Illuminated Parts With Textures

[CAFedm]

Stumped again. Want to apply a texture to a part so that it shows up as illuminated, e.g., to simulate lighting. I am working with FSDS3, textured the part using an RGB 255/255/255 DXT3 bitmap with no tag, _L tag, _LM tag, all with the same results - namely, that the part shows up as basic white, and very dull at that. The part has been given a material name with diffuse/ambient/specular/emissive colours at 255 in every box. I also checked to ensure that the has_lightmap_1 option is enabled in the makemdl compiler. The results look like this:




With the part untextured, and using the same material name applied as above, the part displays properly (in FS9 only), as below:



Of course, any untextured part won't show up in FSX, hence my dilemma here. Any & all hints are welcome.

[CAFedm]

I found some helpful advice that got it working (thanks to Luka on the Freeeflight forum). Thought it might be helpful to paraphrase his tips as they may help anyone facing a similar problem.

- Make a lighting texture in whatever desired colour, and save it with a "_T" suffix (e.g., PARTNAME_T.bmp). In the FSDS texture selection window, check "Light Map/Alpha [_"L" and alpha channel"). Your applied texture name will then be PARTNAME_T.bmp,A.
- Download a handy utility called MDLMat (freeware by Martin Wright). After having compiled your model, open it up in MDLMat, and edit the emissiveness of the required part(s) (this will take trial & error, so make a backup of your model first).
- Save your changes in MDLMat. Upon reloading FS, your emissive part should be glowing, day or night.

Thanks guys, glad to get it all working now.

[Woodylepic]

Dont know if this help

[CAFedm]

My bad - one mistake in there, namely, DO NOT include the ,A after the texture. It should be PARTNAME_T.bmp and that's all. Otherwise it won't display at dusk/night/dawn in FSX.