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[EHood]

In the thread associated with Monty's recent release of the first Spanish Civil War missions for TGA, one of our colleagues, Aioros, posted a question about the pilot's gunsight in the Breguet 19. See reply #16 here:

https://www.sas1946.com/main/index.php/topic,51175.12.html

By the time the question was posted, I'd already flown the second mission of the 1936 - Uprising! campaign. At the time,when it became obvious that a battle was about to take place, I decided to make a quick-save track as a possible source for screenies worth posting here at SAS, and/or at M4T, where I have a running, more-or-less personal screenshot thread. When I actually flew the mission, I was sure that I'd shot down an enemy aircraft. Upon seeing Aiorpo's question I decided to study the track closely, especially for gunsight views. All but of the following screenshots were made with the HUD messages turned off. I turned the messages on for the next-to-last shot; this message confirmed the kill.




To get the best gunsight view in any aircraft, I use the Toggle FOV function, with the ~ key designated. In the case of the Breuet 19, this gets me somewhat closer to the sight than Shift-F1 or Delete. Moreover, the position of the ~ key allows me to set the FOV without having to look at the keyboard. (Yes, my force-feedback controller has buttons, but I'm right handed and side-sticking it; as it is, I have to reach across to manipulate the throttle slide. The ~ key is just faster and easier to get at.) Above is the best view I can get of the Bregeut 19 gunsight, even with my TrackIR system. The gunsight views for a few other aircraft are similarly awkward. For me it's just been a matter of getting used to it. In common with most biplanes, the overall view ahead is somewhat restricted -




to put it mildly. Tracking enemy aircraft in the Br.19 is mostly a matter of banking and rolling and keeping one's head on a swivel. The target is just to the left of the wing center support. Target views like this can be very short-lived, especially when one tries to kick enough rudder to get the target into the sight reticle.
The frosted-Perspex glare is interesting. This I also very apparent in some I-16s and the IK-3. In the case of the screenshot above, the glare doesn't obscure the target.




Now the target, or a portion thereof, is visible between the wing center support and the gunsight tube. It was also about as close as I wanted to get to the target; the risk of a collision seemed fairly high. It was at this point when I began to fire.




By the time I grabbed this exterior (F2) view, the target was trying to dive away. I never could get the target centered in the sight reticle, but the rounds do appear to have been headed in the right general direction.




Now the guy's turning left again. Great.  I thought I was going to have to go back to square 2, but -




this message appeared while I was actually flying the mission, so I was sure that I must have got at least one good hit. Here's an exterior view grabbed a second or so later:




Ka-blammo!

 After watching the track a few more times, however, I have to admit that I'm not certain whether I'd shot the guy down, or if I'd simply flown him into the ground. This does happen now and then, and it wouldn't be the first time I've been credited with a vidtory that resulted from crowding an enemy aircraft into the terrain.

In sum, then gunsight in the Br.19 is very difficult, though not impossible, to use. It would be nice, though, to have a gunsight view more like those in, to name two examples, the Buffalo and the Val.

Here's a link to the campaign and missions in question:

https://www.sas1946.com/main/index.php/topic,51175.0.html

[WxTech]

If you got a kill message, you *must* have got at least one hit--unless the scoring algorithm has been changed at some relatively recent time.

1) Is this plane's sight a telescopic one, having a tube of some length?

2) To confirm, has the SHF-F1 (game default) sight view been implemented?

If yes to #2 at least, a better sight view *might* be possible to implement without resorting to Java coding. This would require adjusting the CAMERAAIM hook location farther forward than the sight's 'lens', and creating a new reticle and reticle mask. Now, I've only modded existing sights, and don't know if making a new reticle/mask also requires coding this message in class file; a more competent authority than me will hopefully chime in.

If my ancient game version was set up for the WWI scenario I could look into this myself. But alas, I'd not be able to conduct the required testing...

But the notion I'd try is this:

Make up a black reticle pattern, with black circular aperture surrounding it and having its edge blurred, like is fine for the likes of the Val sight view. This texture is located something like 10m ahead of the pilot; far enough to render parallax insignificant. Its mesh is sized so that the central 'window' subtends a width of 15-30 degrees (depending on the real sight's field of view, and how much you're willing to depart from this as a concession to game play.)

The inside wall of the sight is modeled, in black, extending a not large distance forward; sufficient to block any sky that would otherwise be seen surrounding the reticle texture.

A reticle mask is created and located just ahead of the eyepiece lens texture, and also ahead of the CAMERAIM viewpoint. The mask's 'window' is a bit smaller than the sight's lens texture. This ensures that no part of the reticle can be seen outside the see-through part of the lens when in the 'normal' cockpit view.

The result, hopefully, would be a view like that for planes such as the Val. However, if not already coded to set a more zoomed-in FOV when SHF-F1 is keyed, then you'll still be at the same FOV that was set in your 'normal' cockpit view. (Again, assuming this whole notion can be implemented without Java coding being required.) Then you could set whatever FOV you desire.

At least, that would be my starting point.

[Dreamk]

In fact, from all the info I gathered, it appears that the Breguet 19 had generally NO gunsight at all - aiming being done using the angles between the various cockpit elements in front of the pilot (the frontal view was VERY limted on this plane, so whatever could be seen was in alignment with the gun/s (if any fixed guns was mounted - often these planes flew only with the rear turret guns). Rememeber this plane was not a fighter but a reco-bomber plane. Bomb aiming was done by the observer (and not the pilot) using a STAe bombsight (or other similar vector bombsight).

[Aioros]

So is bricks and rear gunner with this plane , well I will use dicta boelcke number 3 (without the sights part) to play this campaign, surely that will be fun and different.

Thanks for your answers is good to know that is not a bug of the plane or my cup installation.

[WxTech]

So I gather this plane should have nothing more sophisticated than a basic ring and bead sight? That would be a dead easy fix, which moreover would reduce target obscuration.

[Dreamk]

No, it was an optical tube (more a "vision tube" than a real gunsight) passing through the central mast, behind the frontal window. Look at this photo and you'll understand the problem.



Sometimes a real tube gunsight was mounted on the right of the central mast, quite excentred, like on this photo.



And, sometimes, vision tubes were mounted in the thickness of the central wing on each side of the central mats, like on this drawing taken from the Polish manual of the Br19 (Polish built machine like this one were delivered to the Nationalist side during the SCW)