[RAF_Magpie]

S! Ya'll...

Well, after touching up some things, and completing a bit of the map (a small bit, but a bit none the less) I thought I'd show ya'll what I've been pestering you folks for help with.

Gentlemen I bring you MagTek_New Zealand; WIP

Why NZ you ask? Well simply its my homeland and I love it. She'll do a nice job for joy flights (practicing cross countries which will help me out a lot), not to mention squad training missions, and "what if" scenarios.

The map covers from slightly north of Christchurch, to south of Stewart Island, and is 914km by 914km.

Every airfield will be as accurate as I can get (from AIP dataplates), but based on modern day configurations (historical data is slim, and NZ airfields in the 40's... well, wouldnt be as many).

RAF_Sharkzz has very kindly offered his assistance with the making of accurate (or rather as close as the engine allow's) cities and townships.

There will be 14 mountain lakes featured, all will be usable for float aircraft (the two shown on the map C already are usable).

Already done are Stewart Island (and Ryan's Creek airfield), and Invercargill (NZNV) shown in the screenshots below, is nearing completion (and features 8 different vectors - 1 sealed runway, three grass rwy's)





After importing and before playing with any of the texture's I loaded the map up and did a cross country flight from Christchurch to Invercargill; this took 56 minutes, at 220 knots, at 10000 ft. Here you see a snippet of the southern alps. This is abeam Oamaru: (Thanks to vpMedia for the Mossie skin )


I'm currently doing my diploma in aviation (which gives you a diploma and your commercial licence) at a place called Southern Wings, based at NZNV - here a RNZAF Corsair spawns outside of the Southern Wings hanger;


A RNZAF Corsair (skin by me; avail soon) lined up and waiting on rwy 22 at Invercargill Airport:


Approaching Stewart Island, with Mount Anglem featuring very prominently on the North east side of the Island;

[Flying Nutcase]

Magpie,

Kudos to you good sir! As a fellow Kiwi, from Christchuch, it'd be a mighty (and unexpected) pleasure to be able to fly around home ground. The focus is always somewhere else, eh.

The screenies are looking sweet.

Good luck with the study, too!

[spud]

Cool. I thought about learning the height map process by doing New Mexico (where I live). Maybe I should.

Can't wait to visit New Zealand with your map!

Hey, someone could use it for training missions for a RNZAF campaign in the Solomons, too.

tater

[Phas3e]

Very nice, i've thought if I every wanted to try mapping I would do Bell Block as a wartime training area, Its good to see a chunk of NZ being made.

About your Corsair,
I assume you are doing '662' as a non historical tester? which is cool though
and RNZAF corairs Used the US Navy '4 tone' colour scheme not the 3

[Neil Lowe]

Onya Magpie Lookin' Sweet

Have fun with your new obsession

Cheers, Neil

[RAF_Magpie]

Hi guys, glad you like the look of it so far

Flying Nutcase, I'm glad you're looking forward to it, I'll do my utmost to make sure canterbury's spot on (I grew up out in Leeston, and my fiance is from there, so if I stuff it up I'll never let it down anyway )

Spud, thanks for the kind words, from a member fo Team Pacific - they mean a lot. New Mexico would be cool.. bring on Roswell

Hey Phas3e This is hopefully the first of three maps... each of near on equivelent size. This is the first third... the next planned one will be from slighly south of Christchurch, to slightly noth of Mount Taranaki... then the third and final, will be from south of Mount Taranaki, covering the remainder. I decided to start with the south, as thats the area I know best...
The corsair is modeled off FG-1 NZ5648. The skin pack I am doing consists of 3 skins. One a skin of NZ5648 (see below, its the one with Donald Duck on the side), one blank, and another (the one in the pics) modeled in a www.RAF662.com (my squad) scheme. When I saw NZ5648 back in '06 I fell in love with it... As for the scheme, the RNZAF actually used a variety of paint schemes, from solid to two tone, three tone and four tone... Resulting in rather mottly bunch Here's some pics of two Corsairs adorned in the theme; including NZ5648 (the last surving RNZAF corsair) and the older Birdcaged corsair that was sold and sent to the US a few years back






Cheers Neil, hopefully i can keep her to the standard you and others have set out

[Phas3e]

Hi again

Nice to see a good section of NZ being covered, I look foward to updates

Have you got Warren Russells book on RNZAF Corsairs colour schemes?
Its the only really indepth research done on kiwi Corsairs and covers all the paint schemes and repaints done to Corsairs in the New Zealand, in the Islands and later in Japan.

Trusting modern repaints inst a good option with any warbird 'NZ5648' for example was never 'Irate duck', the 'duck' was actually on a number of other corsairs NZ5277, 5255 and 5248 for example.
Also of note that all FG-1s were painted in solid Gloss blue not 4 tone, and 3 tone was never used on RNZAF Corsairs.

Interestingly theres over 50 documented variations in roundels on kiwi Corsairs, so its a real mine field to get them accurate.

[RAF_Magpie]

Mine field is right - I spent many many hours scratching my head with the many different roundels lol

Havent got the book, and havent seen it any local bookstores... any suggestions on how to get my hands on a copy?

Re the skin, it was more a skin to represent the warbird in that scheme really, and the old bird cage version. There's many more talented skinners out there who can do a better job then myself with historical accurate skins

[RAF_Magpie]

Hi all... here are some shots of Ryan's Creek and Invercargill airfields. Ryan's creek is finished, and Invercargill is nearing completion with the additon of some roads, drainage ditches, and a few other placements, plus a tidy up of one or two little things... thanks to vpMedia for the Kittyhawk skins.

Invercargill Airfield NZNV


Ryan's Creek NZRC

[Baco1170]

Looking good! Naother one to keep track off.

[Nocturnum]

This looks cool. Don't forget Pleasant Point!

[spud]

I forgot about Roswell, lol. Have to get ranwars to turn the lerche into a saucer if I do that, huh?



I was thinking Los Alamos/Santa Fe throught to Alamogordo. Albuquerque had a US Bombadier training school at the AFB during the war. If you've even see the wartime movie "bombadier" it was filmed here at the real base.

The limiting factor would be that I'd need to reskin buildings to be adobe stucco or my head would explode looking at them

tater

[RAF_Magpie]

Thank you Baco, Nocturnum - Pleasant point will be there

Turning the Lerche into a UFO, wouldnt be a terribly far leap lol - And Los Alamos would be a must to have

[Flying Nutcase]

Hi Magpie,

I grew up in Yaldhurst, my sister bought her first house in Springston, my parents later moved to Lincoln before settling in Darfield. I'm sure you'll do justice to the area!

You're doing a fine job of things. It's a heck of project to take on. GL.

[RAF_Magpie]

Ah you wouldnt have been to far from the missus then, she grew up in Oaklands, but was schooled out at Lincoln High - myself; from dirty old Ellesmere College

Thanks... I think I need as much luck as I can get At anyrate, heres a progress report from yesterday:

===============================================================

Change/Completion Log 16.03.08

Invercargill Aerodrome is now COMPLETED - complete with drainage ditches* (trenching), airfield border fence, and access road.

Changed water from European to Pacific - unfortunatly NZ waters are a mix between the two - but the pacific water has the better effects in rough weather (breaking wave caps etc); and to tell you the truth, is a better fit in a lot of ways.

Completed industrial sector of Invercargill City, completed Bluff harbour.

Completed "Sandy Point" and mud flats for the estuary

3/4's done of "Oreti Beach" which, for those of you have seen "The Worlds Fastest Indian" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worlds_fastest_indian) is the scene of the show down between Burt Munro and the local bike gang leader. This is beach also includes sand dunes.

More pics to come over the next day or two.

*I felt these drainage ditches, although some might see as unneccesary, were mandatory - not only because the airfield actually has them (at 5f AMSL, and built on reclaimed swamp land...) - but were the cause of the death of one of our Piper Cherokee's; the only actual crash and right off of an aircraft in Southern Wings' history