Project Orbiter Blue Marble

[EndeavourCmdr]

So as some of you know, I used to work on addons for Orbiter a long time ago. My pride and joy was the Orbiter Atmospheric Visual Enhancement, way back in the day, and it is still like the 10th most downloaded addon of all time for Orbiter (about 26,000 downloads on OH).

I've been hit by the modding bug again. While flying in Moach's excellent G42 spaceplane, I suddenly realized that I am still very disappointed by the level of detail on planet Earth. This prompted me to install the Orbitersim Landsat level 10 Earth, which was definitely an improvement, even though lower in resolution.

But, while flying, I was still unhappy, and set out to see if I could just make my own. At this time, I would say that I am about 1/20th of the way done, but enough so that I have something to show.

So, below are going to be linked some images to the work in progress. I'd like to see A: If there is interest enough in me spending my next 30 nights working on this, and B: If Orbiter will be able to support such a high resolution Earth. The resolution that I am working with ends up being 86,400 x 43,200. I am having to break this into a series of local high resolution tiles, which I will end up stitching together in Orbiter, IF it can handle this level of detail.

For the first image, just a shot of the tiles in one of my WIP folders.

The next image is a zoom in of the Mexican peninsula, which I am sure that we have all seen hundreds of times on our way through re-entry to the Cape.

And finally, a zoom in on that region. This image shows the kind of detail that you will be able to expect in this Earth texture upgrade / addon, again, as long as Orbiter will be able to handle it...

Well, that's all for now. Let me know if there is enough interest in this project to make it tie up my PC for a few weeks =) (I hope there is.)

EndeavourCmdr.

 

[NovaSilisko]

Oh man, I can't wait! Think it would be possible to make an ultra high resolution cloud map as well? I've never been able to find a good one.

 

[ED_4]

That's good. But does that kind of detail start showing how clear the cities are when over them? What sort of detail will we have when we are indeed over those cities? Is it only good when flying far?

 

[EndeavourCmdr]

Do you mean that you would like to see what detail you will see over a city? I can get a quick screengrab of that and post it if you like? I think there are a few clearly visible ones in the dataset that I have done.

 

[Frogisis]

That's beautiful - I'm sure a lot of people here will be spending even more time in LEO.

 

[NovaSilisko]

That's beautiful - I'm sure a lot of people here will be spending even more time in LEO.

Especially when combined with the D3D11 client's new atmosphere...

 

[Cras]

Oh man, I am excited. I am looking forward to this.

 

[EndeavourCmdr]

Okay in response to Ed-4's question, here is a screen grab showing the detail of the Dallas / Houston / New Orleans region.

It's not "Google Maps" level of detail, but I think it's a major improvement over what we've got.

 

[ED_4]

Do you mean that you would like to see what detail you will see over a city? I can get a quick screengrab of that and post it if you like? I think there are a few clearly visible ones in the dataset that I have done.

Yeah that would be good to know. Since much of what the Earth detail we see over cities don't seem to exist without a separate install of some other textures.

 

[Glider]

The resolution that I am working with ends up being 86,400 x 43,200. I am having to break this into a series of local high resolution tiles, which I will end up stitching together in Orbiter, IF it can handle this level of detail.

It is possible to make only L11 texture from 86400x43200 image without loss of details. Orbiter's L8 = 8192x4096, L9 = 16384x8192, L10 = 32768x16384, L11 = 65536x32768, L12 = 131072x65536, so Orbiter with DX7 client definitely can and already handle this level of details (L11/L14 Earth texture). There're also "True Marble" Earth textures which have resolution of 250m/px or 6371000*PI*2/250 = 160120x80060 so it is possible to make L12 from them. I've here a C++ program that I use for creation of L13-L11 planetary heightmaps and land cover maps that can generate orbiter texture from raw file that can be easily created from Blue Marble's 4 .PNG files. It should be possible to use it for diffuse textures too (if gray-scale PNG compression will be replaced by DXT1 ), but it will tooks about 3 hours (at least) for it to make L12 texture and about 10 hours for L13.:hmm:

Oh man, I can't wait! Think it would be possible to make an ultra high resolution cloud map as well? I've never been able to find a good one.

It is possible at least in graphics client, but I've not seen a cloud map with resolution more than L10 (32768x16384).

 

[EndeavourCmdr]

And see that is the part that I've never understood. If Orbiter has level 14 textures for Earth already, why do the base level 14's look so much LESS detailed than these, level 11 ones? Is it just a matter of balance and contrast in the stock textures, that they are too "washed out"? Even the level 10 ones from Orbitersim Landsat APPEAR more detailed than the level 14's. All I am saying is, considering the level of detail that I see in those "level 11's" that I posted, there is no way in heck that the default "level 14"s have 4x the resolution/

---------- Post added at 06:37 AM ---------- Previous post was at 06:28 AM ----------

Also, I'm looking into doing the 250m/px set instead. I am pretty sure that there aren't very many programs that can open those files for editing so I will have to code up something in C# to open and split the images into tiles for me. Shouldn't be too hard. I'll see if it's going to be feasilble, and if so, I'll go ahead with the level 12s.

---------- Post added at 06:55 AM ---------- Previous post was at 06:37 AM ----------

Well, good news. I went ahead and did some testing on the "True Marble" imagery, and it looks like I will indeed be able to make it into surface tiles. There are some "artifacts" in some of the images that make it a little strange, such as clouds that will end up being drawn onto the ground, and clearly visible areas where aerial photographs were overlaid into the images to cover gaps in coverage, HOWEVER, the quality is significantly high enough that I feel those flaws will be overshadowed by the visual appeal, so I will go ahead and use the True Marble images. Thanks for pointing it out Glider.

---------- Post added at 06:56 AM ---------- Previous post was at 06:55 AM ----------

Oh man, I can't wait! Think it would be possible to make an ultra high resolution cloud map as well? I've never been able to find a good one.

Working on this too, just for you.

 

[ED_4]

Since you say it looks sharper than that level 14 textures available to Orbiter. It would be good to also see what yours would look like inside Orbiter. Once you've found out if it is compatible with that degree of detail.

I still want to see what those ground textures look, that is up front and close. Like not the satellite image kind you already posted above. But something a lot closer. It would be nice if you could show what these would look in Orbiter itself. This way we can try to compare what yours has to offer. And what is already out there.

Try a 5000 ft distance to the textures on the ground. If you can spot an airport and then show those, that would be great. That way we can see if they are detailed enough that we can maybe use these textures enough to land on undesignated airports.

 

[EndeavourCmdr]

..That way we can see if they are detailed enough that we can maybe use these textures enough to land on undesignated airports.

I can already tell you that is a no. The maximum full resolution of these images is 250 meters/pixel. A major runway is only 50 or so meters wide. That would be 1/5th of a pixel on the image, which of course, would not exist. Sorry =/

 

[ED_4]

I can already tell you that is a no. The maximum full resolution of these images is 250 meters/pixel. A major runway is only 50 or so meters wide. That would be 1/5th of a pixel on the image, which of course, would not exist. Sorry =/

So, at best we'd only see the smudge of the runway? But not detailed enough that we'd be able to discern if it is a runway or not?

 

[EndeavourCmdr]

So, at best we'd only see the smudge of the runway? But not detailed enough that we'd be able to discern if it is a runway or not?

Here is a cut of the imagery showing Edwards air force base. I've circled it for you. So, I guess this means that Yes, some runways will be discernible.

 

[Spacethingy]

So this would be almost as detailed as the O2010 Florida coverage?! Like, wow!

 

[ED_4]

Here is a cut of the imagery showing Edwards air force base. I've circled it for you. So, I guess this means that Yes, some runways will be discernible.

Edwards Air Force Base is one of those places that has the longest of runways. Particularly if you count the dry lake bed runways. I would guess this was one of the reasons the shuttle made it as one of the best places to land.

 

[Ripley]

I'd LOVE to see this released!!!

OK, Orbiter is not about low-level gorgeous land graphics, but I can tell you that IF it gave a better (default) visual experience, many of my virtual squadron hardcore-flight-sim-junkies buddies would have done a more willingly transition, after years of "spoiling" eye-candy flight sims.

It would definitely help spread Orbiter (and all the "culture" that comes with its knowledge) even more.

For me it's GO!!
&

 

[N_Molson]

Just curious, how much space on hard drive would take L12 global textures ?

 

[orb]

And see that is the part that I've never understood. If Orbiter has level 14 textures for Earth already, why do the base level 14's look so much LESS detailed than these, level 11 ones?

Note that Orbiter's level 14 textures are just Florida, the rest of Earth is level 11. Earth isn't level 14, it's level 11+14 Florida. And are your textures already rescaled to level 11 (the original is level 11.5) and DXT compressed? Rescaling will remove some detail from them and converting to .tex (DXT compressed) will remove some more.