How to create photoreal scenery for FSX

[Jim Robinson]

If you drag "SBuilderX313\Tools\bglcomp.xsd" into an open Notepad window and then search the file for the text string "excludeExtrusionBridgeObjects" I'm sure you'll find it. It's not a filename that you're looking for, it's a text string within the file "bglcomp.xsd". These are "definitions" (I guess they would be called), a sort of library that bglcomp reads to tell it what to do with the code bits in the XML. I don't pretend to understand how it all works but I know if bglcomp.xsd is not present in the same folder as bglcomp.exe, bglcomp will throw an error.

 

Jim

[Zoandar]

Well, I went back and re-read archfer's posts to clarify what it is he wants to do, then decided to try something similar on my setup. So I opened the last SBX project file I had been working on. I selected the Exclude ( "X" ) tool and drew a rectangle off in the lake somewhere, just so I wouldn't make any mistakes with my own scenery somehow. As soon as I did, it opened the window allowing me to check the Exclude Extrusion Bridges checkbox.

 

Once drawn, I Selected All Excludes, and the rectangle turned green. Then clicked Compile. It created a BGL file instantly in the Scenery folder for the project area. The file started with "000". Not actually wanting this file, I then deleted it and closed SBX without saving the changes. But this shows the process does work on my installation.

 

I definitely DO remember the (seemed like a silly hassle at the time) procedure of having to install the SDK 3 times. So maybe that is where the problem lies for archfer. I agree with Jim's suggestion to try re-running the SDK installation/upgrade procedure and then re-install SBX. It definitely should work.

 

For whatever it is worth, I have a vague recollection of seeing that exact same error about not being able to compile and telling me to run SBX in a DOS window to see the error message. Since I don't know how to run SBX in a DOS window, I never tried it. But all I can recall from that event is that somehow I figured out I had been doing something wrong, and once I got it right the compile worked OK. If all else fails, never hesitate to shut down and restart SBX. Even Tiberius K. mentioned that it is not always stable in the beginning of this tutorial thread. I've had it get ornery on me a few times, and had to restart it. Then it ran OK and did what it was supposed to be doing.

[Zoandar]

If you drag "SBuilderX313\Tools\bglcomp.xsd" into an open Notepad window and then search the file for the text string "excludeExtrusionBridgeObjects" I'm sure you'll find it. It's not a filename that you're looking for, it's a text string within the file "bglcomp.xsd". These are "definitions" (I guess they would be called), a sort of library that bglcomp reads to tell it what to do with the code bits in the XML. I don't pretend to understand how it all works but I know if bglcomp.xsd is not present in the same folder as bglcomp.exe, bglcomp will throw an error.

 

Jim

 

I just re-read your post here, and it triggered the memory that, while setting up to do this tutorial, I believe it had me copy certain files from the SDK and put them together with other files in strategic places, and said it would not work if I did not do that. Something else to double-check, that you have all these files where they need to be.

[Jim Robinson]

You were instructed to copy resample.exe into your project folder, that was to facilitate resampling your PR from the local folder by dropping the modified .inf on resample.exe rather than adding your blend mask as a map in SBX and compiling from within the program. Doesn't have anything at all to do with compiling an exclude with bglcomp, they are two totally separate and unrelated processes.

 

Incidentally I created a shortcut to resample.exe and dropped it into my "Send to" folder, resample is available in any folder system wide by right clicking the .inf and choosing "Send to > resample.exe".

 

Jim

[Zoandar]

My solution was not quite so elegant. Since resample.exe is small, I simply put a copy of it in every project folder for every area I worked on. All 75 of them. :D But I like your idea better. :)

 

However, it seems to me there was more to it than that, but perhaps I don't remember the details. That was back in October that I set all this up and started the project.

 

Where was it we were told to install the SDK progressively 3 times? I was thinking that was in this tutorial, but it is not.

 

Ah, yes. I remember it now. Please see my post #38. The issue was that the link for the "SDK" at the beginning of this tutorial is in fact NOT a link to the SDK at all. It goes to SP2 for FSX. I found a link at the bottom of THAT page on the MS site that led me to the SDK and where I learned about needing to install 3 versions in succession. If archfer did not have the same realization when he was setting this up, then I'll bet he does not have the SDK installed correctly.

 

Tiberius, could you please fix that link to the SDK way back at the beginning of the tutorial?

[Jim Robinson]

If you have the FSX deluxe disks+Accel pack disk (FSX Gold) all the SDKs should be on the disks.

 

The copy protection on the disks will probably prevent you from browsing the disks in Windows Explorer but what you can do is "Run" the installers from the Windows "Run" box. On Win7 the "Run" box is in Programs > Accessories > "Run".

 

 

To install the first SDK put FSX disk 1 in the drive and run the following:

 

[drive letter]:\SDK\setup.exe

 

(where [drive letter] is the drive letter of your DVD drive)

 

 

 

Next put the Acceleration disk in the drive and install the SP1a SDK with:

 

[drive letter]:\SDK\SP1a\fsx_sdk_sp1a.exe

 

 

 

Finally with the Accel disk still in the drive install the Accel SDK with:

 

[drive letter]:\SDK\sdk.msi

 

 

 

If you can't get the installers to run from the "Run" box (I couldn't - copy protection again) check my blog entry for a solution:

 

https://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/entry.php?577-Installing-The-SDKs-From-The-FSX-Gold-Disks

 

 

Jim

[Zoandar]

Ah, Yes! I remember this BS all too well! Microsoft's own SDK files that can't be READ by Microsoft's state of the art OS!! Sometimes they just astound me with their............(fill in your favorite phrase here).

 

I was advised I could use a nifty freeware file utility called FreeCommander. If you remember what Windows file browsing looked like back in Windows 3.1, where we had dual pane windows and such, you'll be right at home using FreeCommander. It does a fine job of accessing and running these files.

[archfer]

Hi Jim

 

I'll give that a go. I'll also try Zoandar's suggestion of using FreeCommander.

 

Would another option be to update the .xsd file by copying and pasting the latest contents to it?

 

Cheers

 

Archie

[Zoandar]

Although that might get you over the current hurdle, there may be other issues cropping up later in your efforts with the SDK not being current, that have yet to reveal themselves. ;)

[Jim Robinson]

Here are bglcomp.exe and bglcomp.xsd from my Tools folder which should allow you to compile your exclude.

 

http://www.cat-tamer.com/flightsim/atchmnts/bglcomp.zip

 

 

I'll echo Zoandar's thought's re: current hurdle vs next hurdle - it's imperative that your SDK version match your sim version, at least check Control Panel > Programs & Features.

 

Jim

[Jim Robinson]

I was feeling "clicky" tonight:

 

http://www.cat-tamer.com/flightsim/atchmnts/click_click_frick.jpg

 

(adding another QMID 11 cell to the Maine project, wow, all in one whack. Not bad though, my index finger went to sleep and my eyes glazed over somewhere around point #3000, after that it was actually pretty painless :) )

 

Jim

[Tiberius K.]

Tiberius, could you please fix that link to the SDK way back at the beginning of the tutorial?

 

Done. :)

[Tiberius K.]

I was feeling "clicky" tonight:

 

(adding another QMID 11 cell to the Maine project, wow, all in one whack. Not bad though, my index finger went to sleep and my eyes glazed over somewhere around point #3000, after that it was actually pretty painless :) )

 

Jim

 

Haha, I know what you mean, and NEVER EVER accidentally press the right mouse button! :D

 

My record so far was 4500 points, so good to see someone even crazier than that. :cool:

[Jim Robinson]

Lol, yeah I've made the right click mistake a few times myself, hate it when that happens :) .

 

Got the new water polys and shorelines going in the sim. I was looking at it and having a heck of a time finding the edges of the QMID cell to check for mis-matches so why wouldn't I add some 700 ft tall google earth push-pins to mark the 4 corners, lol? Although that helped, there's still a lot of open area between them, so why not add a bright red "photoreal" border line around the perimiter of the QMID cell?

 

This was pretty slick, I made a 5000px square .tif in PhotoShop, all white with a 3px wide red band set in 1px from the edges all the way around. The blend mask is embedded as an alpha channel in the .tif, all black except for the area directly under the red band which was pure white. I made myself an .inf, compiled it and dropped it into the scenery folder. This made it really easy to find the mis-matches, errors, etc. and removes all doubt about which islands are part of the new QMID cell and which ones were there from the prior ones:

 

http://www.cat-tamer.com/flightsim/atchmnts/QMID_cell_markers.jpg

 

I love weird stuff in the sim :D !

 

Jim

[Zoandar]

Hi Guys.

 

I don't know how, but somehow my subscription to replies in this thread got disconnected.

 

Jim, that image in post 136 of the huge poly is drop dead gorgeous! I can't imagine how long that must have taken, and unfortunately I DO have the bad habit of almost unwillingly right-clicking in the middle of making a poly. It happens too often. I wish there was some facility in SBX to CONTROL+Click or something to remove the last point placed. Also I'd like to be able to add or subtract the node points, like I can do in TurboCAD. Maybe in version 314? lol.

 

Well, I've got something to share which, in my viewpoint, totally rocks this thread. Imagine if you could do a complex watermask and blendmask without TRACING the shoreline???

 

Well, I just DID.

 

Here is the 'comparison' image. I drew a yellow line across where the previously created segment, with a TON of manual tracing, ends, looking northward, and where my latest segment, with NO TRACING begins. This is near Trenton, Michigan.

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]141429[/ATTACH]

 

Here, I moved over that yellow line and angled the view down so you can see the details along the shorelines.

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]141430[/ATTACH]

 

Last night I loaded up my retail scenery for Michigan. About 32GB as the crow flies. Since it, too, has the same ugly "photo water" issue as Ohio's Lake Erie shoreline, and since Michigan is virtually surrounded by lakes, this is going to be a long term project. I then went through and culled out all of the BGL files the retail scenery had provided which included shorelines. About 187 of them. About 83 remain of inland areas, so I won't have to re-do those parts of the state.

 

As I set out to start this huge project, it occurred to me that I had so much luck in learning how to use GIMP's fuzzy select tool to select marinas, with their tiny boats and docks, and add those into the watermask of my Ohio scenery, maybe I could actually use the tool to MAKE the watermask, instead of doing all that tracing? I decided it was worth a try, at the very least.

 

So, using it to select the water in the bitmap image of this area, I then used either SHIFT+click to add pixel colors the fuzzy select tool had excluded, or CONTROL+click to remove ones that had been included. Doing that, I could watch the marching ants of the selection literally snap into and hug the shoreline and all its protrusions. I made several trips around the image watching for pixels I wanted to include or exclude, until I got what seemed to be a pretty good selection of the entire watermask for this rather complex watery area.

 

I then used the selection to create both the Watermask and Blendmask layers for GIMP by brushing it in with 100% black on the Watermask, and 50% black on the Blendmask. Inverting the selection I brushed in 100% white on those 2 layers. Then I went over the shorelines in the Blendmask layer with my gradient airbrush technique, described above. I then added a 'green' layer to correct this area's red coloration from the imagery. In less than an hour, I had all this done, plus compiling it to the BGL, and making the hydro-poly in SBX. It would have taken a LOT longer to trace this all out. Twice.

 

I think it turned out just as nice as anything I could have made by arduously tracing. What do you guys think?

 

If any of you reading this tutorial have not yet gotten into using the Fuzzy Select tool, and how to constrain it with channels when needed (I did not need to do that on this segment at all) I urge you to spend the time. It is WELL worth it. The Fuzzy Select tool has its issues sometimes, but at least for this segment, it saved me hours of work. One contributing factor no doubt is the red-shifted scenery itself. This makes the tool's job of discerning land from water a lot easier. In areas where the land is nice and green, and the water in the photo image is actually water colored, it might not work as well.

 

Sometimes I find some watermask that wasn't done neatly, and I have to clean that up a bit alternating between the black and white brush to cover the stray pixels. But overall it is still a lot quicker and less tedious than tracing everything.

[Jim Robinson]

I wish there was some facility in SBX to CONTROL+Click or something to remove the last point placed. Also I'd like to be able to add or subtract the node points, like I can do in TurboCAD. Maybe in version 314? lol.

 

I get used to using the polygonal lasso tool in PhotoShop which works similarly to the polygon tool in SBX. In PS you can remove the last point by pressing the backspace key so I find myself trying to do that in SBX constantly. Fortunately it doesn't have any negative consequences in SBX like the dreaded right click :) Incidentally you can add or subtract a polygon (or line) point in SBX by holding down "I" (insert point) or "D" (delete point) as you click the edge of the poly. That applies only after you've finished the poly, doesn't appear to have any effect while you're actually clicking your way through making the poly.

 

I'm Gimp illiterate but your fuzzy select tool sounds like the PhotoShop equivalent of the magic wand tool:

 

http://www.cat-tamer.com/flightsim/atchmnts/CS2_magic_wand_tool.jpg

 

I've used it for water masking, and if the water area is fairly consistent (devoid of off-colored areas due to the sun glinting off the waves and what not) it does indeed work quite well. My personal preference for both water and blend masking however is the "magnetic lasso tool" which simply follows a contrasting edge depending on a pre-set tolerance as you move the mouse (no clicking involved). It definitely takes a little longer than the magic wand tool but it doesn't leave the odd spot in the middle of the water that didn't get selected because it was just outside of the color tolerance, and also it doesn't spill the selection out onto areas on the shoreline when tree shadows cause those to be "within tolerance". With the magnetic lasso tool you can take over "manual control" at any point in the selection process by simply clicking to set a point, pressing ALT while clicking puts you temporarily into polygonal lasso mode where edge contrast is ignored so you can make straight lines if need be.

 

BTW the Adobe CS2 family of products was recently made available to the public. Adobe initially claimed that they'd made changes to the activation server and were therefore posting download links and serial numbers so that legit users of CS2 products could continue using their software. Nudge nudge, wink wink, I believe they actually felt the CG public was starting to get a little too familiar with Gimp. Let your conscious be your guide but the general consensus in several discussion threads seems to be that it's perfectly legal for anyone to install and use these products according to the EULA. Those can be downloaded here:

 

http://www.adobe.com/downloads/cs2_downloads/index.html

 

Regarding operating system compatibility, I've been using a legit copy of PhotoShop CS2 on Win7 64 for almost 2 years (and on WinXP for several years prior), it works just fine.

 

CS2 is amazingly capable software, it does everything I need and I see no need to upgrade. I understand of course that as you become more and more adept with Gimp that you likely feel the same way about it and probably see no need to upgrade either. I know commercial FS developers that own PhotoShop, yet still prefer to use Gimp. I personally find PhotoShop to be much more stable, I have some large imagery files (1-1.5 Gb+) that I routinely edit in PS but Gimp chokes on them due to their size.

 

Jim

[Zoandar]

Thanks for the heads up, Jim. I'll keep it in mind, but I would not be inclined to have to start again on a learning curve unless I ran into something GIMP could not do that I needed to do. One problem with these feature-rich programs is that their help files read like an encyclopedia in a foreign language. Written by those who already know the names for everything and how to use them. Not at all newbie friendly. So when I finally get my teeth into one as I am doing with GIMP I tend to stick with it.

 

I need a bit of help. I can post this elsewhere, but if you good folks happen to know the yes/no answer it will save me some time.

 

Is it possible to use a tool such as Instant Scenery 2, which I have used quite a bit, so I know my way around in it fairly well, to move an FSX autogen building or object? Or is there some reason one can't do that?

 

I have some factory buildings poorly placed along the Detroit River where I just created custom scenery. FSX has them hanging out into the water. So I would like to move/re-orient them. I found the FSX/Scenery/0302/OBX25160.BGL file in which they reside, so have IS2 displaying their label as being in that file. When I move one of them, I quickly see Windows cursor "circle of death" spinning, and then FSX 'stops responding' and I have to restart it. I just did this 4 times in a row. So then the 5th time I opened one of my own collection of BGL files in which I have placed hundreds of scenery objects around the country with IS2, and planted a few trees next to the factory. No problem doing that. So I switch and open the above file, move a factory building, and FSX instantly crashes again.

 

Is the only way to deal with these auto-gen buildings to actually EXCLUDE them (with a polygon in SBX, for example), and then have to re-create them if we want them, in our OWN BGL file??

[Jim Robinson]

Well if they're in OBX25160 according to IS2 they aren't autogen, but just a placement of a generic object. Could be a "generic building" too which is a little different than a standard library object in that the size and texturing is scripted into the XML that the bgl is compiled from rather than contained in a .mdl like you'd make with gmax or sketchup. I don't think IS2 understands generic buildings so that may explain the crash. Autogen placements are in the .agn files, those would be in your local texture folder for an autogenned photoscenery, or in the main scenery\world\texture folder in the case of landclass textures. Further, here we are back at the modifying default files debate, which is what IS2 would have to do to move them. I'd say it'd be far better to exclude them and then add them back in the correct locations with a local placement file as you mentioned in your last sentence. Incidentally I just had the exact same problem last evening with some radio towers that were placed in the water half a mile from the shoreline. I can't see on any aviation sectional where they exist anywhere near there in the real world so I just made a small exclude and didn't bother putting them back.

 

IS2 can make an exclude too BTW, but they are an odd duck. I tried that for the first time on the radio towers, yeah it got rid of them, but for grins I decompiled the resulting .bgl and found that it actually contained a .mdl of some sort and a placement of said model. I tried to open the .mdl in MCX and it reported it to be an "empty model". I have no idea what this is about, I deleted the .bgl and made an exclude with SBX.

 

I hear ya on sticking to whichever program you learned on, I started out with PhotoShop Elements long ago, then moved to PhotoShop 7, and now finally CS2. I have Gimp 2.8 installed but every time I open it I usually end up playing around for a few minutes and then closing it before actually causing it to do something productive. Help files? Real men don't read help files my friend, lol. Seriously, I know what you mean, most every trick I know in PhotoShop is something I picked up from some forum post or accidentally stumbled onto by dumb-thumbing the wrong key and realizing "hey look at that, I can pan around while selecting with the lasso tool if I hold the space bar down", etc. I just had one of those "aha moments" a couple nights ago, damned if I can remember what it was now though. Hell I can't even remember which program it was in, I think it was gmax, I dunno. I love this old age thing :rolleyes:

 

Jim

 

EDIT: Oh BTW, I'm in \0302 also, 2916, maybe we'll bump into each other one day :D .

[Zoandar]

I just ran into the same problem as archfer. As I worked up the Detroit River, I came upon the Ambassador Bridge going across it from Detroit to Windsor. And of course, it is not correctly positioned on the satellite imagery. So what did you guys ever decide was the course of action needed to move one of these bridges?

 

Edit - OK, I got it to be excluded, but NOT with the "Exclude Extrusion Bridges" option in an SBX Exclude rectangle. That did not make it go away. I had to ADD "Library Objects" to that, re-compile the exclusion rectangle and reload it in FSX. THEN the bridge went away.

 

If anyone could tell me what BGL file I might find one of these suspension bridges, so I can place a new one with Instant Scenery 2, please let me know. Aha! There is a "bridges.bgl" in my arsenal for IS2/Rwy12 Object Placer. :)

 

Edit - That was pretty painless. I had to remove/edit the appearance of all the bridge imagery from the base image bitmap as well as all the masks and layers used in this segment. So now I am thinking this bridge was not an Extrusion Bridge. Where can I find information on what those are?

[Tiberius K.]

 

EDIT: Oh BTW, I'm in \0302 also, 2916, maybe we'll bump into each other one day :D .

 

I'm in \0004, 0737 - pretty empty there! :cool:

[Zoandar]

Well if they're in OBX25160 according to IS2 they aren't autogen, but just a placement of a generic object. Could be a "generic building" too which is a little different than a standard library object in that the size and texturing is scripted into the XML that the bgl is compiled from rather than contained in a .mdl like you'd make with gmax or sketchup. I don't think IS2 understands generic buildings so that may explain the crash. Autogen placements are in the .agn files, those would be in your local texture folder for an autogenned photoscenery, or in the main scenery\world\texture folder in the case of landclass textures. Further, here we are back at the modifying default files debate, which is what IS2 would have to do to move them. I'd say it'd be far better to exclude them and then add them back in the correct locations with a local placement file as you mentioned in your last sentence. Incidentally I just had the exact same problem last evening with some radio towers that were placed in the water half a mile from the shoreline. I can't see on any aviation sectional where they exist anywhere near there in the real world so I just made a small exclude and didn't bother putting them back.

 

IS2 can make an exclude too BTW, but they are an odd duck. I tried that for the first time on the radio towers, yeah it got rid of them, but for grins I decompiled the resulting .bgl and found that it actually contained a .mdl of some sort and a placement of said model. I tried to open the .mdl in MCX and it reported it to be an "empty model". I have no idea what this is about, I deleted the .bgl and made an exclude with SBX.

 

I hear ya on sticking to whichever program you learned on, I started out with PhotoShop Elements long ago, then moved to PhotoShop 7, and now finally CS2. I have Gimp 2.8 installed but every time I open it I usually end up playing around for a few minutes and then closing it before actually causing it to do something productive. Help files? Real men don't read help files my friend, lol. Seriously, I know what you mean, most every trick I know in PhotoShop is something I picked up from some forum post or accidentally stumbled onto by dumb-thumbing the wrong key and realizing "hey look at that, I can pan around while selecting with the lasso tool if I hold the space bar down", etc. I just had one of those "aha moments" a couple nights ago, damned if I can remember what it was now though. Hell I can't even remember which program it was in, I think it was gmax, I dunno. I love this old age thing :rolleyes:

 

Jim

 

EDIT: Oh BTW, I'm in \0302 also, 2916, maybe we'll bump into each other one day :D .

 

Thanks for the clarifications! It seems you've been around a lot more (scenery) blocks than I have. ;) I'm still learning what everything is called. Question - Could one say "autogen" items are those which will suddenly appear out in front of you while flying (especially at lower LOD levels) like trees and things, whereas the skyscrapers, bridges, etc. which can be seen the whole time, even from a distance, would be "generic placement items"?

 

Actually, excluding the bridge and then placing a new one was quite easy, and in the interim of those steps I realized I needed to edit the bitmap image to get rid of the photo rendering of the bridge and access ramps. Which quickly materialized into the realization that I had to edit not only the base image, but 2 coloration layers, both water masks, and the layer I call GREENWatermask, which is a copy of the Watermask.bmp layer with the black replaced by 273d2d green that I use as a uniform base color under all the water in my scenery. I might not have thought to do that had it been easy to just move the bridge. I think your explanation of the bridge being hard coded and compiled is probably spot on, because on at least one instance of the crash, the factory I had moved and rotated jumped back to its default position and orientation just as FSX was locking up.

 

One big reason I like to stick with a learned program is that I usually find the settings the programmer chose as defaults in most programs to be the opposite of what I want. So once I get one set up I would rather not have to start all over again. I still recall my hours and hours of utter frustration when first learning Corel Draw 8 years back, trying to figure out WHY none of my shape "fills" were being displayed. After a LOT of digging in, as some like to call it, the Helpless File, I finally unearthed the well hidden and mostly unmentioned tidbit that the program defaults to "wire frame mode", so doesn't SHOW fills. Seems to me that should be a prominent user setting to turn ON if you want it, not to have to turn OFF as a newbie.

 

I'll keep an eye out for you in 0302 ;). Actually, years ago when our youngest son was still in middle school he and I used to engage in multiplayer flight in FS. That was back before we had ways to communicate with other players in these games. I researched, designed, and built a set of headset amplifiers with wiring strung between our adjacent rooms so we could talk to each other over the headsets while flying together. Very fond memories for both of us. He no longer seems to find the time, as a GE Field Engineer now, out of Colorado, but now and then mentions how much he misses, and would like to resume, the multiplayer flight one day. Probably one of the rare moments when video/computer games actually brought a kid 'closer' to a parent. lol.

 

Oh, and I should mention.....his name is Jim. :)

[Zoandar]

I'm in \0004, 0737 - pretty empty there! :cool:

 

What part of the world is that?

[Jim Robinson]

I just ran into the same problem as archfer. As I worked up the Detroit River, I came upon the Ambassador Bridge going across it from Detroit to Windsor. And of course, it is not correctly positioned on the satellite imagery. So what did you guys ever decide was the course of action needed to move one of these bridges?

 

The problem Archie was having is that the exclude simply wouldn't compile with "exclude extrusion bridges" ticked. I'm curious, in your case did you get any actual errors when you tried to compile the .bgl? Was a .bgl in fact generated?

 

 

...Could one say "autogen" items are those which will suddenly appear out in front of you while flying (especially at lower LOD levels) like trees and things, whereas the skyscrapers, bridges, etc. which can be seen the whole time, even from a distance, would be "generic placement items"?

 

I think that's basically correct, an easy way to differentiate between autogen and placed objects is to temporarily move your autogen slider all the way left - anything that remains visible will be placed objects or generic buildings - everything that goes away will be autogen. That brings up another subject, at some point in your project you'll want to check out the area with your scenery complexity slider maxed if you don't run with it maxed all the time. This will show up all placed objects, where with lesser settings there may be objects hidden that you're not seeing. Suppose you build a scenery at "scenery complexity: dense", bundle it up and release it. An end user immediately complains that there are some buildings that show up in the water somewhere, lo and behold he is running "scenery complexity: extremely dense" and seeing some buildings that you didn't. See what I mean? Just an FYI...

 

...in the interim of those steps I realized I needed to edit the bitmap image to get rid of the photo rendering of the bridge and access ramps. Which quickly materialized into the realization that I had to edit not only the base image, but 2 coloration layers, both water masks, and the layer I call GREENWatermask, which is a copy of the Watermask.bmp layer with the black replaced by 273d2d green that I use as a uniform base color under all the water in my scenery.

 

I know nothing about Gimp, but in PhotoShop you have "adjustment layers". Generally I make no changes to the actual imagery itself, it remains complately intact at the very bottom of the layers stack. Overtop of that you can add a "Selective color" adjustment layer and adjust sliders ad-naseaum until you get the desired coloration. When you need to do something like edit the bridge out you can simply stamp out the bridge by whatever means possible on the base imagery, the coloration remains intact since the adjustment layer affects whatever is below it. Further these color adjustment settings can be saved to a file, then when you start working on another piece of nearby imagery you can simply import the settings into another selective color layer and the new imagery will match the prior with just a few clicks. You might have a look and see if Gimp has a similar function, it could save you a lot of fiddling.

 

I'm in \0004, 0737 - pretty empty there! :cool:

Let us know if you get lonely out there in 0004 Tiberius, we'll come and pay you a visit :) .

 

 

Some work on the night environment:

 

http://www.cat-tamer.com/flightsim/atchmnts/kbhb_07.jpg

 

http://www.cat-tamer.com/flightsim/atchmnts/kbhb_08.jpg

 

http://www.cat-tamer.com/flightsim/atchmnts/kbhb_09.jpg

 

http://www.cat-tamer.com/flightsim/atchmnts/kbhb_10.jpg

 

 

Jim

[Zoandar]

The problem Archie was having is that the exclude simply wouldn't compile with "exclude extrusion bridges" ticked. I'm curious, in your case did you get any actual errors when you tried to compile the .bgl? Was a .bgl in fact generated?

 

No error, it just compiled the exclude into a BGL. But loading it made no difference until I went back and added a checkmark in the Exclude Objects checkbox and recompiled. Then the bridge was gone.

 

 

 

 

I think that's basically correct, an easy way to differentiate between autogen and placed objects is to temporarily move your autogen slider all the way left - anything that remains visible will be placed objects or generic buildings - everything that goes away will be autogen. That brings up another subject, at some point in your project you'll want to check out the area with your scenery complexity slider maxed if you don't run with it maxed all the time. This will show up all placed objects, where with lesser settings there may be objects hidden that you're not seeing. Suppose you build a scenery at "scenery complexity: dense", bundle it up and release it. An end user immediately complains that there are some buildings that show up in the water somewhere, lo and behold he is running "scenery complexity: extremely dense" and seeing some buildings that you didn't. See what I mean? Just an FYI...

 

I see your point. Something I had not thought much about, because I doubt I'll ever distribute this scenery I am making. I like to run with the settings as close to max as I can get them, but because I prefer to fly a lot of helicopters, I often have to reduce some of the settings to keep the fps up where a copter flys smoothly. They seem to cause quite a hit on the fps compared to a plane - like cutting the fps in half. Mostly in external view, but I do a lot of that.

 

 

I know nothing about Gimp, but in PhotoShop you have "adjustment layers". Generally I make no changes to the actual imagery itself, it remains complately intact at the very bottom of the layers stack. Overtop of that you can add a "Selective color" adjustment layer and adjust sliders ad-naseaum until you get the desired coloration. When you need to do something like edit the bridge out you can simply stamp out the bridge by whatever means possible on the base imagery, the coloration remains intact since the adjustment layer affects whatever is below it. Further these color adjustment settings can be saved to a file, then when you start working on another piece of nearby imagery you can simply import the settings into another selective color layer and the new imagery will match the prior with just a few clicks. You might have a look and see if Gimp has a similar function, it could save you a lot of fiddling.

 

GIMP has layers, and that is how I do these kinds of corrections such as coloration changes. For removing the bridge, though, I did edit the base image. I always keep the "original" bitmap in the project folder in case I need to go back and undo something crucial. I had not thought to try saving a layer or layers as a file. I'll have to look into that, especially since some of what I am doing is essentially an exact repeat of the previous area in a layer, over and over. Dealing with the red-shifted scenery, for example. Something else to learn in GIMP. :)

 

 

 

Jim

 

Nice job on the night scenery! I have not ever tried doing any of that.

[G_Fil_24]

Hello.

I have a problem.

On step IV-4, when I drag the .inf file to resample.exe, resample opens for a second and then closes.

Any help?

 

EDIT:

Here's the content of the .inf file:

 

[source]

Type = MultiSource

NumberOfSources = 3

 

[source1]

Type = BMP

Layer = Imagery

SourceDir = "."

SourceFile = "Corvo.bmp"

Variation = January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December

Channel_BlendMask = 2.0

Channel_LandWaterMask = 3.0

ulyMap = 39.7283134102975

ulxMap = -31.1297607421875

xDim = 5.36441802978476E-06

yDim = 4.12748808598583E-06

 

[source2]

Type = BMP

Layer = None

SourceDir = "."

SourceFile = "Corvo Blendmask.bmp"

SamplingMethod = Gaussian

ulyMap = 39.7283134102975

ulxMap = -31.1297607421875

xDim = 5.36441802978476E-06

yDim = 4.12748808598583E-06

 

[source3]

Type = BMP

Layer = None

SourceDir = "."

SourceFile = "Corvo Watermask.bmp"

SamplingMethod = Gaussian

ulyMap = 39.7283134102975

ulxMap = -31.1297607421875

xDim = 5.36441802978476E-06

yDim = 4.12748808598583E-06

 

 

[Destination]

DestDir = "."

DestBaseFileName = "Corvo"

DestFileType = BGL

LOD = Auto

UseSourceDimensions = 1

CompressionQuality = 85

 

EDIT 2:I just solved it-Ignore this post.