Active Sky Cloud Art

User’s Guide
Last Revision: 6/22/2017
 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

Legal Notices

By using this software, you are bound by the End User License Agreement which you
accepted during installation. Please refer to the EULA.rtf or EULA.txt file included with your
installation, located in the base program installation folder, along with the
AdditionalLicenses.rtf or AdditionalLicenses.txt file.

Under no circumstances is this software to be used for real aircraft operation or planning
activities. This software is designed for use as an entertainment and educational product,
is not fault-tolerant, and is not acceptable for use in high risk activities including, but not
limited to, aircraft operation and planning.

This software may only be used by one person on one computer. Attempting to use this
product by more than one person or on more than one computer may result in the product
becoming unusable.

An internet connection is required for each use, including automated registration and
activation of the product, as well as usage of most product features. This product will be
unusable without a working internet connection.

This software’s online services include access to private servers, which keep track of all
online activity and usage. Illegal or unauthorized access to our servers, by way of
unlicensed product usage or piracy, is automatically identified and tracked. Continued
illegal usage may result in prosecution.

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

Table of Contents

Introduction ......................................................................................................................................... 3
Welcome to Active Sky Cloud Art ................................................................................................ 3
Installing ASCA ................................................................................................................................... 4
Using ASCA .......................................................................................................................................... 5
ASCA Themes ..................................................................................................................................... 7
Standard Themes ....................................................................................................................... 7
Global Automatic Theme (Requires AS16) ............................................................................ 7
Full Dynamics (Requires AS16) ............................................................................................... 7
Theme Editor ....................................................................................................................................... 8
Settings .............................................................................................................................................. 10
Performance Considerations .......................................................................................................... 13
Getting Support ................................................................................................................................ 14
Credits ................................................................................................................................................ 15

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

Introduction

Welcome to Active Sky Cloud Art

Thank you for using Active Sky Cloud Art, also known as “ASCA”! ASCA is a new kind of
graphics add-on for Flight Simulator X and Prepar3D that incorporates brand new
technologies and content types to transform your skies and significantly increase realism,
variation and dynamics.

The technology behind ASCA has been in development for several years and includes
optional tight integration with Active Sky 2016 and Active Sky for P3Dv4 to enable
features such as Real Time Texture Dynamics, which allow you to manually change or have
your textures automatically changed multiple times throughout a flight without needed to
shut-down and restart your simulator!

ASCA’s graphical content includes replacements/enhancements for everything above the

horizon: Cirrus clouds, cumulus clouds, stratus clouds, thunderstorm clouds, sky colors and
lighting. But in addition to the graphical textures, ASCA also includes something very
different: Brand New 3D Cloud Structures, which replace and/or enhance nearly every
aspect of the cloud scene within the simulator. Thunderstorms are much bigger and taller,
overcast is more full, light “few” humilis-type clouds are more visually appealing, and all
cloud scenes are specifically tuned to match the ASCA texture content and provide
maximum realism. Things like upside-down textures and mismatched styles are a thing of
the past with ASCA.

While ASCA and AS16/ASP4 work great together, they are also fully compatible (either
alone or together) with any other graphics add-on and weather add-on. You have full
flexibility to mix and match any aspect and selectable feature set within these add-ons.
Please note that Instant Texture Dynamics are currently only supported with
ASCA+AS16/ASP4, although we are planning on providing integration methods to allow
dynamics with other graphics add-ons and texture categories with AS16/ASP4 in the
future.

Onward and Upward,

The HiFi Development Team

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

Installing ASCA

If you are using a normal configuration on a single computer, ASCA should simply be
installed there just like any other program. If using AS16/ASP4 and ASCA together, they
will communicate with each other automatically for integration functionality.

If you use both AS16/ASP4 and ASCA, and you are using a networked configuration, where
AS16 is installed on a separate machine other than your simulator computer, ASCA must
also be installed on that separate machine, along-side AS16/ASP4, for integration to
operate correctly. AS16+ASCA must exist on the same machine. In such a configuration,
ASCA will install textures across the network appropriately using specialized high-
performance low-overhead routines.

Note that when AS16/ASP4 and ASCA are installed together, ASCA will automatically
launch and close with AS16/ASP4. If you wish to disable ASCA texture installations, you
can do so by using the ASCA options screen to disable the categories of your choice.

If you are using other graphics add-ons along-side ASCA, you can pick and choose which
categories of graphics/textures you would like from each add-on. Each graphics add-on
including ASCA has several categories listed in the options/settings/configurations area.

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

Using ASCA

ASCA's simple interface allows you to choose and activate a theme with ease. Simply use
the left and right buttons to scroll between the available themes, and then press the
middle "Activate Theme" button to activate it. It's that simple!

The top section of the ASCA main screen shows the previous, current and next theme
items (i.e. Departure, Discovery, Exultant). The current selected theme is shown in the
center. Below the current selected theme, the 3 main category variants that comprise that
theme are shown. In this case, Azure (Sky), Feather (Cirrus) and Bloom (Clouds) are the
variants that make up the Discovery theme.

At the bottom, the last activate theme (including the theme variants) are shown in blue
text.

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

The following buttons are available within the main ASCA screen

Help, Send to Tray, Minimize, Maximize/Restore and Quit

These standard control buttons are available at the top-right of the screen

Left / Right Selection

Changes to the previous/next available theme

EDIT THEME
Opens the theme editor, allow editing of the existing theme or creating a new theme based
on the existing theme

SETTINGS
Opens the settings screen to allow you to configure your ASCA/Graphics options

ACTIVATE THEME
Activates the currently selected theme as shown in the top/center

VIEW LOG
Views the current session log which may be useful to view which selections/variants have
been activated during dynamic theme modes

ART TOOLS
Brings up the Art Tools API, allowing you to create ASCA and AS16/ASP4-compatible
graphics content. See the Art Tools Documentation for details (there is a help button
directly inside the Art Tools screen).

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

ASCA Themes

ASCA is designed around Themes which are Activated with a single button press. Standard
Themes contains various textures/variants that attempt to provide a cohesive and unique
look. Dynamic themes provide advanced texture selection and activation features as
described below.

Standard Themes
These themes contain specific preset items for Cloud Textures (cumulus, stratus
and thunderstorm clouds), Cirrus Textures (cirrus clouds), Sky Color and 3D cloud
structures. Standard themes can be activated at any time, and if AS16/ASP4 is
installed and running, will be shown momentarily after activation within the sim
without needing to restart. Without AS16/ASP4, the simulator must be restarted to
show a new selected theme.

Global Automatic Theme (Requires AS16)

This dynamic theme includes automatic weather influenced support for all content
categories. When activated, ASCA and AS16/ASP4 will constantly communicate
with each other and load new content on-the-fly when weather changes dictate.
When a change occurs, the new content will appear at various intervals slowly to
prevent instant transitions as much as possible. This theme is called “Global”
because the cloud textures applied over the cloud structures will be duplicated
throughout the entire scene, similar to the default simulator and/or traditional
graphics add-ons. The textures will change periodically through the flight, but when
they change, it affects the entire scene.

Full Dynamics (Requires AS16)

This theme is similar to the Global Automatic Theme, with the main difference
being that the cloud textures are configured with what we call Associative
Dynamics, and multiple cloud textures can be assigned and visible at a single time,
with each individual cloud structure inheriting a specific associative texture set.
This provides maximum simultaneous variation in a single cloud scene. In addition,
certain high-overhead cloud types including overcast are configured with lower-
resolution textures to provide a smoother experience without detracting from the
overall visual quality. While the Cloud Textures remain Associative, the Cirrus
Textures and Sky Colors update in a global automatic fashion to provide full
dynamics throughout.

To change between standard and dynamic themes, simply use the left/right arrows to
select the new theme names.

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

Theme Editor

Pressing on the EDIT THEME button from the main screen brings up the theme editor.
Here, you can edit the theme's details and variants, create a new theme, or delete the
existing theme.

To change the name or description of the theme, click in the name or description name
textboxes and adjust as desired.

To change the SKY COLOR, CIRRUS or CLOUD TEXTURE variant, simply press the left or
right (previous/next) buttons displayed for that category until the desired variant is
displayed.

To create a new theme based on the existing theme, press the NEW THEME button.

To remove the current theme, press the REMOVE THEME button. USE CAUTION - You
cannot "undelete" a theme!

Once you are satisfied with your changes, press the SAVE CHANGES button.

To cancel chances, press the CLOSE/CANCEL CHANGES button accordingly.

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

AUTO variants
You can select the "AUTO" variant in any category which will use automatic weather-
influenced selections (requires AS16/ASP4) each time the theme is activated.

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

Settings

From the SETTINGS screen, you can configure various options that will affect your graphical
experience.

You can also configure your simulators and simulator paths, enable or disable certain
categories, and reset to default options.

QUALITY
Use the slider to select your desired resolution / quality settings. The higher the resolution,
the higher the quality and the lower the potential performance. We recommend trying
various settings here to find the ideal balance for your needs.

ENABLED CONTENT
Each category can be enabled/disabled as desired. This can be useful when using ASCA in
combination with other graphics add-ons.

SIMULATORS
Here you can configure your simulators and simulator paths as well as which simulator is
currently active.

ASCA automatically detects the first installed simulator on first run. If you only have one
simulator installed, you will not need to configure anything here. However, if you have

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

multiple simulators, and/or want to change which simulator ASCA is targeting, or which
path is used for a given simulator, you can do so here by using the appropriate buttons.

For each simulator entry:

Use the Path Settings button to adjust the path for the associated simulator.

Use the Restore button to restore PRE-ASCA textures (i.e. default, or as per previous
graphics add-ons) for the associated simulator.

Use the Make Active button to make the associated simulator active for this ASCA
session.

In general:

Use the Add Simulator button to add a new simulator. You will then need to manually
select the simulator installation path. New simulators will be listed as either the simulator
name/version (if matched to known existing installation registry keys/paths), or as the
prefix of the actual path, if the name/version could not be identified.

Use the Reset Simulator Definitions button to clear all simulators and reset to defaults,
including the initial automatically found simulator (if found).

Main Settings Buttons

Once you are satisfied with your settings changes, press the Save and Apply button to save
your changes, or the Cancel button to cancel your changes.

You can also reset to default options by pressing Reset to Defaults.

Pressing Wx Influence Configuration brings up a configuration screen allowing you to

assign wx profiles to each installed content item in each category.

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

Wx Influence Configuration

Accessed via the Wx Influence Configuration button in the Settings screen, this utility
allows you to assign various wx profiles and geographic profiles (for latitude) to each
content item in each category.

To change an assignment, first select/highlight it in the listbox on the left, then toggle
on/off the desired wx profiles you would like to trigger this item.

Once your changes have been made, press Apply Changes to save them.

The wx profiles assigned to a content item will be used during automatic selections
including Global Automatic Theme mode or custom themes using the AUTO setting for a
given category.

Wx profiles/assignments are NOT USED for FULL DYNAMICS Theme Mode. FULL
DYNAMICS uses an entirely different way of providing variation that is intrinsically
associated to each of hundreds of potential cloud structures/models, and cannot be
configured by the user at this time.

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

Performance Considerations

While we have worked hard to manage a good balance between performance and quality
within ASCA content and technology, it must be realized that clouds are probably the
biggest overhead in rendering a simulation scene. During overcast and/or storm
conditions, very high scene complexity can reduce frames significantly.

We recommend utilizing several performance-related options/features to obtain the right

balance for your experience in all conditions.

Features, factors and options that we have found to have the measurable effect on frame
rates:

• "Cloudy" weather conditions

This appears to have the biggest affect on frame rates and depends on the specific
conditions entirely. If using real weather, the scene complexity will increase in these
conditions and reduce performance significantly.

• Overcast Cloud Models

Overcast Clouds contain the most cloud sprite/cloud objects and thus cause the biggest
hit on scene rendering. Using High Performance overcast clouds (per ASCA options)
can improve frames significantly at the expense of slightly reduced coverage. As an
alternative, use Balanced (default) overcast clouds which have a higher performance
penalty but not as severe as High Quality clouds, which offer extreme coverage but can
reduce frames significantly.

• Strained Video Card / GPU

With higher graphics settings, increased resolutions, new simulator builds with
improved graphics features, new 3rd party shader enhancements and more, GPUs can
become easily strained especially due to the above factors. A balance of graphics
settings and enhancements should be achieved to obtain acceptable performance, and
this may require compromising quality / features in certain areas.

• ASP4/AS16/ASN Smooth Theme Reload

While Active Sky's Smooth Theme Reload feature offers a much greater transition
experience, this feature can cause a high hit on frame rates, as the scene complexity
will temporarily double while one cloud scene fades out and another fades in. In
extreme weather conditions it may be desirable to disable smooth theme reload (by
enabling Local Suppression).

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

Getting Support

HiFi offers several options for obtaining support for Active Sky Cloud Art:

• HiFi Forums

Our own forums where you can discuss ASCA, simulation and aviation weather
with other community members, Active Sky users, and HiFi Developers.

Access the HiFi forums at www.hifisimtech.com

• Unofficial AVSIM Forums

A large simulation enthusiast community with a special HiFi/Active Sky forum.

Access AVSIM at www.avsim.com

• HiFi Support Center

The official means of obtaining support, including technical, order and billing
support. Uses a ticket system which allows escalation, current status, and
transfer of files (screenshots, logs, fixes).

Access our Support Center at support.hifitechinc.com

Our goal is to provide excellent customer service and meet or exceed your every
expectations. Please give us the opportunity to serve you!

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

Credits

Creative Designer
Diana Lopez
Assistant Developer
Kostas Terzides
Lead Developer and Producer
Damian Clark
Community Manager
Dave Opper

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 Active Sky Cloud Art User’s Guide

All of us at HiFi would like to express our sincere gratitude and thanks to the following
individuals and organizations for their support of our efforts and/or support of flight
simulation in general (in no particular order):

The HiFi Testing Team

PMDG
iFly
AivlaSoft
A2A
Majestic Software
Flight Sim Labs
Peter Dowson
Tom Allensworth
AVSIM
Lockheed Martin

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