Compare and Contrast

I've been thinking about how realistic the view from the simulator is or is not. You can find youself really immersed in the experience, and marvel how true to life it looks. But then you can shift your objectivity, look again, and see that it is still kind of cartoony in many ways. I think one of the biggest obstacles to a truly realistic view is the matter of contrast. Computer displays are incapable of the necessary range of contrast. It would be neat if the computer could compensate, for example if it knew you were looking at the instruments on the panel, the scenery would be washed out. If you're looking at the scenery, the panel would become dark. In other words, it would show things the way your eye would see them.

In the image above, I manipulated a screenshot using the GIMP image editing software. I separated the inside and outside views. Then I blurred the outside view a bit, and drastically lowered the brightness of the inside view. The first time I did the outside blur I was amazed at how much it improved the realism. I'd like to try more of this type of editing, but I'd rather spend more of my discretionary time with the yoke or stick, instead of the mouse!