madfish]

Scratches in the glass are very easy to make though. Engine sounds are not necessarily easy to make (it takes a very good recording job or even worse, it takes a crazy amount of time to re-create sounds with just software)

And yes, all glass degrades, no matter what quality it is and the quality of glass back in 1940 wasn't even remotely comparable to todays standards in the automobile or aviation industy.

By the way, it's not just absurdly obvious scratches. A tiny amount of "texture" is probably what describes the issue best. CoD glass looks as if it's not even there. Anyone with real world experience knows that you will always be able to see a glass surface. due to very fidel textures and reflections. This is well done even in Wings of Prey but in CoD I don't feel imerged at all.

[Plt Off JRB Meaker]

Just a bit of useless info,the priority of the ritualstic cleaning of these
perspex canopies can't be expressed too much.

Apparently the perspex material could be scratched so easily,so much so,that the ground crews were given the softest cloths to clean them with ,as even wiping them unwittingly with a handkerchief could damage them.

After all you're life depended on the effeciency of you're search tfor the enemy through you're canopy.

(An exert from Spitfire at War by Alfred Price)

[Ekar]

+1.

[pupo162]

Scratches in the glass are very easy to make though. Engine sounds are not necessarily easy to make (it takes a very good recording job or even worse, it takes a crazy amount of time to re-create sounds with just software)

And yes, all glass degrades, no matter what quality it is and the quality of glass back in 1940 wasn't even remotely comparable to todays standards in the automobile or aviation industy.

By the way, it's not just absurdly obvious scratches. A tiny amount of "texture" is probably what describes the issue best. CoD glass looks as if it's not even there. Anyone with real world experience knows that you will always be able to see a glass surface. due to very fidel textures and reflections. This is well done even in Wings of Prey but in CoD I don't feel imerged at all.

good maintenence makes glass scratches unniticable.

i flew a 1946 plane with original glass, and it looked cristal clear.

AS opinion keep it as it is. its good.

[recoilfx]

good maintenence makes glass scratches unniticable.

i flew a 1946 plane with original glass, and it looked cristal clear.

AS opinion keep it as it is. its good.

But by your logic, we shouldn't have the current weathering effect on planes because good maintenance.

Scratches should appear more depending on the weathering slider.

[Plt Off JRB Meaker]

Yes,I would like to see the scratches appear more pronounced as weathering slider is moved up,I really like this idea.

[Cataplasma]

Aircraft "glass" is typically plastic, except for armored glass.

Plastic is easy to scratch, and would be awesome to have.

Armored windows is glass, and scratches, even nicks and spider chips, would be very unusual because rocks off of tiers do not fly up to 12,000 ft! ;)

Plexiglass (PMMA=Polymethylmethacrylate) was invented by army and used for the first time for spit's cockpit (with its typical thermoformed rounded shape).
The scratches that you see in Lock on are typical of modern PMMA cockpits.
Alcohol is very aggressive for PMMA, if you want to make some scratches on PMMA you just have to clean it.
Glass scratches are different and very rare to see on old glass cockpit's thikness.
The spit is the only plane that should have this "scratches", and also different clean-cut bullet's holes

[II./JG1_Wilcke]

That is why you have your ground crew, to blend the canopy Perspex and get those scratches out! Get them to work!

[pupo162]

But by your logic, we shouldn't have the current weathering effect on planes because good maintenance.

Scratches should appear more depending on the weathering slider.

your right. good idea.

[Ekar]

your right. good idea.

I like the effect in Wings of Prey. All it does really is give a slightly nicer impression that there's a medium between you and the sky. I had a go of WOP the other day and it was one of the first things I noticed, apart from the fact that cockpits are much more completely modeled in CloD.

[xnomad]

Plexiglass (PMMA=Polymethylmethacrylate) was invented by army and used for the first time for spit's cockpit (with its typical thermoformed rounded shape).
The scratches that you see in Lock on are typical of modern PMMA cockpits.
Alcohol is very aggressive for PMMA, if you want to make some scratches on PMMA you just have to clean it.
Glass scratches are different and very rare to see on old glass cockpit's thikness.
The spit is the only plane that should have this "scratches", and also different clean-cut bullet's holes

The 109 canopy is also plexiglass. There's even a section in the real Messerschmitt Emil manual about how to clean it without scratching it.

Glass was only used in the windscreen as armoured glass and that was introduced later on around the time of the F model and retrofitted to older E models.

[Madfish]

In my opinion not even the best glass in the world will ever be scratch free, at least I haven't seen it, not in moving objects like planes, trains or cars but even some buildings e.g. in dusty environments with strong winds.
I also think many are confusing this: In my post I said "give the glass some texture" and as we all know from physics there is no perfect surface. Even high tech mirrors do have a surface structure and a cockpit window is certainly not a high tech mirror in a vacuum and hermitically sealed environment.

The important message I want to convey here is that there are stains from water drops, dirt, smashed bugs, minor glass degradation, residue from various sources, even from the inside, e.g. touching the glass or just breathing. Did any of you really ever see a perfect surface without even some of this? Because I sure didn't.

There are countless sources for textured glass, not only hefty scratches. However, none of you will, hopefully, disagree that you can always see the canope glass. You don't just have to guess it's there - you can see it. This effect is produced by reflections and texture.

As such I must say I like the idea of a coupling with the aging slider but considering the hefty default aging I believe at least a little bit of realistic glass would be fine. Right now the glass is just perfect. As if it wouldn't have seen the real world at all. Not a single stain on it, nothing. Only a very slight reflection of sunlight.

Considering how they implemented those new sounds I really hope that the coming SDK's will make it possible or that they maybe think about this as I assume making a glass texture is much easier than re-doing the sounds and since you are in the cockpit 99% of the time it'd add a lot to the realism and imersion. :-P


Also I did a quick random search on youtube just to illustrate the point here and entered "warbird cockpit" and first result I got was this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=lE-F29kBjsE
Now this may not be the best maintained plane in the world but even so - it's what I would expect. You can clearly see the glass surface. As everything in this world it's just not perfect although you may never realize this unless you pay attention.

You can also see this beautifully in this video here, notice the tons of tiny scratches on the canope when the plane turns: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DiAIyX0l42M&hd=1

And I have yet to see proof of a scratch and stain free canope. Especially considering the crazy airflow that goes over it you'd have to expect it to get sandblasted by everything that gets caught up between propeller and the canope.

That said I would very much like to see some typical glass texture that could even be worsened depending on the aging slider setting. Bear in mind though that all pilots would still want to have vision so the effect of the aging slider should be mild. The reflection of the cockpit itself could eventually be a bit stronger though as it also provides much of what then leads to a recognition of the glass.

[Skoshi Tiger]

With visibility being a matter of life and death, and I'm not talking just about spotting an E/A, but just seeing out of the cockpit when headed into the sun. Even a small amount of grime or dirt can make it impossible to see out under the wong conditions.

I think the ground crews would have spent a very large ammount of time polishing those canopies. Also you see the photos of the planes with canopy covers to protect them between missions.

On the space shuttles the windows were polished with toothpaste after each mission to get rid of any scratches or blemishes. We're talking a bout hours of hand rubbing here!

A realistic weathering of the canopy would be Ok, but once the visiblilty reduced past a certain point no one in their right mind would fly in the plane.

Cheers!

[Madfish]

With visibility being a matter of life and death, and I'm not talking just about spotting an E/A, but just seeing out of the cockpit when headed into the sun. Even a small amount of grime or dirt can make it impossible to see out under the wong conditions.

I think the ground crews would have spent a very large ammount of time polishing those canopies. Also you see the photos of the planes with canopy covers to protect them between missions.

On the space shuttles the windows were polished with toothpaste after each mission to get rid of any scratches or blemishes. We're talking a bout hours of hand rubbing here!

A realistic weathering of the canopy would be Ok, but once the visiblilty reduced past a certain point no one in their right mind would fly in the plane.

Cheers!And that's the problem. You think the aircrews had the time to spend many hours on cleaning and hand rubbing with toothpaste but I don't. Do you actually seriously think that?
I simply don't believe the conditions of the planes were always perfect and I very much doubt they ever had the time to polish the canope with toothpaste for some hours while the planes literally fell apart, had failing engines, torn wings and other brute damages - all that while flying multiple sorties a day mind you. I really very much doubt that, sorry. If you can please elaborate what squadron had such a luxury then I'd be really interested.

Did you watch the video I posted? Do you believe the visibility is that bad? I think it's perfectly normal and all the pictures and videos I can find are similar.
The point is that right now it's completely unrealistic: The glass isn't there right now. The reflections are way to subtle. You would normally see them much stronger and there is no indication of even the smallest scratch. PC gamers are just too used to "perfect vision".
Maybe the only way to clear up this myth is to actually ask a veteran about it.

I'm not talking about a thick layer mud when I said stains or dirt by the way. I'm talking about micro scratches that are mostly only visible when under the right sunlight conditions and natural dirt grease that gathers relatively quickly - especially considering the weather conditions during take off mixed with some good ol smashed bugs.

The video I posted shows a very realistic image of the canopes I have seen. I haven't seen an unscratched one in my life. I don't think we should mix up warbirds during BoB with a space shuttle that sees one mission a year or less and has a service crew 100 times bigger than a whole squadron during BoB.