Friday 2010-01-22 Screenshots AND Discussion Thread

[SlipBall]

I think that any shaking in a aircraft you are keenly aware of just because you are off the ground and out of your environment. In my case being shaken always triggered fear and rapid mental assessment.

[ZaltysZ]

Originally Posted by Skoshi Tiger

As stated before (and after) by a few people our brains tend to make us ignore the bad effect, my point is that when we try to concentrate on the gun sights this would be one of the times when it would be noticable. You would need to keep your head in a relatively fixed position (within the viewing angle of the refector sight) and thats when you'ld notice the movement.

It is not that hard with reflector sight, but with iron sight it is. Rise of Flight combined with TrackIR gives good feeling how hard it is to align sights for precise shots while maneuvering and constantly looking around. However, this is true only if you don't use any "magic" button to center the camera.

Eyes (or brains) don't filter the movements in sense of image processing. Instead, they are stabilized on the point where you look. This is possible due to vestibular system, which allows us to feel rotation and linear acceleration. This system allows us to feel when we fall, are pushed, turned and etc. (it even helps us to walk in complete darkness). Also, it sends signals to eyes, so that eyes will compensate for head movement and turn towards the point we want to look at.

Magnitude of effect depends on individual, but in case of vertigo (i.e. too much spinning) stabilization of eyes might become less effective or completely off. So, after multiple barrel rolls you may temporary think that plane shakes much more than before.

[airmalik]

Originally Posted by Skoshi Tiger

I must say I'm a bit jelous and would love to see some of your footage.

Please check your PM.

I went out flying again to see exactly how turbulence looks like from a light plane - hey anything for research

It's quite smooth flying in the winter so it took a while to find turbulent air. Wasn't too bumpy but I noticed that at times there was enough shaking to make reading the instrument panel difficult but at the same time if I looked outside, it wasn't difficult to focus on any particular spot.

Looking at the spitfire video again, it seems to be similar in the respect that the view outside isn't as bumpy as the interior. Of course that also has to do with the proximity of the cockpit to the pilot but I think it's closer to reality than I thought previously. I guess while flying I'm mostly looking out and don't notice the shaky interior except when I'm consciously trying to read the instruments.

cheers!

[ZaltysZ]

Originally Posted by Skoshi Tiger

I have my pilots licences (though it has been a few years since I flew last) and in my opinion the head shake is probably under modeled if anything.

Modeling of head shake is harder to do than it may look. You can't simply shake camera in the same way as real head is shaken, because then you will get a feeling that it shakes too much. It will be so, because in reality eyes can compensate for the movement of head, but in game they can't as we don't move of course and see only shaking picture. The simple example is the book reading in the car. Despite you can still read it while car is moving, you won't be able to read it in the video, if it has been filmed by high speed high resolution camera attached to your head.

Head shake is almost always lowered down in sims for simulation of eyes compensation and sake of playability. I would say, we should not be concerned about it too much until we get a chance to test it in game. Videos do not depict such things well.

[HFC_Dolphin]

I'm not an expert in real flying, but I think that the shaking we saw in the video was caused because of change of flaps and hard stick movements· maybe in connection with some strong wind.

Anyway, Luthier can explain better as he was the one flying in this video.
Nevertheless, it's pretty obvious that everything is still under heavy tweaking and that SoW team will need our opinion in such matters mostly during beta period. (That's why, after all, this was not an official video release.)

[HFC_Dolphin]

By the way, please keep in mind that especially about WW2 planes' behaviour, Oleg has excellent feedback by a real pilot who's actually flying these birds.
I know the man and I'm sure we can rest assured that he knows what to tell to Oleg and Team.
I'm also sure that Oleg and Team can implement all good feedback in the game. They can do it better than anyone else in the game industry.

Let's wait a bit for official video releases.

[Insuber]

Originally Posted by HFC_Dolphin

I'm not an expert in real flying, but I think that the shaking we saw in the video was caused because of change of flaps and hard stick movements· maybe in connection with some strong wind.

Anyway, Luthier can explain better as he was the one flying in this video.
Nevertheless, it's pretty obvious that everything is still under heavy tweaking and that SoW team will need our opinion in such matters mostly during beta period. (That's why, after all, this was not an official video release.)

+1!

And add to that the engine vibrations at some point. So, exaggerated or not, I'd like to think that we have something nice and original modeled there (turbulence under clouds, engine vibrations, high G stutter), requiring tweaking and fine tuning maybe. Don't look at the finger, look at the moon instead ... .

Regards,
Insuber

[airmalik]

Originally Posted by Skoshi Tiger

Hey everyone is entitled to their opinions.

I have my pilots licences (though it has been a few years since I flew last) and in my opinion the head shake is probably under modeled if anything.

Heres a small video from a head cam in a light plane doing aerobatics

Hand held/head mounted cameras always exaggerate the amount of shaking. I've tried simple mounts on the wing strut and landing gear and it's always a struggle to get steady footage. Hand held cameras aren't much better unless the cameraman is very good at damping the little bumps felt while flying but not necessary 'seen'. The lens in this video isn't very wide angle which helps. Just yesterday I was out flying (ultralight) with a friend who was shooting video from the right seat and while editing that video I had to junk pretty much every clip where he tried to zoom even a little. Even at the widest angle the video was shaky at times. The amount of shake in the video was NOTHING like I experienced while flying. So I don't think that camera footage can be used to determine the amount of shake we should see in flight sims.