Orbx Unveils Pacific Northwest Video

Cody Bergland of Jaggyroad Films just released his latest opus, a preview of Orbx’s upcoming FTX NA Blue: Pacific Northwest scenery. Not only do you get stunning views of this gorgeous part of the world (though I may be biased), but also a couple of peeks at the first two payware airports designed to fit within it – 1S2 Darrington Municipal, and 7S3 Stark’s Twin Oaks (okay, I’m definitely biased). Watch it below, sure, but this is one that’s worth downloading the high res version.

Fanboy Friday Delayed

Ack! I’m up to my neck in day-job work today, with no time to whip my weekly Fanboy Friday post into shape. My plan is to cobble it together tonight or tomorrow morning for a Spooky Saturday post instead. Thanks for bearing with me.

In the meantime, if you’re new to FF, you can browse the previous posts here.

Have an excellent Friday!

It’s Fanboy Friday Time Again…

And that means another heaping pile of stuff that you could spend all your money and time on, if you were so inclined. This week has been a real mixed bag of releases, so you’re sure to find something here that tickles your fancy, makes you roll your eyes, or both. So, what’s new?

Fanboy Friday: Freeware and Previews Galore

Friday, again!? Honestly, where does the time go? Well, I know where most of mine went this week, and that’s to putting the detail touches on Twin Oaks Airpark for ORBX. While I was hip-deep in that, wonder what else was going on in the FS universe…

Introducing Stark’s Twin Oaks Airpark

This one has been a long time in the making, but the preview pics are finally available. My first project for Orbx is nearing completion: 7S3: Stark’s Twin Oaks Airpark. It’s designed to fit seamlessly into the upcoming FTX NA Blue Pacific Northwest scenery, but it’ll stand alone as well.

If ever there was a small airport that captured the spirit of GA flying in America, this is it. From the official blurb:

Nestled in the rolling farmland of the fertile Willamette Valley near Portland, Oregon, Stark’s Twin Oaks Airpark is ideally located for sightseeing in the Pacific Northwest. The rural location makes for less traffic and a relaxed atmosphere, while providing an easy jumping-off point for flights to either the coast to the west, or the rugged peaks of the Cascade range to the east.

The scenery includes a large area of 30cm/pixel aerial photoreal terrain, featuring the various orchards, Alpaca ranches, and small farms in the area. One special point of interest is the massive Glacier rock quarry, located a few miles to the southeast of the field. It deftly shows the sim possibilities when high-resolution terrain mesh is matched with detailed and meticulously color-corrected aerial photography. The high-quality mesh also makes another appearance, in what is quite possibly a first for an FS airport: multiple elevations. Twin Oaks is carved from the side of a gentle slope, and as a result, the Starks’ house, garage, and two of the hangars are on a hill overlooking the rest of the field. Lead developer Bill Womack has obsessively researched and photographed the airport over the last few years, with the enthusiastic support of owners Bob and Betty Stark. We’re proud to offer the definitive sim rendition of one of Oregon’s aviation jewels.

Check out the preview pics here. And while you’re at it, have a look at the other releases planned for both North America and Australia.

Shop Talk with the Guys at FSBreak

Last Sunday I had the opportunity to do an interview with Eric McClintock and Mark Stewart of FSBreak, the weekly podcast. I was a little nervous about it. After all, I’ve never done radio or audio interviews before. Turns out I needn’t have worried. It was great fun, and we had a good chat about a wide range of FS scenery topics.

Give it at listen!

Laugh in a Cracker’s Face!

The Avsim forums are up and running again, and even seem to be largely intact from before. That’s an astounding effort from all involved. Good job, fellas.

Oh, and take THAT, whichever lowlife scuzzball thought it’d be fun to wipe them out. Now let’s show our team spirit and go make or comment on a forum posting today.

http://forums1.avsim.net/

Avsim Hack Makes the News

Occasionally, our little hobby grabs the attention of the mainstream press—usually when things go astray. The BBC posted a news item this morning about the destruction of Avsim by hackers. I whole-heartedly agree with Derek Davis’s quote from the end of the article – Avsim will indeed rise from the ashes. The article also quotes me (albeit unattributed) from a post I made on SimFlight: there is a special place in hell for hackers who pull stunts like this.

It’s almost worth going to hell just to kick those *&^#% in the nuts when I get there.

Avsim Hacked

By now you might have heard the news: some low-life numbnuts bottom-feeding scumbag (or group of scumbags) has decided it would be fun to hack into the Avsim servers and take down the world’s largest FS website and file library. Nice. Rather than me going on with choice expletives all morning, I’ll reprint the press release from Tom Allensworth, Avsim’s head honcho:

“We regret to inform the flight simulation community that on Tuesday, May 12, AVSIM was hacked and effectively destroyed. The method of the hack makes recovery difficult, if not impossible, to recover from. Both servers, that is the library / email and web site / forum servers were attacked. AVSIM is totally offline at this time and we expect to be so for some time to come. We are not able to predict when we will be back online, if we can come back at all. We will post more news as we are able to in the coming days and weeks.”

Needless to say, this is terrible news for the hobby. Let’s all put our collective heads together and think/pray/meditate for the speedy recovery of their data, with a side of prosecution for the mindless idiots who would do such a thing.

A temporary forum has been set up for Avsim users here. I encourage you to visit it for updates on the situation, and to express your support to the Avsim team. I imagine they’re in need of it right now.

iBlueYonder Now Tweeting

Just a heads-up: I recently added Twitter “tweets” to my FS repertoire. If you’d like to follow me, visit the Twitter site, log in, and follow “bwomack”. I’ll try to make it worth your while.

What’s that? You don’t have a Twitter account? I won’t tell anyone. Just visit the site and set up your account today. You can just lurk if you like and follow me and others, but I’ll bet that after a while you won’t be able to resist joining in. It’s that fun.