Toys – Page 5 – Fooyah

July 17 2021July 17 2021

Just The Way I Like It

This is the system I use to play on the flight simulator. I really enjoy my time flying around the world virtually and trying to split the journey up into twenty minute flights.

The stuff I have here is a HOTAS system from Logitech, two PC screens, keyboard and mouse from Razer along with two external displays. The Samsung tablet runs some software giving me a PFD and the information involved there. My phone runs some software which is similar to the tablet PFD but also includes glideslope information and forward terrain. In the picture below you can see my chair, which I absolutely love. It’s a lovely chair.

It was quite hard to get the camera to take a reasonable photograph of the system because I have a polarising filter on the lens and as the displays are also polarised, but in different directions, it means that I couldn’t really get the best direction of the polarisation. But I did ok. Here is what it looks like at its worst.

July 17 2021July 17 2021

There And Back To See How Far It Is

Parents are funning creatures. When I was young they had a couple of phrases designed as “in” jokes but possible more widely known, I don’t know. If my parents wanted to go somewhere but not tell us where we were going they would answer with “there and back to see how far it is” whenever we asked where are we going. It’s a vaguely amusing come back which really means “we want it to be a surprise, or maybe it’s somewhere you won’t like, so shut the fuck up”. Another in-joke was whenever we were lost or getting somewhere was taking longer than expected dad would say we are taking “one of mum’s shortcuts”. I guess the implication is that anything mum suggested was terrible? I don’t know, I’ve never really thought of it as sinister until know and I’d rather pack that one back in its little box. We once went to Flatford Mill as a family and it pissed down all day, so if it rains hard someone will normally make reference to Flatford Mill. It’s these little in-jokes that forge a sense of belonging and community [explicit sexism aside].

I’ve got a lovely scenery pack on my computer for X-Plane 11 and it covers the whole of the UK [I think it has Northern Ireland, I ought to check]. But flying around over the UK has limitations I guess and so for giggles one day I decided I would start flying following the coastline. I started at RAF Valley and headed south, I popped over the channel and visited Jersey and then I kept going westwards around France, Spain, Portugal and now I’m in the Cameroon. I’m not sure when I am going to stop this particular journey but at least I’m seeing other parts of the world.

This is a picture of the T-7N flying over Lac Bamendjing heading from Bafoussam to Ngaoundere. #roundtheworldflight pic.twitter.com/2WVoh2sF7E
— Ian Parish (@iparish) July 16, 2021

I have spent some time wondering whether I should get rid of my Twitter account as when I look at what’s trending or what people are discussing it seems full of stupid arguments limited by the character limit. There isn’t really any space for nuance and so I use it only as a place to plug tweets into this site. If I get rid of my twitter account then all the absolute glory within these communications will be gone. No one will be able to see my anger and sheer disgusting language over the years. Social media is bad for your mental health. It’s bad for society.

I am going to try and catalogue the rest of my journey in X-Plane on Twitter so that is a good use for the platform. I will not be using twitter for much else, although there are a couple of people I keep in touch with over there.

June 2 2021July 19 2022

Going Live

I’ve been playing around recently with live streaming on YouTube. Why? Not sure, I think it’s because I can. Also, each thing I do will get saved and added to my video collection. I have no idea if this is sensible or not but it seems fun at the moment.

Heading to Dakar. https://t.co/2FqjXZ955x
— Ian Parish (@iparish) May 31, 2021

My current plan is to fly down the west coast of Africa and then head up the eastern side. I’m hoping to get distracted by some mountain ranges and fun stuff. My general plan is to find an airport around 100 miles away, bomb up to 30,000 or so and then fly there. I’ve decided to skip Cape Verde, because islands are mostly boring. I figured that out while heading around the Canaries.

There’s not a lot that happens as I don’t commentate as I’m doing this. I’ve got the microphone off as I don’t want any house noises coming over the video. You can follow me on this map, but you’ll have to make sure you click on the link when I am flying or it’ll be boring, which even when I’m flying will be the case.

May 30 2021May 31 2021

Bayside Villa – Adjusted

I spent a little while adjusting some of the decoration on the villa. The idea what to make it still look textured but less “busy”. I’m not sure it’s complete yet but it’s better that it was in the previous communication.

RTX and the Villa - back view — RTX and the Villa – back view

May 30 2021May 30 2021

World Tour 2021

I’ve decided to fly somewhere in X-Plane. I’m not sure where I’m going to end up but so far I have travelled from RAF Valley to Mauritania [the worst country you’ve never heard of]. I’m doing short hops heading around the coast. The route has, so far, been roughly:

RAF Valley
Bristol
RNAS Culdrose
Southampton
Jersey
Somewhere in Brittany
Bordeaux or so
St Sebastian
Santander
Portugal somewhere
Lisbon
Faro
Gibralter
Morocco somewhere
Canaries – various
Mauritania somewhere.

For a laugh I have streamed some of these. I had streamed to Twitch but that doesn’t save your videos AFAIK and so I’m now streaming this stuff to YouTube. These videos are really NOT interesting. I’m not talking over them. I’m just recording the screens and considering that I get to FL300 and then go straight there isn’t a lot to see. I’m also using this as a way of learning more about flying aircraft. I think I’ve got the basics sorted. I can take off, manoeuvre, land etc but I want to learn a little more about a/c systems and so on.

I’m hoping the scenery will get a little better as I head further south through Africa. I think I’ll sneak out to Cape Verde on the next hop. I’ll also try to remember to fill the plane with fuel and use reheat most of the way. I’m curious to see just how fast I can get it going.

I’m using a multi-screen set up for these trips. The devices are as follows:

Main PC screen – X-Plane standard cockpit or outside views.
Second PC screen – X-Plane Garmin device and VR Tablet add-on.
Android Tablet – browser with details from X-Plane and ability to turn switches etc via the touchscreen.
iPhone – running X-Plane Control so I can see approach angles and flight information.

So, when it looks as though I’m not really looking at the main PC screen I’m not. I’m probably doing plenty of other stuff on other screens or just letting the thing fly. I don’t think I have breakages turned on so nothing should go that wrong as I’m flying. Mind you, I’ve had a couple of occasions where the aircraft has ejected me for some reason and I’m not sure why – I suspect it was over-g at low level. Anyway, I’m looking forward to seeing Table Mountain when I get there.

May 23 2021May 23 2021

The Villa

I really liked my beach house that I built in the Minecraft series that is on my YouTube Channel. It was placed nicely although a little small. So, in the latest world I wanted a nice big beach house. And I’ve made it.

Now, I’m not sure I’m happy with some of the texturing and so I am going to remove and change of it. There’s too much detail in the fascia of the villa. The villa faces east and so this is a shot of the house with the sun rising.

This is a more front on view and you can see the levels. There’s an animal farm to the right rear of the villa. All the storage systems and other farms are hidden in a basement to the rear of the building.

Here you can see the side of the villa and the animal farm. In this series of screen shots I’ve got RTX turned on and it’s lovely. Absolutely lovely.

This is the view from the top balcony. There’s a bridge in the mid-distance and that has the old entrance to the mine that we started. I now have a minecart that goes from the basement to the mine and I can get there straight from the villa rather than heading into the dangerous outside.

May 22 2021May 22 2021

I Felt Productive

I recently had a long session on Minecraft, I was stuck in the house and couldn’t get out as I was waiting for someone to come and fix my boiler. I didn’t really feel like getting into a TV show so I spent some time [too long really] putting an idea I had a while back into place. Here’s an overview of part of the latest world:

The mess top right next to the bay is the MAIN Base. I’m going to see if I can get some screen shots of it, or maybe give a walk around viewing video, I’ll see what I can manage. The big grey blob in the middle of the map is a gravel topped mountain and I’ve not been there to get the gravel yet but it will be useful at some point I hope. In the bottom left of the map you can see the nearest village to the base. I wanted to create a way of getting to and from the village without having to walk over land. I could have created a minecart track but in this world I chose to dig a canal.

This cross-sectional map shows everything at level 62 – sea level [currently]. If you look closely at the top you can see a thin blue line going horizontally. That is the canal I dug and added water to. You enter the canal from top right and move directly westwards and exit in the Great Lake. From there you follow the passages and mini-canal southwards to get to the village. There could be an issue that I can’t remember whether it was this village or not that had actual live villagers in it. I didn’t bother to check before I started this infrastructure project so it could have been for nothing!

My map making software also has a measuring tool. You can see that the total canal length is about 0.85km. So that’s 850 blocks long. I’ll probably create a video soon of the base and where the canal goes but until then, I leave you in peace.

May 20 2021May 22 2021

Well, At Least I Tried

Gran Turismo has been accepted into the 2021 Digital Virtual Olympics. Anyone playing can attempt to qualify and so I have. Attempted.

The first round is a time trial around a Tokyo street circuit which makes sense given the actual games are going to be in Japan. The circuit has a good mix of slow technical corners and high speed straights and high speed esses. There are some slightly annoying things though – if you touch, and I mean just touch, a wall then your lap is discounted. I have completed around 200 miles around this circuit and I think in all those I have fewer than ten green laps. I guess it means that I am pushing it around the corners but at the same time it is very frustrating. Maybe I’m just not that good?

After my first few attempts I managed a time around 2 minutes and I knew I could improve by about two seconds. I will have another go I think but it is marginal gains and I’m already too far down the rankings. I’m also about FOUR seconds behind those in the lead. That’s quite depressing. My driver rating is around a C or B whereas those at the top are all A+ rated drivers. I know I’ve been playing this game since 1997 but perhaps I’m not that good? Ahhh, I think I’m suffering a bit with imposter syndrome. Anyway, I made it into the top 5000. I’m nowhere near that now, but given that the “local” area is made of Europe, Africa and most of Asia I’m probably doing OK. Perhaps I’ll try again tomorrow. See if I can get below 1:59.

Here’s a screen shot of my initial qualifying time:

May 3 2021May 3 2021

ILS

I’ve finally got around to reading the instructions for my T-7 plane in X-Plane. I’m playing around with the beacons and following those as I work my way around Europe coastline cities.

Porto. pic.twitter.com/yNErq7GfMY
— Ian Parish (@iparish) May 3, 2021

I’m currently in Porto, Portugal and heading south. I haven’t decided whether I am going to carry on to Africa or just do Europe. I have a suspicion I’ll try to get around Africa but I am concerned that the number of airports will decrease quite significantly and I might not want to land in awful countries like Mauritania – look it up it has a terrible record on human rights. I guess I could always land on a carrier, if I can figure out how to put one near to me.

This is the view I get on my phone. There’s an X-Plane app that connects to the PC and displays certain information. I’m trying to improve my glideslope to landing and this is the first time I’ve used this app. It looks quite good and I get more information than I was expecting. I should be able to use the ILS system within the T7 but although I’m tuning the Nav to the correct frequency it doesn’t seem to be popping up in the HUD. I’ll just have to keep trying.

March 6 2021March 6 2021

The Good, The Bad and The Whoops!

Below I have arranged some screenshots from me playing X-Plane. I’m not really going to give any commentary. I should be writing a summary of this week of lockdown here but I genuinely am not sure what I can say without breaking my own website rules.

February 4 2021February 4 2021

Into The Woods

I recently set up a virtual competition at work. The idea is that everyone tries driving the Brands Hatch GP circuit in a game and records their best time. That seems simple I guess. The only rules are that the vehicle must be closed wheel and exist in real life. It would be too hard to specify [and then check] other settings like traction control, gear ratios, engine mods, aero packages etc. So basic rules and hope everyone plays by them. Yesterday I had a go in the Porsche 919 Hybrid. I thought I was doing really well and I was aiming for a time of 1:12 ish [this was my best lap time from composite sector times] only when I decided to quit did I notice that my Audi R16 had gone faster [close wheels cars that exist irl].

I’m reasonably convinced I should be able to get somewhere in the 1:11s with either the Porsche or the Audi. I’ll have another go tonight I guess and try. I’m not really bothering with the suspension set up and I’m not upgrading the engine [yet] the only thing I have adjusted is to tune the gearing to the Brands Hatch circuit. This makes the acceleration as effective as possible for all of the not-straights that Brands has. I took a photograph of my lap times because I thought it looked quite good. I’m not sure how consistent is a good consistent but I think it’s quite good to be in the low 1:13s.

As you can see my fastest lap was on lap seven of this particular run. I do think I should be able to get it down another second though. But this requires everything to be good on a lap and Paddock Hill bend is really annoying. On lap 8 you can see I was really pushing it and went off, I think at Paddock, I then used the rest of that lap to try some corners in different gears to see if I could take them a little faster or change the acceleration profile on the exit. Quite clearly after lap 12 I rage quit and decided that I wouldn’t get any better in that session. Let’s see how I do later today.

January 15 2021January 15 2021

Not Often I Actually Manage This

While avoiding all the terrible news at the moment I have been spending some time gaming because, let’s face it, other worlds are better than this one at the moment. I’m starting to look for ancient debris in Minecraft [seems like a job for me, just keep doing the same stuff] and I’m considering my YouTube series on aircraft in X-Plane and how to improve that. I’m not sure I remember what day I last drove the car. It might have been Monday, who knows? The heating in my house is going to fail and I booked a technician but I have to wait three weeks for that person to turn up, so it could get interesting over the next while. I have heating at the moment but keeping it going requires fiddling a couple of times each day.

Mr O and I have been looking for places to do follow-the-leader low flying. Our first attempt was through the Mach Loop and it’s slightly annoying that it seems that could be the best place in the world to do that. I had a go at Star Wars Canyon in the USA and it isn’t that long and was actually quite boring from a – you can fly anywhere in the world – point of view. So I’ve been looking at the Chilean fjords. They look more remarkable than the Norwegian fjords and I wonder if Slartibartfast had any role in designing them. So, along with my search to find somewhere to retire I am also looking for decent valleys and LFAs, Low Flying Areas. Currently I’m tempted with New Caledonia and Tierra Del Fuego. One is warm and tropical and the other is most definitely not. These are dreams really as I doubt very much that I could afford or qualify to move to those places and then end up being a burden on their healthcare systems. It’s nice to dream though.

In these times we have to take enjoyment from the smaller things and do our best to keep sane. It’s not going to be easy and the fall-out from this pandemic is going to affect people for many years to come. Hopefully we will have a government willing to cough up the money to ensure the best of all. They seem quite cash-happy at the moment but I suspect that’s because of business losing money rather than an overall caring for people thing. Let’s wait and see.

1564. I mean, I thought 500 a day was bad.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 15, 2021

January 2 2021January 2 2021

43 x 47

New year new glasses or however the saying goes. Not a lot to say but I did think I should write something before playing some games. Let’s summarise what’s happening at the moment:

Weather – shit
Human rights – likely to be trampled
Pandemic – still really bad
Roaming charges – likely to return
Horrible people – still in charge
Scientific illiteracy – still high
Uncle Frank – still a racist

So, going well in the new year then. I think I might start another miniseries on YouTube this time flying different types of aircraft in X-Plane. I just need to find a nice place to fly a few circuits. I expect each video to be around five minutes long. I need to have a practice at some.

I don’t do resolutions but I am going to try and play a more varied selection of computer [or console] games this year. I have many games and I enjoy buying them but I rarely get through them. I have some suspicions about why this is and I will probably write about that some day. But, much like buying books, getting new games is exciting and I like owning things. I’ve solved the books buying issue by buying a Kindle and making sure that I read more things more often. I’m doing well at the moment. It helps not having loads of channels on the television because there aren’t that many things I want to watch. There will be even less once the NFL season finishes in about a month.

Anyway, we have to keep our hopes up that at some point this government will accidentally do something good and actually help people. At the moment they seem to be a bunch of art history students trying to understand that gravity exists. Which is probably what they are:

Boris Johnson – Classics Oxford, Eton
Rishi Sunak – PPE Oxford, Winchester College
Dominic Raab – Law Oxford, Dr Challanor’s Grammar [state school]
Priti Patel – Economics Keele, Westfield Technical College [state school]
Michael Gove – English Oxford, Robert Gordon’s College
Robert Buckland – Law Durham, St Michael’s School
Ben Wallace – Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, Millfield
Matt Hancock – PPE Oxford, Kings School
Alok Sharma – Applied Physics and Electronics Salford, Presentation College
Elizabeth Truss – PPE Oxford, Roundhay School [state school]
Therese Coffey – Chemistry Oxford, St Mary’s College
Gavin Williamson – Social Science Bradford, Raincliffe School [state school]
George Eustice – Truro Cathedral School
Robert Jenrick – History Cambridge, Wolverhampton Grammar School
Grant Shapps – Business HND Manchester Polytechnic, Watford Grammar School [state school]
Brandon Lewis – Law Buckingham, Forest School
Alister Jack – Glenalmond College
Simon Hart – Radley College
Natalie Evans – Social and Political Sciences Cambridge, Henrietta Barnett School [state school]
Oliver Dowden – Law Cambridge, Parmiter’s School [state school]
Amanda Milling – Economics and statistics UCL, Moreton Hall School

December 25 2020December 25 2020

Could Be A New Thing

After the launch of my YouTube series Minecraft Megaship 3000, I have been pondering other things. I quite enjoyed the challenge of creating those videos and maybe I should do more? I might try streaming on Twitch and I think it will be flight simulation based. I’m just trying to work out what I could do. I might even stream some Minecraft. Who knows?

There are two videos currently live. Another six will be released with episode three today at 1500. The last video covers a tour with a ray tracing resource pack, it’s worth watching all the others for. Happy Noodlemass.

December 24 2020October 1 2021

Machynlleth Tours

I spent a lovely time last night flying over the Welsh countryside with Mr O. We both have PCs capable of running X-Plane 11 and as we near the winter no-work-period it seemed sensible to try and fly together. While this is possible it is not easy. X-Plane has the ability to link up with another computer but only if you are on the LAN together. This is somewhat irritating. Also, it will only link up if the copies of all the sub-directories are exactly the same. This is not really a possibility as neither of us wanted to change our personal set up. So, the next thing was to find a solution from the world of the internet. There are a few after market add ons that will allow you to fly together but I didn’t want to pay money [I think I might make a donation] and I wanted the simplest set up. I found JoinFS a cross-platform tool to fly together over different sims! Also, as an advantage it is P2P and so doesn’t rely on an external network or server.

Two Ships Heading For The Mach Loop — T7 and Tonka Live Flying

After a while trying to set the software up and not reading the instructions, because who does that, we managed to get one aircraft showing in my sim although Mr O couldn’t see me. I think that’s because JoinFS works by “knowing” the type of aircraft you are in and telling the other machine what type of aircraft to show. My T-7 wasn’t categorised and so nothing showed up for Mr O. This wasn’t a problem and we proved the concept worked with a trip around the Mach Loop until Mr O crashed!

On the next attempt we both had Tonkas and heading out to the Loop from RAF Valley. It looks like there are some positioning issues as Mr O’s plane was partly sunk into the ground and his weapons rack was ten metres from where his plane was, but you know what, at least we could see each other on the tarmac.

In the previous picture you can see my Tonka, Mr O’s and also his weapons rack just off his starboard side. So we headed to the loop. I think we did OK. I guess we might need a bit more coordination on airspeeds and maintaining a distance but for a first go it was done well. I think we did about three tours around the loop. In this next picture you can just see Mr O flying with much bigger balls that me!

We both ran out of fuel at some point so we had to coordinate pausing the game and adjusting the settings to add more fuel to the planes. This worked fine for Mr O but when my cockpit lit up like Xmas and I had run out of fuel I only had one engine burning upon game restart. I couldn’t get the second engine started, but that didn’t matter, we still made it back to Valley and landed.

I look forward to the next flight. I just need to pick somewhere cool to fly. Maybe the Swiss Alps?

December 23 2020December 23 2020

So, I Did A Thing And Learnt Some Stuff

Early on in this pandemic that is fucking the world I started playing Minecraft pretty much so I could engage in conversations with my kids and understand a little about the world they were obsessed with. I still don’t know everything but I know what I like and enjoy and so I’ve been building. It gave me purpose. I hated it at times, having to head off to the farm to get wool or go and get supplies so I can make concrete. I considered making a squid farm at one point, but just changed my design to have less black concrete. I quite liked the process of building a thing and then changing my mind about what I wanted to to look like or how to complete a particular section. I would often think about what to do while I was running or working.

I haven’t done everything I want. There are things I kept thinking about that I could make to increase the complexity of the build and make it look even better. I wanted exhaust tubes to be built heading from the base of the launchpad up to the ground level around 100 blocks away and these would have smoke constantly pouring out of them to look as though the rocket was taking off. I wanted to build a launch control centre like the one at Kennedy for the Apollo launches but I only have so much time and there are other things I like doing. I’m not a complete obsessive!

Once I had done enough – I don’t think I should say finished – I tried to figure out the best way to save this build for posterity. I have the world save files backed up and stored on a NAS and in the cloud. But I wanted to be able to show this off I guess so I looked into making a YouTube walkthrough. Now, I have some rules about this website and I decided I should have rules about the videos. I wasn’t going to feature my ugly face, but I decided I would in the end. I have an opening title card – ha ha, created in MS Paint – yes it looks cheap but these are my first videos. Not sure what I’ll do next. I’ve been really impressed with the video recording software and I found it very intuitive. So, here is the first in the series, Episode 1 of Megaship 3000.

It turns out I can talk much better if I have wine and it amuses me how stilted and staccato my opening words are. I think I relax a little once I get going and know what to talk about. Many, many thanks to Penguin for giving me feedback on the first few attempts at a video and I would also like to thank the penguin chicks for their advice which, as seasoned YouTube watchers, was really good. I guess it’s now time to publicise my efforts and think about a release schedule! There are eight episodes in all and I guess, one day, I might do this again.

December 5 2020December 5 2020

Megabuild Progress

So, as time goes I progress on my Minecraft Megabuild. Even as I continue to build I keep coming up with ideas for new things and extensions but I have decided that once I’ve completed the inside and possibly adjusted the route of the underground railway approaching the build I will stop. I’d love to make a launch control like the one at Kennedy Space Centre but maybe another time. I need to start playing on a new world. This server is now known as Season Two and Season Three has already started. I expect another couple of weeks of tidying up this thing and then I will start recording the tours. I’m keep planning how this is going to work. I’ve practised recording a video with audio and it went ok. I just need to sit down and plan the sections. I think I’m going to make each video around five minutes long covering a single aspect of the build each time.

I’m currently fitting all the control systems to the rocket. Really this is just a bunch of switches and toggles in places that look right. I’m also moving all the material I excavated from the hole into rocket storage. I guess my plan is to have this thing be able to blast off and then build a new world somewhere. I’ve got my cabin sorted and I’m pleased with the view from there.

I’m not sure how much time I’ve spent on this. It’s been around an hour a day for quite a while. I’ve been spending time collecting the resources as all this has been made in survival game mode.

I’m waiting on a new camera and then some more time just to sweeten off this model and then it’ll be record time. I’m looking forward, it’ll be a new skill and one that I’ve kinda tried before but the result was terrible!

Here you can see my beach house, tree farm, beach bar and monolith. There’s also a nether-portal and if you know what you are looking for you can see Beach Station. Anyway, just wait for the videos!

December 4 2020December 4 2020

Do I Want This Much Detail?

Yes – I suspect I do.

I’ve found a website which looks through all your GT Sport data and makes in nice and clear. I’m not sure what this means. I’m not sure if I want this much detail but I am sure it’s cool. There are a couple of sites that do this:

KudosPrime
Gt Sports Stats

Both of the above sites should link to my profile on those pages. This is what I have foiund so far:

I’ve only driven 35,409km. I think I probably need to get that increased. I’m also concerned about my driver rating, below, but what I can do about it I’m not sure.

I guess I just have to keep plugging away at this in between bouts of Minecraft building.