Javelin

After the introduction inside Xplane as developer, constructing a cockpit for a free Texan, I decided to make a plane similar as an F18, that I loved its design when I saw it first time. The ATG Javelin.

The problem with this plane was that I almost didn't have any information of it. The project was cancelled, and only some units where built. For sure my Javelin, had more success than the real one!
This was going to be the first plane to be sold by me. I was going to deal with people that had problems and payed with their money, but I started the construction of it.
It was modelled in 3DStudio Max 2011, but still at that time (2008), 3DStudio and Alexander from SteptoSky, didn't met, so I had to export all the model with texture, to an early version of Blender, and use the Marginal plugin to export and animate. Was not easy at all, but I did already in the cockpit of the Texan (and later in the CRJ200).
But the biggest problem didn't came from technical things.

When I built the cockpit of the Texan, there were some contest in X-Plane.org where people dediced the best freeware of the month. I signed and we all started to vote. I made cheat, when I created 3 accounts (if I don't remember bad) to vote my plane three times, and some friend people voted my work also (maybe using the same method). That is something normal in Spain. Our culture comes from Lazarillo de Tormes, and I am not going to say that is right. It was wrong, but we never give this actions too much importance. Something that in English culture, cheat is not permited at all. What resulted in that was a ban from the org forums for a week or so, but things where more complicated when I protested. At the end I wanted to protect my hard work in the Texan cockpit, as it where removed from the forums.. and the news about my work in the Javelin.
I found a place to talk in X-Pilot forums that are part of X-Aviation, and you will see the Jetstream only sold in X-aviation but not in the Store of the ORG. At the end I returned to the ORG forums and all was forget and forgiven.

What I wanted to achieve with all my projects is to offer something that no other products offered before. A plus. I discovered a "bug" in the transparency layout zbuffering, that allowed me to hide certain parts of the geometry. And I used (and explained to everyone how to use it in forums) in the Siai Marchetti. I built a colimated HUD of the plane, and I published in a youtube video

Another extra feature I made, was the dynamic illumination of the plane with the lights included. In Xplane9 there were not spill of lights as they are now in xplane11. For simulating a real 3D light, specially the strobo ones, I could do it with the LIT textures, but the plane already was using those LIT textures with the nav (red-greed) tune of the fuselage. I could not use more LIT textures. The solution? Build an transparent geometry very near the fuselage, with same shape, and use the LIT on it to simulate the strobo illumination over the plane.
As alwasy, simulation comes from games. There are users that hate games, and they say "no, I do not play games. I play simulators" The reality is that they play also games, because all we share same methods of "simulating" reality. Games simulate winds on trees, in open landscapes, light and shadows. Flight simulators, simulate systems with tricks. They do not make a real simulation of a real system, because that real simulation would take any great expensive PC to their knees. Imagine having at least 30 fps, "vomiting" images at 1080p per second. Imposible. Flight simulators use the same techniques as games do. A shame they are years away of all the technology developed for them.

Product Page:

The Javelin MK-20 for X-Plane is a fun little trainer jet to fly low and fast! Great details in and out, you'll find yourself cruising the skies like you own them!

Quick Facts: A custom 3D cockpit, many liveries to choose from, and X-Plane 10 comaptible.

Highlighted Features

• Full Function 3D Cockpit in pilot and copilot seats

• Easy click buttons

• 10 Liveries to choose from

• Real HUD (one of the first planes to have this)

• Dynamic Strobe Light (see the lightning of the strobe flash on your plane)

• Custom Sounds

• 46 PDF Page manual with tutorial of navigation

• Config files for PilotView plugin with predefined views, and XFCS (flybyWire) plugin

This plane is not ready for Xplane11!!!

Expecial notes:

This was my first plane to be selling in Xplane 9. I managed to have the HUD colimated, that no one did it before, and some other extra features not seen still in xplane. The information about this plane was very rare, as the company that built it was bankrupt. As said, the plane do not work correcly in Xplane11. Maybe in a future I would rework over it.