Welcome to Developer Month 2019. Between April 8th and May 8th 2019, we will feature a variety of developers, publishers, community personalities and more who will tell us their story. From written interviews and blog posts to video interviews and more, we have curated a range of interesting content to maybe even inspire you to be one of these developers in future years. Please enjoy Developer Month 2019 as much as we enjoyed putting it together for you.
We couldn’t have put together Developer Month without the support of all the developers & publishers involved. Also, huge thanks to Thrustmaster for their assistance in sponsoring Developer Month.
April 15th: Imaginesim
Felipe from Imaginesim took the time to talk to us about a range of subjects such as how he got into development, his current role(s) at Imaginesim and what most excites him about scenery development.
Tell us a little bit about yourself.
Sure, my name is Felipe and I’m a fairly young guy who loves to sit in front of the computer and develop while listening to music and drinking coffee.
How long have you been with ImagineSim and what is your primary role?
I’ve been with ImagineSim for about a year now, although full-time for just about 6 months. My primary role actually “are” my primary roles: Design 3D content for our products and manage X-Plane 11 projects.
How did you end up in scenery development?
Ever since I had my first contact with computers I started trying to create things. It could be anything, editing a photo, making a very simple 2D animation, just anything that I could
create/edit, I would enjoy. With flight simulators it wasn’t different and as soon as I discovered I could create something for it, I started to learn it. I first started making liveries
for the airplanes that I enjoyed flying. I think the first one was for a 757F and it was a UPS livery. I love cargo and I love Boeing! A very frustrating experience, though… It took over
a month to figure out why my textures were super blurry and now I don’t even know the reason anymore!
Airport sceneries got me because I was kind of disappointed for the fact that my local airport was just a runway in the middle of nowhere. And I had tried to create 3D stuff in the past but I was never able to understand it.
With this motivation, I started trying to create my local airport and learn how to model something in 3D. After 9 months discovering things, asking questions and having a combination of frustration and realization, my first airport was finished and made available for those who wanted to download it. I received very positive feedback, very useful criticism and I became addicted to it. Here I’m still enjoying it and probably will enjoy for [insert a very good amount of time].
Is there an area of expertise you feel you have over another (e.g. 3D modelling)?
Hm… I think my main area of expertise is creating textures, which probably is a consequence of scenery development. Working with textures is also what I probably enjoy the most and things are easier to do when you love them more.
What skills did you learn in school/university that helped you with your current job at Imaginesim?
Basically, all of my learning comes from online content, books, videos, forums, asking questions for the most experienced people and etc. But talking about school, I think the
coding classes I had helped a lot. Not only about computers, but it also was the first project that I led, so it was a nice experience overall.
If you could go back in time and re-visit school, which subject do you wish you had paid more attention in and why?
Physics! Because I love it!
My understanding is that you’re now focusing on X-Plane development. What excites you about developing on various platforms?
Ah, yes. Right now I’m focusing on X-Plane and it is being awesome. I think that what excites me more about developing on various platforms is that it gives diversity. More diversity on the things I do. And it’s great. I really enjoy learning, having that kick in the discovery(as Feynman would say) is awesome for me and developing on various platforms just makes the learning more fun. It is challenging, the community is different in various aspects, we have different websites, forums, different people, things to care about. So what most excites me is to go to a new atmosphere and understand it.
How has scenery development changed over the years for you? Has it gotten easier or harder as we’ve seen new technology?
I think the complexity increases over the years as new technologies emerge and we put everything at our “pipeline”. So, dealing with everything is more complex in my opinion. However, at the same time, better solutions are created, software becomes less buggy, the system is more stable, faster. I think there is a balance between complexity for handling new technology and convenience of improved systems.
In the end, I think things are easier now.
Felipe is currently working on bringing KAUS Autin to X-Plane 11
How do you use community feedback to help your projects?
In a ton of ways. The community is everything for a developer and it really is what shapes our work.
I like to make notes of most of the feedback we receive so I can use them to guide me. We are all passionate about flight simulation and we all want the best experience possible, so it is very easy to understand the language in which the community speaks.
It really is a very amazing sensation when people like what you did, when both of us share the same love for that thing, that airport, that detail. I’m always trying to learn from the community and it has always lead me to improve my work.
Where do you see simulators in the next 3-5 years? What technology or tools would you like to see which would help you?
Good question. VR should increase a lot in the next years, I’m seeing a very positive acceptation from the community to it. PBR is also a thing that probably will increase significantly. It is hard to say where we will be 3 or 5 years from now, but I’m sure it will not disappoint.
What advice would you give an inspiring developer?
If you are someone that enjoys developing, then definitely go for it with dedication because the result will be very pleasant. It will be frustrating at some time, you’ll probably ask yourself “what the heck I’m doing with my life fighting with a computer?”, but if you enjoy it and you persist, you’ll be very satisfied once you accomplish your goal. Have a question? Just ask in a good way and you’ll be surprised by how there are so many great people willing to help you. The knowledge is out there, go for it.
Hope you do well.
==
Thank you once again to Felipe from Imaginesim taking part. You can explore the entire range of Imaginesim products on their store page.
[button type=”round” color=”#2074bc” target=”” link=”https://fselite.net/developer-month-2019/”]Developer Month 2019 Hub[/button]
Stay tuned as Developer Month continues tomorrow with QualityWings Simulations.
Content sponsored by Thrustmaster. Read our review on the TPR Pedal Set. | Read our review on the Air-Force Edition Headset.
