21:9 support
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Does BMS support ultrawide resolutions, such as 3440x1440? (21:9)
If so, are there any FOV problems with TrackIR and looking down at panels?
(I searched for “21:9” and “ultrawide” and “3440” already and came up with nothing.)
Nevermind, I didn’t look in the hardware corner, so my search returned no results. I’ve found my answer.
This can be deleted.
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Falcon BMS supports the ultrawide resolutions (ie, all the Matrox TripleHead2Go resolutions for example).
Anyway, the point is that it’s not going to greatly improve your field of view.
Falcon confuses the “Field of view” concept (angle of the scene that is rendered from the player point of view) and zoom.If you increase the FOV (in Falcon), you will probably see a wider area, but the HUD and all the cockpit will be smaller.
Example :
Credits : http://www.checksix-fr.com
Source (in french) : http://www.checksix-fr.com/articles/detail.php?id=1587To compare, here is what should be achieved (Rise of Flight) :
Credits : http://www.checksix-fr.com
Source (in french) : http://www.checksix-fr.com/articles/detail.php?id=1587 -
Actually, that RoF acts like that is not so much that it does NOT make a mistake between zoom and FoV, so much as it is a user friendly feature.
If you adjust displayed FoV without adjusting the display area, then you will have a zoom effect. Simple physics.
In RoF, adjusting the resolution also adjusts the FoV. In BMS the two are separate settings. This is actually a good thing from the perspective of making a display for a cockpit.
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I guess that I have not understood what you wrote.
In my opinion, the FOV setting in BMS is ONLY (and nothing more than) a “min zoom” level. The angle you will actually see will not grow if you increase the FOV angle setting.
The point is that more FOV should mean letting the zoom level as it is (HUD and cockpit are always the same size as before) and “add” parts on the left and right (just as RoF does).
It seems that FSX handles it very well too (just like RoF).
But to answer the question : yes, the 21:9 resolutions are handled by Falcon BMS.
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Well, coming from a photography point of view it makes sense the way it works now - the same lens on a bigger size image sensor (i.e. changing the display area) naturally changes the perceived zoom level.
FoV is a setting independent of aspect ratio. You can set it to whatever you want. If you change FoV without changing the display area, then the zoom naturally MUST change.
You are mistaken about the setting, too. If you increase the displayed FoV in BMS, then it will increase the angle you see in the sim. If you do not also adjust the size of the display to have it take up the same FoV as it displays, then it will appear warped as you look around.
FoV in BMS is a FoV setting, not a zoom setting. The two are very different.
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I run 5670x1080 and Falcon seems to handle it fine. The warp distortion is due to the rectilinear mapping which is a choice by rendering software. There are other mapping schemes in the world. They are all compromises of displaying a spherically angular information onto a 2D planar display. It’s analogous to the difficulty of making 2D maps of a 3D globe. http://www.tawbaware.com/projections.htm
Field of view is shorthand for the horizontal field of view which is the measure of the angle in 3D space which is mapped to 2D space. The aspect ratio is simply the vertical space defined as a multiple of the horizontal space. All renderers I know assume the same ratio of the 2D axes to the 3D axes.
Changing the render target either in pixel width or aspect ratio by convention will change the vertical 3D information while keeping the horizontal 3D info fixed. There exists a value in a config file which states “I want you to squeeze X° of angular width onto my display.” If you change the aspect ratio the left and right 3D angular limits remain the same. The vertical is automatically adjusted. For example if the aspect ratio is 2:1 then 100° wide means 50° tall.
If you want to go from a 2:1 display to a 3:1 display you might expect to add extra information to the left and right sides as in the Rise of Flight example. This is wrong according to conventional fixed-width design. Instead you get 100° wide as before but the screen isn’t 50° tall it’s 33° tall. If you want fixed-height then you must adjust the FOV setting from 100° to 150° in width to add on the extra information without changing the height. The difference between both methods is trivial as long as you have control over the aspect ratio of the 3D information frame and the FOV in the horizontal. Depending on what you want to change or remain fixed both methods allow access to all solutions.
Zoom is different than FOV. With FOV you can consider more or less angle in the 3D world to project onto your 2D monitor. If you regard less solid angle (angle wide x angle tall) then your monitor shows a more detailed picture as each fixed dimension pixel corresponds to less angular space in the 3D world. The amount of 3D angular space an object occupies also depends on the distance from the camera and the object in 3D space. Distinct from mapping a smaller angular region to a fixed monitor pixel space using a far away camera you can also just move the camera toward the object. You are regarding the same angular “window” with regards to the camera but the object you are interested in is simply closer and thus appears larger. This is zoom.
This also explains why zoom is available in external view but not cockpit view while FOV is available in both. With external view you are essentially looking at the object as a camera at the end of a stick. Zoom makes the stick shorter and the camera closer to the subject. In cockpit it’s not permitted to shift the camera around.
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I’d like to know what the limits are on both resolution and number of displays that can be supported in BMS. This is because I’m giving halfway serious consideration to making or buying a dome simulation screen, and actually the making of it would be trivially easy as the local electronics scrapyard I frequent has several large hemispherical radomes that covered stabilized satellite antennas on ships. They’re shaped like R2D2 and made of fiberglas, in various sizes, and would be pretty easy to cut up and configure as a dome projection screen. I think the one that’s 6 feet in diameter is more than sufficient, and I would use cheap LCD projectors shooting through small holes in the dome to illuminate the opposite sides, as you couldn’t do rear projection in a setup like this as the fiberglas is NOT transparent or translucent. Of course I would cut away all excess dome, keeping just the sections that would actually carry a projected image. A 6 foot diameter dome actually may be too small but I’m willing to experiment. I figure on one projector mounted vertically just behind the pilot’s seat, to cover the top view, and depending on viewing angle, between three and six projectors to cover the rest. Yes, these would all need lenses suitable for curved screens, but that’s also something that can be dealt with. Or I might skeletonize the dome and use it as a geodesic frame holding a number of flat translucent screens that can be illuminated by rear projection with conventional lenses.
I don’t know if BMS has the capability to generate enough image channels to feed the number of projectors that would be needed. I’m sure it doesn’t have native image warping capability, either, but that’s another matter for later evaluation. I think that can be achieved in post-processing with other computers, and if I get serious enough to build a cockpit with a dome screen, then I’ll be serious enough to pursue those problems.
Right now I will settle for just learning what the limitations are regarding resolution and number of display feeds that BMS can generate.
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Pepe u can zoom and Falcon is great. Falcon doesn’t have only Fov.
So to the Op
U can search my hotlist and you will find what u want. -
The guys in LA “fly the dream” are doing well with BMS it seems.
Note I am not affiliated.
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Falcon supports 1 display of the main view. Large FOV suffers from the distortion angle-pixel mapping issue. There exists software which partially corrects this distortion for display on non-traditional screens but beyond about 180 degrees the distortion is significant and you want to produce another frame from a new camera view which Falcon doesn’t do AFAIK. The practical limit is a single rectilinear frame buffer warp-correct or not displayed on a curved screen by one or more projectors. The frame buffer limit in 2D pixel space is high and GPU horsepower or display resolution will probably limit you first.
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Well I think the graphics PePe shows is not fully true to life and some think that you don’t see more well I can say for a fact you do and those pictures are not true to life…
I see way more then those pictures show with triplescreen. that is the entire idea behind it…
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Falcon supports 1 display of the main view. Large FOV suffers from the distortion angle-pixel mapping issue. There exists software which partially corrects this distortion for display on non-traditional screens but beyond about 180 degrees the distortion is significant and you want to produce another frame from a new camera view which Falcon doesn’t do AFAIK. The practical limit is a single rectilinear frame buffer warp-correct or not displayed on a curved screen by one or more projectors. The frame buffer limit in 2D pixel space is high and GPU horsepower or display resolution will probably limit you first.
Can you explain in English whether there’s anything I need to do, or should do, to increase my satisfaction with Falcon in a 21:9 configuration?
What software are you speaking of? My new monitor arrives Wednesday, and I’d be very appreciative of pointers on working with 21:9 and making it display appropriately. If it matters, the 21:9 monitor is the Dell U3415W, which is curved. I was under the impression that adjusting FOV in my games would be “enough.”
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Hi Wizard I recently upgraded to a 21:9 myself from and old 27 inch. Depending on your taste and set up you will probably want to set your FOV through the config file to about 90 or 100 to get the peripheral effect and also keep in the MFD’s. I initially went real wide to about 110 but found reading the MFD’s without leaning in and changing FOV to be hard.
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21:9 is not a large display. I have 16:3 and it is acceptable to me without special tricks like Warpalizer.
User\config\falcon bms.cfg
set g_fMaximumFOV 150
set g_fDefaultFOV 120These are my values. I also have keys/axis to change FOV while playing. If it seems “too zoomed out” reduce FOV and vice versa. At high FOV settings you will feel left and right edges seem “stretched.” This is normal distortion for projection.
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Frederf,
Thanks for clearing up your post. I’m familiar with FOV and config adjustments. I was not aware of software such as Warpalizer and was looking for pointers in that direction.
Here’s hoping the new monitor doesn’t have a reason to return it, and I can get some 21:9 flight in shortly.
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Hi Wizard you would only need a warping software like warpalizer if you used projectors with a curved screen… I would say set the FOV to what you like I set mine to 130fov…