January 2019 – tinkerXperience

ATC Voices

The ATC voices found in Microsoft Flight Simulator from many years ago (2006) are the kind of audio I wish X-plane 11 would use. Having realistic voices would greatly enhance this simulator without the need to use and pay for third party software or ATC systems. There are many users of X-plane 11 including myself who simply use the sim for fun and only wish for some better sounding voices without needing to speak to a real person pretending to be in a tower.

Give Users More Rendering Options in the UI

Another way to improve X-plane 11 would be to add more user interface options for controlling the level of rendering details of autogen. In X-plane 10 there are many options for controlling autogen and visuals (perhaps too many) but X-plane 11 has appeared to dumb down the UI too much and has unwisely (from a customers standpoint) removed most settings altogether or linked everything together.

The main reason X-plane 11 needs to add more options for autogen settings is because it would allow the player to have better control over the visuals when flying over rural vs urban areas. This is not a frame-rate issue (I know X-plane developers have claimed that is the reason they removed it) but in fact for some of us, its purely for realism in visuals. For example, where I live there are no trains and generally minimal traffic. There are not many buildings either but there are lots and lots of trees. In this situation it would be great to be able to lower the traffic, building and train numbers without lowering the tree density. And what if I never want deer or birds in my sim? Currently I cannot remove them. What if I want to have more buildings but less traffic and trees or vice versa? Currently in X-plane 11 all these settings are connected and it’s frustrating! Either you get lots of trees, traffic, buildings and trains or, little to nothing at all. By the way, X-plane 10 handled these decisions much better giving the user better control over these settings and it was awesome. It’s clear that that having more visual options in the UI would greatly improve X-plane 11 realism.

Disclaimer: The opinions and information expressed in this review are my own and are based on my own experience. These views or opinions are not intended to reflect the views or opinions of Laminar Research nor any of the developers of X-plane 11 in any way.

Images are my in-game screenshots from default X-plane 11.05

If you enjoy Bob Ross like I do or are at least a bit interested in getting started in painting using the wet on wet technique, check out this special 1 hour episode of the Joy of Painting with Bob Ross.

Below are links and recommendations to some of the painting products I use which can help you get started using the Wet-on-Wet oil painting technique that Bob Ross used on his show.

Bob Ross Master Kit – I highly recommend beginning with this kit as it will really help you get your painting going and you will save some money on basic paints, palette knife and brushes.

Complete List of Bob Ross Brushes and Palette Knives

Complete list of Bob Ross oil paint

Complete list of liquid oil mediums for preparing the canvass. While this is a complete list of Bob Ross available mediums, Bob mainly applied his signature Liquid White or Magic White to the canvas before painting his landscapes.

Bob Ross 2-in 1 Easel (as seen on the Joy of Painting after Season 27) – This easel is a good deal especially when it’s on sale. (Note: any easel will probably work to get started but I have found not many easels allow edge to edge painting on the canvas as this one does well. The Bob Ross 2-in-1 Easel also can be used as a table top easel if you want to paint while sitting at a table.)

Canvases 16″ x 20″ – also a good deal at Michaels when they are on sale or using a 50% off coupon (Note: Bob used 18″ x 24″ canvases on the Joy of Painting but you can use any size you prefer just make sure they come at least double primed which most are.

Odorless paint thinner

Bob Ross beater rack and paint brush thinner screen

Small bucket with a lid (the size of the brush thinner screen)

Also highly recommended:

Bob Ross large Clear Palette

Baby Wipes at Costco or Dollar tree

Roll of Paper Towels

Larger trash bucket for beater rack

Apron and old pair of clothes you don’t mind getting paint on

some old towels

a place to set your paints and brushes when not using them but within reach while painting

Palette paper or a super cheap palette unless you jump right in and purchase the Bob Ross Palette which I recommend if you want to get serious