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Post by jacklyon on Apr 4, 2014 4:34:08 GMT -5
hi they look really nice all your building!
just one recommendation to improve textures
building look very clean/new
add some dirty to walls and roofs that will improve realism
cheers
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Post by Tom/CalClassic on Apr 4, 2014 18:22:38 GMT -5
Hi,
Yes, you often have to guess on hidden walls. I usually make them about the same as the visible ones, unless I have a reason not to.
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Post by lyoung on Apr 16, 2014 23:00:06 GMT -5
I've pushed this issue off long enough as it is now really beginning to cause me problems. I think the in-simulator texture issues are a result of the simulator reading the master textures for the models (which are 256x 256 jpegs). I have followed the tutorial as closely as possible, but, as I have newer versions of the programs, I can't follow it exactly. I load the textures that I make into SketchUp (version 13.0.4812) as jpegs and position them on the models accordingly. I export the models and I get a folder with the textures used in that model just as I should. I load the model into ModelConvertX (version 1.3). The process of conducting a mass texture transformation is a bit different that with the version in the tutorial, but I get a screen that allows me to specify the file format I want the textures converted to, the size (one power of 2 size bigger or smaller) I want, and a space to specify the exact file location the new textures should be sent to. This is all easy enough to figure out. However, once I hit update, I think things go wrong. I use DXTBmp (version 4.00.96) as the conversion tool. However, when it loads up, there is nothing on its screen and when I go to save, no save location pops up. From my understanding of the tutorial, DXTBmp shouldn't even come up, at least to the foreground. When I save from DXTBmp, I get no new files anywhere I can find, and I get the seemingly same results when I hit exit on DXTBmp instead of saving the files (which don't actually appear to save anyway). Does anyone use at least MCX v1.3 that does not have these issues? I am pretty sure that I have the paths set up correctly. The only question I have about proper paths is in the texture setting. The Texture Search Path Editor for FS2004 (which is what I use) is <[FS2004PATH}\effects\texture>. I have no idea if that is correct of not.
I'm running out of other things to do before this issue totally stops me from progressing any further. I only have the hangars to finish before I have to be able to place the finished models into FS so that I can set things like lights and carts. Any help will be greatly, greatly appreciated.
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Post by Tom/CalClassic on Apr 17, 2014 11:05:18 GMT -5
MCX 1.3 is very old. You should be using the development release (at least 1.4), unless you have a very old video card which will not support later versions (like this computer I'm typing on).
I have never had DXTBmp come up at all during MCX texture conversions - AFAIK MCX handles this itself and needs no external programs. I don't know why that is happening.
If you cannot get MCX to do the texture conversion for you, it's not that difficult to do them yourself.
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Post by lyoung on Apr 17, 2014 21:48:32 GMT -5
Well, that might be a significant part of the problem. I'll try using the new version.
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Post by lyoung on Apr 17, 2014 23:10:59 GMT -5
I discovered my problem, only to run right into another one. I didn't realize that when MCX (now using version 1.4) was asking for the path to Imagetool, that Imagetool was an actual program. I was trying to use DXTBmp as my image tool, hence the issues. I downloaded the latest version (3.0 which is very old) and installed it. I promptly got an error message when trying to convert my textures. It turns out that IT3 is incompatible with the 64bit version of Windows 7. Anyone have any ideas on how to get around this?
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Post by Tom/CalClassic on Apr 18, 2014 10:03:34 GMT -5
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Post by lyoung on May 14, 2014 23:12:26 GMT -5
Thanks to Tom, I was able to solve my issues with MCX, and have moved forward with the project. After some brutal weeks at work and the usual home life with small children, I have moved back to working on the hangars. Here is what I was able to do tonight. I was able to find a better shot of the hangar that the Navy built during WWII. Some of it is still just guessing, but this portion of it is fairly accurate.
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Post by lyoung on May 31, 2014 23:51:52 GMT -5
After being distracted for a week or so with another game, I have finished the Navy's hangar. This one didn't prove to be too difficult to do thankfully. Hopefully, I can stay a little more focused until the end. I only have a one more hangar to completely texture, one to partially retexture (the Curtiss one), and a few minor buildings to rework and texture. After that, I will work on the airport fire station that is south of the current terminal. Once that is complete, I will be able to add in ground details and get some sort of test release out, assuming that I can get it all to work...
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Post by lyoung on Jun 18, 2014 23:38:52 GMT -5
The hangars are complete (no screen shot tonight) and in place. I also have the terminal and North American plant also where they should be (I inexplicable removed the old terminal from my scenery folder, so it's not in yet, though it has long since been completed). And just when I thought I was about done, Tom, in a post not related to mine, mentioned the Historic Aerials website. I have so, so many more buildings to put in. I never realized how many buildings they managed to cram in around a not so big airport. Oh well, I do enjoy the modeling part, it's the texturing that I can do without.
On that subject, what is the normal size texture I should be using? Some of the masters are 2048x2048 jpegs, which then get converted to (at the moment) 512x512 dtxbmps for the finished product. Should I go down to 256 or do most of you use 512, something else?
Thanks. I'll get a screen shot up soon.
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Post by Tom/CalClassic on Jun 19, 2014 9:58:50 GMT -5
For small textures without much more than one building's walls, 256 is fine. If there is a lot of detail or multiple buildings, 512 or 1024 is what I typically use.
If these ever get converted to FSX, it is best to use fewer but larger bitmaps for a scenery project (the fewer the better). Arno says this is true even for FS9 (each texture file has an overhead in the video card that will be duplicated with smaller but more numerous textures), but video card limitations are rare in FS9 these days with the powerful video cards we use today. Not so for FSX or P3D.
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Post by lyoung on Jun 19, 2014 21:10:41 GMT -5
Thanks.
I have the hangar fronts/backs (this includes the doors and the portion above the door) scaled down from 2048, but they look quite a bit fuzzier as the other textures were either 512 or 1024. I have some quite detailed brickwork on the tower portions of the hangars that is 1024 that still looks pretty good when cut down to 512, but the hangar doors, even though less intricate, still look worse. I'll redo them at 1024 and see how they look.
I do have a lot of different textures mostly due to the wide variety of buildings with little carryover between them. I'll do a check on performance when I get done. If things get ugly, I can always combine the smaller textures into single, larger textures and just remap as needed. I will use some more generic textures when doing the myriad of much smaller buildings that have few photographs of them (some I only know existed because of the 1957 aerial shot I saw last night). Most of those will probably look similar, but we will see how it goes.
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Post by Tom/CalClassic on Jun 20, 2014 9:50:17 GMT -5
Keep in mind that if you are going to add 3rd party library objects or default FS objects to the airport that they do not normally have razor sharp textures (to keep the texture load down). So if you want everything to "match" you don't need to have razor sharp textures either. If they are all your custom objects then this is not an issue.
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Post by lyoung on Jul 6, 2014 22:49:10 GMT -5
Here is the added-to North American factory. After looking at the aerial shot from 1957, I didn't realize just how extensive the factory was. I was, in fact, missing two other building (both of which are still there). All three buildings appear to be connected by elevated and enclosed conveyors. There are some smaller builds that I am going to leave out for the sake of not killing frame rates. Attachments:
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Post by lyoung on Jul 19, 2014 23:22:19 GMT -5
I finally have all of the main buildings placed and in a single folder. I need to redo some textures and I am working on redoing a part of the terminal. The fixes won't take me too long to complete, so I should have a preliminary version for testing done soon. The first shot of the North American Plant Attachment Deletedand another showing just how huge the complex was Attachment DeletedAnd on of the four hangars Attachment Deleted
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