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Panel popups and view changes
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| Robert | Дата: Вторник, 16.08.2011, 04:32 | Сообщение # 26 |
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| Thanks for that clarification. :) I understand the position of having a large workload, as I have been there myself many times. Thankfully I am retired now so my life is more "mine" than "theirs". I appreciate the answers, and will forget about that single heli that wasn't cooperating.
Being a lifelong "experiential" learner, I usually prefer to "cut to the chase" of the solution I seek, rather than go the traditional route of learning large volumes of surrounding fringe material over a long period of time before I can uncover the solution to the single problem in front of me. That said, your "stuffit" explanation is much preferred over the "technical twaddle". You accomplished the goal of explaining to me what that statement does. ;-)
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| cassini-m | Дата: Вторник, 16.08.2011, 04:32 | Сообщение # 27 |
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| I have been retired for so many years that by now I'm simply "tired..." My current "work" is the end result of what began as an extension of my flightsim "hobby," modeling and gauge/system programming! :LMAO:
My years of teaching "Introduction to Computer Programming" at the University of Florida Gainesville back in the 60's forced me to learn ways to explain complex concepts in simpler terms. I've always enjoyed teaching. It was the paperwork that did me in
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| Robert | Дата: Вторник, 16.08.2011, 04:32 | Сообщение # 28 |
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| My personal opinion is that someone who can take a complex concept and explain it in simpler terms makes a very good teacher! I'll bet you had a lot of students who enjoyed your classes.
My interests in FSX have taken a slight detour, and I thought maybe you can help me find the answer to my current wonder. In the Textures folder of most of the FSX aircraft I have installed there a lots of bitmap files. But some of them have no thumbnail. And when I try to open one which has no thumbnail I get variations on the following message, depending upon which application I try to use to open it. In a nutshell it tells me the file is too big to be opened, or else is corrupt, or is of a format that is unfamiliar to the application. So what's the skinny on those files? What program was used to open/create them?
The reason I wanted to look at one is that I have a really nice rendition of a UH60 Blackhawk. It flies sweet, looks really nice on the outside, and even has impressive sound files. But the VC has one 'flaw' I was wondering if I could somehow fix or at least improve upon. The right side "A" post for the windshield (where it meets the RH cockpit door) is extremely jagged and appears very poorly drawn. It looks more like sharks' teeth than a nice smooth angular part of the fuselage. I thought perhaps if I could open the file named "cockpit.bmp" I could play with a copy of it and perhaps smooth that out. But I don't know anything at all about how these files are used to formulate a virtual cockpit image. So it might be way harder than I imagine (which may be why it didn't turn out as nice as the creator may have wanted). But I was hoping I could leave all that to FSX and simply give it a better image file to use in its wizardry when it creates the aircraft.
Those bitmap files which do have thumbnails and allow me to open and view them seem to be a mosaic of elements. So I am guessing the segment of FSX that creates the aircraft uses these images as some sort of map and takes a portion of the 'map' and wraps it around the defined airframe, not unlike how scenery is created in FSX and other games. I've read a little about it over the years, but video games have gotten pretty complex these days so I am sure there is a lot happening I have yet to even encounter, let alone understand.
Anyway, if nothing else I'd like to know why the files can't be opened like a 'normal' bitmap with a typical image editing app.
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| cassini-m | Дата: Вторник, 16.08.2011, 04:32 | Сообщение # 29 |
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| The bitmap files to which you refer are compressed using various algorithims. Both FS9 and FSX Software Development Kits (SDKs) have a tool named Imagetool.exe that will uncompress/compress the bitmaps to either 24bit .bmp or 32bit .bmp type files.
DXTBMP.exe from Martin Wright will also uncompress/compress these files.
http://www.btinternet.com/~mnwright/
Since I have Adobe Photoshop CS4, I use a plugin file from nVidia that allows me to directly load compressed .dds files into Photoshop, and export new or edited files back to .dds format.
http://developer.nvi...adobe-photoshop
There is also a .dll file available that will allow Windows Explorer to display thumbnails for compressed .dds files.
http://developer.nvi...y-texture-tools
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| Robert | Дата: Вторник, 16.08.2011, 04:32 | Сообщение # 30 |
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| Thanks! I'll check those out.
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| cassini-m | Дата: Вторник, 16.08.2011, 04:33 | Сообщение # 31 |
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| DXTBmp is working for me, once I figured out that I have to edit both the opaque AND the Alpha Channel copies of the image file. But I had to import MSPaint from a WinXP PC. Windows 7x64 Home Premium's version of Paint apparently has no tool bar!!?? How useless!
The A post of the Blackhawk now looks better than it did to start out. The obvious issue is one of resolution. I am wondering if I could use a higher resolution bitmap to replace the one that was included for that section of the helicopter, or is that not a good idea? It comes down to not being able to draw a "straight" (no jaggies) line on an angle up the screen when having to use pixels the size of clay bricks. :) If I could go higher in resolution, the pixels would be smaller and then I could smooth out the line better. Is that doable? Or would it create problems integrating with the other images being used for the overall helicopter?
I took a guess at which format to save the file after editing. I noticed before I made any changes that DXTBmp showed in its header bar of the window that the image is an DXT3 bitmap 512x512 and 16 bit. So I am saving the edited file as Extended Bitmap DXT3 and that seems to be working.
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| Robert | Дата: Вторник, 16.08.2011, 04:33 | Сообщение # 32 |
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| For FS9 you can double the bitmap's size to 1024x1024 DXT3 .bmp format.
For FSX, you could go as high as 4096x4096 DDS/DXT5 .dds format.
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| cassini-m | Дата: Вторник, 16.08.2011, 04:33 | Сообщение # 33 |
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| That's interesting! 8X the resolution of the files I am working with. So would I make the resolution changes to the file I am editing with DXTBmp after I edit it, when I am saving the file back into the texture folder in the FSX aircraft? Or would I want to change the resolution first, and THEN edit the file and save it? The 2nd option seems like it would give me the finer editing capability I was hoping to achieve.
Thanks!
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| Robert | Дата: Вторник, 16.08.2011, 04:33 | Сообщение # 34 |
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| If you resize the bitmap image, you will likely have to repaint the entire bitmap, as all you'd accomplish otherwise is to increase the size of the original pixels...
In any case, increase size first, repaint/edit, then save...
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| cassini-m | Дата: Вторник, 16.08.2011, 04:34 | Сообщение # 35 |
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| I found out a few things by rote experimentation. All I had wanted to achieve is to smooth out the frame of the windshield in a Blackhawk helicopter I had downloaded. The original imagery had that A post looking like the teeth on Paul Bunyan's saw. :) I did try using some of the higher resolution formats like .dds but I ran into issues with the bitmap then being rendered at the wrong size to match the rest of the fuselage. So in the end I stuck with extended BMP but did increase from DXT3 to DXT5, which seems to smooth out the still unavoidable rough edges on the angled lines. Since I have other aircraft which are finely rendered, I presume it would be possible to do so here, but as you say I would likely have to completely overhaul the bitmaps being used, and I don't want to get into that. The improvement I made will be sufficient.
I started to describe the issue in text, and realized I can post the Alpha channel image I had saved which shows the issue along the left end of the windshield, and on the right is where I "fixed" it. Not perfect, but much better than before anyway, thanks to your help in figuring it all out. :)
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