Simviation Forums

I have converted all my *.0AF / *.1AF etc etc. to Bitmaps.

But is there any easier way of repainting than jumping into Photoshop and painting?

It just seems very tedious .

Thanks.

If you mean with aircraft textures I don't think that there is.

Will

Which texture converter are you using? This job should be easy enough with BMP2000. You will still have to do the actual editing in Photoshop.

TEXBMP2.exe

It works. BUT ... Now I have another problem. I think I may have missed something. I took a Hawker Sea Fury. I converted all of the *.0AF and *.1AF etc. files using TEXBMP2.exe. it did the job. Then I spent half an hour giving it a good repaint. Then  converted all the Bitmaps back to *.0AF and *.1AF etc. files using the same program. Then I copied the Sea Fury folder and renamed it to Sea Fury Repaint in the .air file. I then put in my new textures. Then I started CFS and my new Sea Fury is there, but back in its original colours. Do I have to do anything else? Have I missed something?

Which sim is this for? I assumed you were converting the textures to BMP format. If you're going to revert to the original AF format I suggest ConvR8 might be a better option. http://www.mnwright.btinternet.co.uk/index.htm

Read the instructions carefully & set it up to work with Photoshop. ConvR8 will automatically convert back to the correct format when saving out as BMP or AF. (R8 & AF are basically the same format.)

If you simply duplicated the aircraft you most likely have a texture conflict with the original. Depending on the sim you might need to rename the textures & hex edit the MDL to recognise them. Be more specific & maybe I can help or point you to the appropriate tutes.

CFS1 - I know you haven't used CFS1 for a while now but I would be really grateful for any help.

Thanks.

OK, I might be a tad rusty but I've done a lot of work for CFS1 in the past. First, I suggest you use ConvR8. You can either leave the textures in the original AF format or convert them to BMP. This is a little more complex as you will need to flip the textures before saving to make them display properly.

Try the conventional method first & tell me how you get on. Repaint a few test pieces, no need to paint the complete aircraft. I think you should learn how to hex edit the MDL to recognise differently named textures & avoid texture conflicts. We can cover this later.

This is getting weirder by the second. Now the textures display fine. But they are in completely the wrong places! For example, the wing paintwork is over the cockpit.
Sorry I am new to this so please be patient  :D.

Thanks.

And even weirder. Now [glb]ALL[/glb] my Sea Furies have got the wonky paintwork.

HhHhhhHEElllPPP!

Right. let's start from the beginning. First, take a copy of the original texture folder to back it up. The quickest method is to use the right-click options. Right-click on the Texture folder & select Copy. Now right-click in a clear space & select Paste. You will now have a new folder named Copy of Texture.

Open a texture from the Texture folder in ConvR8. Send it to your graphics editor by double-clicking the large image. Convert the color depth to 16 million colors. Resize it if necessary. Repaint as desired & exit the graphics editor. Click Yes when prompted to save changes. Click on the image in ConvR8 to load the repainted texture. Click File/Save as R8 & save the file under its original name. Make sure you use the correct file extension when saving. Now go & check it out in the sim. If this worked try the next texture & so on. Take this in easy stages. Don't try to do it all at once.

PS. If all your Sea Furies are the same model you have a texture conflict. Concentrate on repainting this one for now. We can fix that later.

OK, I did exactly as you said. Followed everything. I just got rid of the old copy, and made a new copy of a Sea Fury. Then I opened a texture file (SEAFURY1.0AF) and painted the windscreen blue. Then I started up CFS and all of my Sea Furies are back to normal - none of them with a blue windscreen!

This is very strange - I think I will delete all of my Sea Furies, and have just one to repaint.

Be back tomorrow - I am very grateful

Thanks.

OK. Good idea. No need to delete the others. Drag them into a Hangar subfolder so they don't show up. You can move them back later.

I have got rid of all of the Sea Furies into a HANGAR subfolder. Now I tried repainting a winscreen and put it into the Aircraft folder. It worked. Now I have tried to use my textures from yesterday to repaint the plane.

However I am back with the same problem that the texture is still all over the plane in the wrong areas. There are no other Sea Furies active, so I reckon it must be something to do with the textures I made.

OK - I have finally done it. I told you I have missed something. I had rotated the textures for editing and never rotated them back. Silly me!

Now I would like to know how I can stop the textures conflicting. What I would like to do is have four or five models of the same Sea Fury painted in different paint schemes.

I would also like to know how to get the 3D "shine" on planes when I repaint them.

Thanks.

Great stuff. The next part is a tad complicated. Iain Murray's tute from the SimV Help section is for FS98 but explains the basic principle. http://www.simviation.com/fsdtutrpaint.htm

Ignore the first part & start reading from "Stage 2 - Creating a Duplicate Aircraft with a New Identity". This is the same tute I used to get started. The tools & utilities mentioned in the tute are old & outdated.