What a tracer should look like (before spazzing just look).

[klem]

taka taka taka taka taka ...

you're dead.

Serves you right for studying those streaks instead of your tail.
This has to be the umpteenth thread on this over-taxed subject. It isn't likely to change. Check the other threads.

[Sammi79]

Originally Posted by SYN_Bliss

Most of the ammunition that the British used did not leave a smoke trail. The "vapor" trail that you see in some gun cam footage happens because of an atmospheric condition and not the round itself. Again, this only happened when the atmospheric conditions were correct for it. That's why you can see RAF gun cams with and without smoke/vapor trails.

Ahh, Ok thankyou for enlightening me on that. could still argue it should be present in game.

Originally Posted by SYN_Bliss

2ndly the guns were more firmly fixed in warbirds than any modern day turret.

Yes I agree, but the warbird itself is certainly not firmly fixed and would vibrate quite a lot (even the airframe itself can and will flex) especially when firing heavier calibre cannons and such. Like I say is very apparent in not just a few but every single piece of gun camera footage you can find. The rounds should spread more. ATM they don't seem to spread at all, or just barely. I guess this could be a flight model issue though as opposed to a bullet model. Maybe the plane just needs to shake more...

Originally Posted by SYN_Bliss

As far as the dot thing goes, when you have an offset (guns are on either side of you converging) that's when you'll see streaks of light, and guess what?.., with wing mounted machine guns, they are heavily offset from your POV.

No, really? I'm not getting that, could you explain it again? no need to be patronising SYN_Bliss. Even you must admit that they are too long though.

Originally Posted by SYN_Bliss

All the physics in the world does not change how they appear simply because you are not calculating in the fact that you are flying and maintaining the same speed and distance as the weapons themselves on the plane. You might as well be standing still. That's why the rounds start arcing to the eye under extreme forces. And this is evident in game.

All rounds arc in reality its due to gravity and friction. As the friction with air slows the round down, gravity changes its trajectory more and more. No fired round ever followed a straight line. ever. period. Across a distance of more than a few hundred yards, this would be apparent, particularly looking down the direction of travel, unless you have a very high muzzle velocity then it would take a greater distance, but still.

[ATAG_Bliss]

Originally Posted by winny

If the path of the dot of light (relative to the viewer) is curved then the streak must also be curved. Put your BSME into practice and demonstrate to me how what is essentially a continuous curved line that fades away can leave repeated straight lines that don't point to where they came from behind it?

I'm getting personal because no matter what I show or tell you, you still don't listen.

Take a light source, say a laser pen light with a room full of smoke and point it towards something 5 ft away in a fixed position, so you can see the beam of light. Now have this light pattern repeat very rapidly. As this light source is switched on and off it will not matter one IOTA where you are standing or viewing the light. It will always be in a straight line UNLESS, you got hit by a freight train or decided to pull a few G's out of your butt while standing still. Your eye's WILL ALWAYS SEE THIS LINE AS STRAIGHT.

That is simple physics. You may see the line shorter or at a different angle depending on your viewing angle but viewing the trajectory of said moving object that produces the light trajectory will always be viewed in the in the same direction and trajectory that said object is traveling. (UNLESS as stated above)

If you can't understand that, then you need to take a remedial science class. Or you could quite simply fire and observe 1000's of rounds of tracer ammunition from fixed and high speed moving positions.

[ATAG_Bliss]

Originally Posted by Sammi79

Yes I agree, but the warbird itself is certainly not firmly fixed and would vibrate quite a lot (even the airframe itself can and will flex) especially when firing heavier calibre cannons and such. Like I say is very apparent in not just a few but every single piece of gun camera footage you can find. The rounds should spread more. ATM they don't seem to spread at all, or just barely. I guess this could be a flight model issue though as opposed to a bullet model. Maybe the plane just needs to shake more...

You'd be surprised at how little shake a .303 round would have on an being fired from a heavy warbird let alone just hip firing that same machine gun.

SYN_Bliss. Even you must admit that they are too long though.

Actually, in same cases, they may be too short, but I think what they have now is good middle ground.

All rounds arc in reality its due to gravity and friction. As the friction with air slows the round down, gravity changes its trajectory more and more. No fired round ever followed a straight line. ever. period. Across a distance of more than a few hundred yards, this would be apparent, particularly looking down the direction of travel, unless you have a very high muzzle velocity then it would take a greater distance, but still.

Now this is patronizing, but has nothing to do with the discussion. The only point of the arc we care about is the miniscule amount that you'll actually see while a tracer is moving (which funny enough, you can't even see!). If you only see a 5ft section of movement till it disappears from leaving the weapon to out of visual range,.,... that 5ft section (streak of light) following the round will always appear perfectly straight because in the short time frame of the tracer you see (5ft) the trajectory drop is so insignificant it's not even worth mentioning.

[Das Attorney]

Originally Posted by Sammi79

All rounds arc in reality its due to gravity and friction. As the friction with air slows the round down, gravity changes its trajectory more and more. No fired round ever followed a straight line. ever. period. Across a distance of more than a few hundred yards, this would be apparent, particularly looking down the direction of travel, unless you have a very high muzzle velocity then it would take a greater distance, but still.

This is true. If viewed long enough, it would be apparent that the trajectory of the bullet is curved (due to gravity).

However, the tracers in this game burn out mostly between 300 - 500 yards. During this initial distance, the tracers should appear roughly in a straight line. Even a .303 round (small fry in this sim) has sufficient energy to maintain a relatively flat flight path over the comparatively small distances they were used in by the RAF.

I think there is a tracer round that burns up to 800 yards, but I haven't tried it in game.

Anyway, it's a trifling point. The tracers in game do their job. I'm not too bothered if there are any inaccuracies. I'd much prefer them to fix the sound issues etc!

[Wolf_Rider]

Originally Posted by yellonet

The human eye have the equivalent shutter speed of 1/60 s.
If you set a video camera to record with that shutter speed it should result in video that shows approximately what one would see in person.

that, with respect, is just plain wrong... the MKI Eyeball has no shutter and sees in fluid capture.

you run a CRT monitor refreshrate at (min) 60 Hz and FPS (similar to a shutter but in reverse, to avoid getting eyestrain/ headache from the flickering screen

Originally Posted by SYN_Bliss

That's why the rounds start arcing to the eye under extreme forces. And this is evident in game.

actually, the stream will arc physically if the barrel tip is being moved about at a great manner, such as in deflection shooting, or "hosing" down a target with a GAU... but only in relation to the round fired immediately after (the same as "hosing" off the front path and seeing what the water stream does as the nozzle is moved about) But, in any case, the tracers still are straight and the round still flies straight (taking into account, as mentioned earlier, gravity, projectile launch power, and atmospheric conditions)

[yellonet]

Originally Posted by Wolf_Rider

that, with respect, is just plain wrong... the MKI Eyeball has no shutter and sees in fluid capture.

Yes. That's why I said equivalent of shutterspeed...

Originally Posted by Wolf_Rider

you run a CRT monitor refreshrate at (min) 60 Hz and FPS (similar to a shutter but in reverse, to avoid getting eyestrain/ headache from the flickering screen

And 60 Hz is used as that is the limit of human "shutterspeed", 1/60 s.

[yellonet]

The thing is that under the right circumstances the light streak will bend. And as with all tracer streaks it's not really happening but is only an illusion that occurs in the eye of the beholder so to speak.

No one is talking about bullet trajectory - the trajectory could be straight as a laser, the discussed effect would still occur.

And unless you have experience flying an aircraft and firing loads of tracers in sharp turns any amount of firing tracers from fixed positions will not get you to observe the phenomenon, so that experience is for this discussion completely inconsequential.

I for one would really like to see the effect in the game as it would probably look really good from external views.

[Wolf_Rider]

There is no "equivalent" to shutterspeed or anything like your train of thought there, yellonet, for the human eye. The human eye does not have a shutter.
All that lovely flowing milk, etc, you see in tv adverts, is usually shot at up around 300 ~ 500 frames/ second and sync'd.
Light doesn't bend, except supposedly under extreme magnetic influence... you're confusing afterimage in relation to the eye and the round's velocity... as for the human eye can following the round, I have seen Samurai slice an oncoming bullet in half with a katana but that is in an exceptional circumstance after dedicated training.

the tracer streak doesn't bend, twist, distort or anything, yellonet... the stream does, but not the individual streaks

[winny]

Originally Posted by SYN_Bliss

I'm getting personal because no matter what I show or tell you, you still don't listen.

Take a light source, say a laser pen light with a room full of smoke and point it towards something 5 ft away in a fixed position, so you can see the beam of light. Now have this light pattern repeat very rapidly. As this light source is switched on and off it will not matter one IOTA where you are standing or viewing the light. It will always be in a straight line UNLESS, you got hit by a freight train or decided to pull a few G's out of your butt while standing still. Your eye's WILL ALWAYS SEE THIS LINE AS STRAIGHT.

That is simple physics. You may see the line shorter or at a different angle depending on your viewing angle but viewing the trajectory of said moving object that produces the light trajectory will always be viewed in the in the same direction and trajectory that said object is traveling. (UNLESS as stated above)

If you can't understand that, then you need to take a remedial science class. Or you could quite simply fire and observe 1000's of rounds of tracer ammunition from fixed and high speed moving positions.

A Laser beam is physical, tracer streak is not, it's an effect. You cannot compare. As you already said, tracer rounds are dots not beams of light. Different.

You need to take the basic science class not me. If the tracer left a trail of smoke that would be straight no matter what becuse it actually exists. Tracer streak can only exist when it's being viewed. It's not 'there' all the time. It's a dot, or is it a circle or is it 2 circles on top of each other?

You are all over the place. Trajectory is an objects path in a 3d space and we're not dealing in 3d.

Have you ever seen the wobbly pencil trick where you take a real pencil and move it up and down in such a way that it appears to bend? It must be real magic to you...