Review Chris Bell Creative Design Studios - Stargazer

[mutley 4,498]

 

Just published is my review of Stargazer by Chris Bell Creative Design Studio.

 

This is a makeover for the default star map in the sim with a more accurate display of stars. How does it look? Read on...

[MyPC8MyBrain 273]

Thank you Joe <3 

[mutley 4,498]

A great product Chris with plenty of potential to add extra functionality.

 

[MyPC8MyBrain 273]

i am little surprised with the images posted and obviously the result you see in your sim at night  

it doesn't look anything like Stargazer; more like default Stars!

 

is your HDR turned on in these shoots?

[MyPC8MyBrain 273]

HDR ON

 

HDR OFF

[mutley 4,498]

Yep, I had it set up as good as I could get it, full HDR and ultra wide through a 1080 ti not sure what else I could do to improve it. Unfortunately Stargazer is one of those products which looks great when flying live but screenshots can never do it justice.

[MyPC8MyBrain 273]

we haven't rendered multicolored stars, its a single white colored with difference in brightness, size, and distance,

if you noticed colored green blue or red dotted stars that means you had HDR turned to off!

which explains why you saw colored stars as P3D cannot render these shades with HDR off,

 

to get a less exaggerated result for the purpose of navigating by stars;
you could have used Mag 7 without HDR which would bring out a more familiar patterns you were looking for  

 

this addon is not meant to use for star navigation and never claimed to be!

yes again in theory it is possible to do so; how practical is it; questionable! which iv'e stated!!! 

it is suppose to only complete the night ambiance and give you a more realistic and fuller sky's at night,

realistic not in the scientific level! but more inline to what one would see and perceive with our eyes,

granted all positioning and all stars data used 1:1 real and up to date; but this is not designed for navigating by!

the review completely misses the premise of  Stargazer and focuses on it as being a navigation aid when its not meant to be one! 

 

 

[mutley 4,498]

I formed the opinion about the colours when zooming in, I guess the fuzziness is formed from primary colours in the sim making up the fuzzy dot. You make claims about the accuracy and give the product the name of Stargazer, I would expect as a watcher of the skies to identify constellations, but I cant, if it is just for a pretty image then the product should only be selling for less than 10 dollars. There are plenty of freeware products like Autostar X that will do it for free.

[mutley 4,498]

1 hour ago, MyPC8MyBrain said:

the review completely misses the premise of  Stargazer

 

Perhaps you should make the purpose of the product clearer on your product pages, I spent weeks researching the background of star mapping as that was the impression I got from you both publically and privately, it wasn't a 30 minute write up.

[MyPC8MyBrain 273]

i know you don't take these reviews lightly  Joe 

you were very enthusiastic from day one with regards to stars data,
your interest in astronomy is far more advance then most simmers i know,

that's one of the reasons it wasn't as formal as it should have been due to our numerous discussions on the topic,

it is still your point of view i have no issues with that,

i just feel a miss, we should have match expectation earlier,

i was sure you would perceive Stargazer as an ambiance addon with added real values in it; rather than a straight up navigation aid addon,

yes the data is there; but its not designed for navigation; the emphasis is to fill the night sky with sufficient data coverage that actually fills the night sky with stars,

at MAG12 we bring in a quarter of a million real star records, vs the 9k default!

[mutley 4,498]

The ambiance is first class Chris, I tried to make that point in the review, in full up 12 magnitude the night sky is just a wow and gives the pilot a feeling like s/he is on the Enterprise in the midst of it all! Thanks for clarifying the default, I thought it was 6K. 

[MyPC8MyBrain 273]

i should probably mention that from the data we have; rendering below MAG7 yields very close to the 9k records currently exists in sim native database,

that is why we opted to start Stargazer at MAG7 and didn't bother with offering anything below that,

our MAG7 is not far from Sim native database starting at 16k records vs sim's 9k native records,

we give you everything from there to the most ridicules MAG that still makes sense rendered

[MyPC8MyBrain 273]

there is also an additional global switch you can use to increase stars brightness with any data set being applied,

stars global brightness can be adjusted in both situation with HDR is ON or OFF! to further refine any database global brightness,

this will further refine how stars are finally rendered on each specific screen,

 

i know i said its not designed for navigation, still... challenge me! 

[mutley 4,498]

@MyPC8MyBrain Chris, I have done some tweaking to my system, actually, I just reset my display defaults and deleted the shader cache as mentioned in your forums and the stars look a lot better, I have re-uploaded the Stargazer comparison shot, and the Seattle shot near the end and "wow" is even "wowwer!"

Joe

 

 

[MyPC8MyBrain 273]

YaY \  o  /

Thank you Joe <3

 

i would still love it as a friend and as a personal challenge!
to work with you to get you the perfect sky you are envisioning at night   

we do have controls we can work with, down to individual setting for each one of the 58 stars used in navigation,

[mutley 4,498]

Chris, thanks! I am uber busy with the day job, but happy to work with you, I'll be in touch by email. 

[MyPC8MyBrain 273]

any time Joe <3