FSX / P3D scenery

FSX Make Photoreal Ground Textures Tutorial

Photoreal ground textures turn ordinary scenery into crisp, custom terrain with real aerial imagery in FSX. This tutorial breaks down the key concepts and walks through using SBuilderX to download high-resolution images, align them accurately, and compile them into usable scenery, with clear examples that make the workflow easy to repeat.

1.6k downloads 2.09 MB Scanned clean

Flight Simulator X Prepar3D

Images & Screenshots

44 total

A terrain resampler utility window displays detailed configuration text for processing imagery and blend mask files, with progress statistics at the bottom.

Aerial view shows a large roundabout with twelve radiating avenues surrounded by dense city buildings, displayed within a photo editing program.

A satellite map with a red selection box is displayed, offering four tile size options and zoom levels for map customization.

An aerial view shows a cross-shaped airport layout with intersecting runways surrounded by green areas, golf courses, and nearby residential neighborhoods.

A satellite-style overhead view shows a large park with intersecting walking paths and a prominent square, lattice structure at the center.

Aerial view shows a geometric park with a large rectangular building, surrounding pathways, and adjacent city blocks with several roads.

Aerial view shows a small airport with intersecting runways surrounded by green areas, golf courses, and several blue ponds.

A satellite-style aerial view shows a coastal airport with a single runway, overlaid by a software dialog box offering background image compilation options.

A top-down planning interface displays an aerial view of an airport runway with taxiways, buildings, and a context menu open.

A map properties dialog displays latitude, longitude, and grid settings over an aerial view of a coastal area with turquoise water.

A menu window displays map import and project options over an aerial view of a coastal area with turquoise water and buildings.

A map properties dialog displays file paths for different seasonal textures, with the summer texture highlighted and several control buttons below.

Aerial view shows an airport runway near a coastline with several irregular blue patches and the word flatten labeled offshore.

A single-runway airport sits between a coastal town and turquoise bay, surrounded by hilly green terrain and winding roads.

A top-down satellite-style view shows an island surrounded by deep blue water with several smaller islets nearby and scattered clouds.

A grid-based scenery editing interface displays a small island surrounded by blue water polygons, with labeled arrows indicating "exclude" and "Hydro Polygon" areas.

A scenery development tool window displays a satellite view of an airport near a beach, with the Photo Scenery option selected for compilation.

Aerial top-down view shows the Arc de Triomphe at the center of a large roundabout with radiating avenues in Paris.

A circular aerial view shows the Arc de Triomphe at the center of radiating streets, surrounded by a red border.

Aerial view shows a large formal park with tree-lined walkways, geometric lawns, and adjacent city blocks featuring rectangular buildings.

Aerial view shows a large park with geometric pathways, a prominent rectangular building, and surrounding city blocks with dense housing.

Aerial view shows a large city park with geometric pathways, surrounding buildings, and a circular plaza with vehicles at the bottom.

A large airport with three intersecting runways sits near a coastline, surrounded by water, roads, and scattered buildings.

Aerial view shows a large formal park with geometric pathways, surrounded by city streets and dense blocks of buildings.

A circular aerial view of a city intersection with radiating streets and surrounding buildings is displayed on a black background.

A large airport with intersecting runways is surrounded by grassy fields, trees, and a nearby body of water.

A coastal airport with a single runway is surrounded by turquoise bays, green hills, and scattered buildings near the shoreline.

A grayscale circular vignette with a bright white center fades smoothly to black at the edges, displayed in an editing program window.

A map editing utility displays several large tiles marked failed to download over a dark blue and black satellite imagery background.

A preferences window displays a list of selectable tile servers with GoogleSatellite highlighted and an option to enable GoogleSatellite checked.

A grayscale editing window displays a large white circle with a soft gradient halo centered on a black background.

A top-down aerial view shows a detailed city layout with a river, bridges, parks, and dense urban streets.

A large, rectangular terminal building with a control tower sits beside a taxiway, surrounded by greenery and nearby urban structures.

A small river lined with trees winds through open fields near a single runway with white threshold markings and approach lights.

A runway sits in the distance with visible boundaries between photo-real and default ground textures, labeled by yellow arrows and text.

A project save dialog window is open with the file name FSX_Photo_St_Barths and the save type set to SBuilderX (*.SBP).

A project properties window displays fields for project name, BGL folder path, and item counts for lines, polys, waters, maps, and objects.

A grayscale editing window displays an irregular white polygon shape centered on a dark gradient background, with rulers along the top and left edges.

A large rectangular terminal building with a control tower sits between taxiways, surrounded by grassy areas and urban development in the background.

A grayscale editing window displays several irregular black shapes scattered across a white background, with rulers along the top and left edges.

A coastal landscape features turquoise water, a sandy shoreline, scattered palm trees, and rolling green hills with small buildings in the distance.

A coastal landscape features turquoise water, a sandy shoreline with scattered palm trees, and rolling green hills dotted with small buildings.

A nighttime aerial view shows illuminated city streets and intersections with clusters of bright yellow-orange lights against dark surroundings.

A dropdown menu under the File tab displays options for creating, opening, saving, and importing projects, with some choices grayed out.

It is very easy to create your very own high-resolution, custom (photoreal) ground textures. This document explains the concepts and techniques and illustrates the use of SBuilderX with which you can quickly and easily download aerial images and make this type of scenery. By Luis Feliz-Tirado.

Example of photoreal ground textures.

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Free for all simmers · 2.09 MB · Scanned clean

File information

Filename

mkprtx.zip

File size

2.09 MB

Virus scan

Clean (scanned with ClamAV)

Access

Freeware

Content rating

Everyone

Download speed: Free tier is capped at 0.5 Mbps. PRO members download at full line speed.

This is a freeware file — use is subject to our freeware copyright terms.

How to install this mod

FSX / P3D scenery

Extract the downloaded archive

Use 7-Zip (free) or WinRAR to extract the ZIP to a temporary folder. Don't install while still zipped — the simulator can't read inside ZIP files.
Place scenery in Addon Scenery

Create a folder under FSX\Addon Scenery\ containing scenery and texture sub-folders.
Activate in Scenery Library

In FSX, go to Settings → Scenery Library → Add Area. Higher priority means it overrides lower entries for the same location.
Always read the included readme

Every mod ships with a readme.txt or README file. It tells you exactly where files go, what dependencies are needed, and any quirks specific to this add-on.

What’s inside this archive

The archive mkprtx.zip has 51 files and directories contained within it.

File Contents

This list displays the first 500 files in the package. If the package has more, you will need to download it to view them.

Filename/Directory	File Date	File Size
images	11.17.07	0 B
background.jpg	10.29.06	2.70 kB
banner_top.JPG	10.29.07	43.69 kB
Fall.jpg	11.17.07	45.52 kB
faro_autogen.JPG	10.27.07	38.47 kB
faro_no_autogen.JPG	10.27.07	35.18 kB
fs9_custom_ground.jpg	10.24.07	40.73 kB
fsx_custom_ground.jpg	10.24.07	76.54 kB
Hard_Winter.jpg	11.17.07	66.64 kB
Higuero_correction.JPG	10.27.07	36.84 kB
Higuero_no_correction.JPG	05.02.07	36.83 kB
hydro_polygon_flatten_01.JPG	10.28.07	56.02 kB
hydro_polygon_flatten_02.JPG	10.28.07	57.91 kB
hydro_polygon_flatten_03.JPG	10.28.07	32.23 kB
hydro_polygon_flatten_04.JPG	10.29.07	59.62 kB
hydro_polygon_flatten_05.JPG	10.28.07	31.71 kB
Night.jpg	11.17.07	28.93 kB
null_value_blend_mask_01.JPG	10.28.07	87.30 kB
null_value_blend_mask_02.JPG	10.28.07	42.99 kB
null_value_blend_mask_03.JPG	10.28.07	44.95 kB
null_value_blend_mask_04.JPG	10.28.07	43.63 kB
null_value_blend_mask_05.JPG	10.28.07	50.86 kB
null_value_blend_mask_06.JPG	10.28.07	52.72 kB
SBuilderX_01.JPG	11.14.07	24.14 kB
SBuilderX_02.JPG	11.14.07	38.09 kB
SBuilderX_03.JPG	11.14.07	36.80 kB
SBuilderX_04.JPG	11.14.07	45.16 kB
SBuilderX_05.JPG	11.14.07	53.48 kB
SBuilderX_06.JPG	11.14.07	42.37 kB
SBuilderX_07.JPG	11.14.07	63.68 kB
SBuilderX_08.JPG	11.14.07	65.18 kB
SBuilderX_09.JPG	11.14.07	112.95 kB
SBuilderX_10.JPG	11.14.07	61.25 kB
SBuilderX_11.JPG	11.14.07	87.79 kB
SBuilderX_12.JPG	11.14.07	62.48 kB
SBuilderX_13.JPG	11.14.07	60.77 kB
SBuilderX_14.JPG	11.14.07	54.74 kB
Spring.jpg	11.17.07	45.44 kB
Summer.jpg	11.14.07	38.92 kB
Winter.jpg	11.17.07	45.08 kB
x26_blend.JPG	10.29.07	36.55 kB
x26_custom_final.JPG	10.27.07	46.48 kB
x26_fsx_default.JPG	10.27.07	45.48 kB
x26_source1.jpg	10.27.07	82.94 kB
x26_tmfviewer.JPG	10.29.07	66.38 kB
x26_water.JPG	10.27.07	34.14 kB
Make_photo-real_ground_textures_in_FS_X.html	11.17.07	86.60 kB
notes.txt	11.17.07	574 B
Make_photo-real_ground_textures_in_FS_X	11.17.07	0 B
flyawaysimulation.txt	10.29.13	959 B
Go to Fly Away Simulation.url	01.22.16	52 B