# Modeling Scenery<no value>

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Due to the addition of [SimPropContainers](modeling-simpropcontainers/) to the simulation, this page is only relevant to the legacy method of modelling scenery, ie: large-scale modelling.

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This section of the documentation is designed to help you create proper landscape models, specifically for **Airports** and **Scenery**, although most of the general principles outlined here are also applicable to **aircraft**. On this page you can find some general information about how to best create these different model elements, and you can find additional information specifically about {{< glossterm >}}lod{{< /glossterm >}}s here:

-   [LOD Selection System](../lods/lod-selection-system/)
-   [Debugging LODs](../lods/debugging-lods/)
-   [Scenery LODs](lods/)
-   [Modeling SimPropContainers](modeling-simpropcontainers/)

 

Also make sure to have read over the [Modeling Technical Information](../../modeling-technical-information/) and [Texturing Techincal Information](../../textures/texturing-technical-info/) before creating anything. If your model requires lights, then please take a moment to look over the following page: [Lights](../../plugins/lights/)

 

Finally, we have a page specific to creating the **Jetway** scenery object, since this is an integral part of any airport and also requires some specific setup when modelling:

-   [Jetways](jetways/)

 

 

### Optimization Recommendations

The following are a set of recommendations that we make to ensure that your models for scenery and airports are as optimised as possible:

 

-   If you have a licenced copy of the Simplygon SDK, then you can use the engine AutoLOD feature for model LODs (see here for details: [Using Simplygon To Generate LODs](using-simplygon-to-generate-lods/)).
-   Share textures between different models and model LODs.
-   Remove textures you may not need at a distance, such as the normal map.
-   Use appropriate texture resolutions for your textures. It is usually not necessary that all textures in a material have the same resolution.
-   Use metallic/roughness/etc… material *settings* instead of *textures* when possible.
-   Use vertex color whenever you can! Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 uses a single vertex format, so using vertex color is essentially free. Because of this, low-resolution LODs often do not need a texture at all.
-   Minimize skinned mesh usage. Compared to regular objects, they consume a significant amount of CPU and memory in Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024. Use them only if mesh deformation is necessary. Skinning can often be avoided on lower resolution LODs.
-   Use [SimProp Containers](modeling-simpropcontainers/) when creating assets that have components which can benefit from being modelled independently.
-   All scenery models (and their LODs) - with the exception of objects that aren't important for collision - will need colliders. You should prefer using the collision shapes (rectangle, cylinder, sphere) over collidable meshes/materials. This is explained in more detail here: [Collision Handling](scenery-collision-meshes/)

 

 

### Optimisation Example

{{< image-center
    src="images/3_Models_And_Textures/Landscape/cdg_collisions.png"
    alt="Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport Model" >}}

In this image, you can see an overhead view of the model, and the blue boxes represent the collision mesh (created using rectangle colliders as explained here: [Simple Shape Collisions](scenery-collision-meshes/#h)). Now consider the following image:

{{< image-center
    src="images/3_Models_And_Textures/Landscape/cdg_meshsplit.png"
    alt="Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport Mesh Splitting" >}}

  
On the left the black box describes how the object was initially created as a single unique mesh of 1300x600m. However, on the right, the black boxes describe how this single object has been split into smaller **SimProp Container** objects that can now be clipped by the camera easily.