Simviation Forums

I seem to remember discussing being able to fix this on a particularly nice P-40 a while back, but I can't remember how it was done.  I think it was something to do with the zoom on it.  Any thoughts on this, anyone?

ok that looks like an LOD problem.. seems to me that it loaded the lowest LOD model..
no idea how to fix it mind you but its a hand if anyone else knows anything about probs with lod's.

dan.

LODs (as far as I know) are part of the model, so it probably isn't possible to fix this without getting the source files.  I've run into this a few times, and it has always irked me.

LOD stands for Level Of Detail.

In the aircraft's source file, every part has its own name or tag.

Advanced 3D modelers would choose to make several copies of several important pieces [wings, fueslage, and tail section].

Each piece would have something like this as its name:

my_piece_LOD_100
my_piece_LOD_500
and so on.

The number will indicate how many maximum pixels [on your screen] it will take to show the rendered pieces. For example. If a piece in GMAX is name with LOD_100, that piece will apear in FS whenever it's size [across the screen] is 100 pixels or less. If its size across the screen exceeds 100 pixels, the next copy of the same piece with a higher value will be shown and the one with the lower value will disappear.

This method is used by advanced 3D modelers so that the farther the visual model is from your sight, the less detail it will be. Thus, improving frame rates.

However, I could be wrong about this. If I am right, then I made the best d@mu guess.

From what I see, you're using a Combat Flight Simulator aircraft in Flight Simulator 2004 [a non-CFS type]. Therefore, FS9 is probably having trouble rendering such a model built for CFS. FS2002 had this problem as well, because I used to fly that exact same aircraft that you have in FS2002.

If you had the source file, you would then alter its LOD value for each piece so that the visual model wouldn't look so 2D when you view it up-close.