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Hi everyone, I was wondering if anyone knows the methods used by MapMFD to plot: a) ground tracks b) the horizon visible to the spacecraft c) the terminator between day/night (and the shading of the day/night areas) I guess for the ground track, it could perform a series of forward...

Hi! I haven't posted for a while, but I think this is a good place to ask this question! I'm interested in the maths behind how autopilots work. Right now I'm interested in programming something that will simulate a plane intercepting a localiser and flying along it towards a runway (for a...

Hi! I have a quick question about relative coordinates in a simulation of the solar system. Let's say I am simulating a spacecraft using an RK4 propagator in an environment containing the Sun, the Earth and Mars (with the Sun at the centre). The two planets are on simple circular orbits around...

I'm wondering how the sim handles spherical planet meshes? When I'm close to Earth the edge of the planet looks very spherical with no visible bumps, however when I zoom out there comes a point where it noticeably switches to a low-poly sphere and stops rendering the atmosphere. Is it just using...

Wow, I haven't been here for ages! I don't want to look at how long ago it was that I last posted... Anyway, I thought I'd share a neat little thing I made in C++ - a ray tracer. A ray tracer is a program which creates a picture purely using mathematical algorithms for reflection and...

Hi everyone, I have the position of a satellite in topocentric cartesian coordinates (i.e. the position of the satellite is given in [x,y,z] coordinates with the Earth-bound observer at the origin) and I want to convert this to and RA and Dec position as seen by the observer. I have seen...

Hi everyone, I was wondering (I guess MartinS knows) - what sort of algorithm does Orbiter use for shadows? There are a few options (shadow mapping, volumes, geometry flattening, etc...) and I'm just curious about which one Orbiter uses! It would be nice to see self-shadowing in Orbiter, which...

Does anyone know if there's a place where I can download heightmaps of the Apollo landing sites? I'd like to try and get some 3D models of them done, but I can't find this info! Thanks!

Hi everyone, I made a small program to simulate a pendulum last night and it seems to work OK apart from one thing: the pendulum gains momentum as it swings. First off, here's the code I'm using: accAng = -g*sin(posAng)/l; velAng += accAng*0.01; posAng += ((velAng*0.01)-(0.5*accAng*0.0001))...

Does anyone know how OrbitMFD calculates all the values it displays, specifically apoapsis, periapsis and orbital period? I know that if you use the formula for an ellipse to define your orbit, there are easy ways to determine the properties of it (such as 'r(a)=a(1+e)' and 'r(p)=a(1-e)'...

Hi everyone! I posted a thread a while back about a simple orbit simulator I'd managed to make. That one was based on the Kepler 2 body problem, which is not a real-time simulation, but rather a pre-determined assumed path. Today, I found the PDF in the orbiter documentation called 'dynamics'...

Hi everyone, Does anyone here know of a free video editing program which allows you to overlay one video onto another? For example, if I wanted to add a small webcam video in the upper corner of my main video? Movie maker doesn't do it. I have searched for a long time now, and can't find...

Has anyone else taken a look at this game? It's quite famous at the moment, with a ton of pretty amusing let's play videos all over Youtube. I've been trying to get all 8 pages for a couple of weeks now, and I can't manage any higher than 6/8 without being captured by Slendy. I wonder if anyone...

It would be awesome to have an addon which allows you to move your winged spacecraft around on the ground, sort of like a pushback truck. I don't know if such a thing exists, but it would really be great to be able to tow my Delta Glider to the top of the runway rather than having to taxi it...

I found out quite recently that FS9 doesn't support multi core CPUs - since my computer has a 1.8Ghz quad-core processor, it can only effectively use one core, meaning that it only runs on 1.8Ghz. This makes it pretty laggy, despite my pretty good specs! I don't think there's a way around this...

I'm having a bit of a problem finding a good screen recorder for making Orbiter movies. I tried Fraps, but the FPS is terrible. I tried Hypercam, but it won't let me record any higher than 10FPS - anything else, and it tells me it's too high. So, what, in your opinion, is the best way to go...

Well, it's been a sunny day in the UK today, and since I could see the sky, I went to take some pictures with my new DSLR camera. I went out onto a local footpath leading through a field, and here's what I got:

I tried it for the first time today, and I was suprised to learn on http://www.geocaching.com/ that there are at least 5 caches within a mile of me. I looked for all 5, but managed to find 3 in the end. It's a really awesome way to spend a couple of hours, and get some exercise! I signed off the...

I'm making some custom models, and the textures are looking unnaturally dark. I created the models in Gmax and applied the textures using the material editor. Does anyone know how I can make them look more natural?

Well, I've decided to try and create my own surface base for the first time. I've chosen my favourite airport in the world - Male International (pronounced 'Marley') in the Maldives. The only thing I've done so far is create the surface tiles, and it's the first time I've tried doing that, so...