????How can I add a shine effect?????

[McLovin]

Im not all that new the the repainting department of FS. But there is one thing I dont know how to do, the SHine effect.

The A/C has already a dynamic shine effect on it from the designer, but I cant make hte shine come to life when I try and repaint it. I was told something about adding a greyscal on it and when I did the whole A/C went grey.lol. I saved the file before doing this because knowing something bad will happen at somepoint. How can I obtain the shine that I want?

~Brett

[Foxtrot Sport]

Okay, first thing you'll need to learn is the 'Alpha Channel'

An Alpha Channel is a version of the same texture of a craft, except in complete grayscale.  However, the mode works like this, the darker the gray (or black), the shinier the area of the plane will be, but the lighter (or completely white) the area is, it will be dull as a textbook.  

So, find the texture you want to edit (ex. 737_400_T) and open it preferrably with DXTBmp.  I am not accustomed to any other program.  In the top right, there is a box saying "Alpha Channel".  You can open that and it will give you the current alpha channel for the texture.  Take that texture, and either in DXTBmp, or in Photoshop, or even paint for that matter, and edit it to the right amount of black/gray/white you want.  It doesn't have to be detailed, just make sure everything is in the right spot.

Then, you can replace the alpha channels, save your texture, and enjoy you're new shiny aircraft.

-HF

[CAFedm]

If you don't have it yet, download DTXBmp (it's free).

[McLovin]

Thanks guys, but I still am confused. You mean to tell me to take my beutifl repaint and make the entire thing grey.  Whaaaaat?

[H]

That's not what they mean but a similar thing can happen if you you inadvertently resave your work in the wrong color-bit. In your case, you may be losing a channel in the save.
I've been working with CFS1 so it has to be saved in 256-color;if it's resaved in less there is major color loss.
If you don't mind spending a million years of time as I originally did, shines can be applied by individually lightening pixel by pixel. More recently I've found I can make a light grayscale printout (1st attempt was to hand draw the whole thing) with a graphics program, hand color it -- including shine effects and such -- and scan it back into a bitmap file (since my graphics program can reformat to the 256-color, I save it in 16M-color). Of course, since the sim doesn't apply textures evenly (by how the sim model is done) I still find it difficult to exactly match section for section.

[McLovin]

If you don't have it yet, download DTXBmp (it's free).  Open up your texture within it and then do the following:

- Click on Alpha from the menu at the top and then choose Send Alpha To Editor.
- This will open up your bitmap editor (mine is MS Paint), within that window you apply the greyscale.  The lighter the grey, the less shiny or more opaque; the darker, the more shiny or transparent.
- Save this greyscale (just do file/save) and then go back to your texture opened in DTXBmp's main window.  Click on Alpha once again, this time select Apply Alpha To Image.  
- Save your texture as Extended Bitmap > DTX3 format.  This will ensure you have reflectivity/transparency in the texture.  

Note that with DTXBmp (as far as I have found) you can only alter the transparency of a texture, not the "shine".  To accomplish this you need to ensure your project has reflective parts enabled.  I work with FSDS-v2 and whatever parts need to be reflective are designated as such in the project design phase, by ticking a checkbox in the part properties dialogue box.  Then, if an alpha channel is applied to such a part, it becomes "shiny" rather than transparent.  You mentioned your project had reflectivity added already but thought to mention this as it can be confusing if doing it for yourself when new at the game.  If there is a way to do this directly in DTXBmp hopefully someone more knowledgeable can help.  

OOps-didn't see the above post, will leave this here in case it is of any assistance as well...

Well I did what u said and it worked, but the thing is, is that now its all chrome. Heres what I did:

1. Sent alpha to Editor

2.created a medium greyscale

3.saved alpha

4.applyed alpha

5.Looked at repaint and it was CHROME ahhh.

So what am I doing wrong

[McLovin]

HAHAAAA, I got it! Thanks guys Ill post all 10 repaints in a package. Its for a Dassault Flacon 2000!

Brett

[CAFedm]

A "chrome" one would be cool!

[McLovin]

What's that, A chrome Falcon 2000. I could do that as a request along with the package I am realesing.

[asda_price]

Eugh! Alpha channel shine is a big no-no in the major world of top-class repainting!

[citationX]

If you don't have it yet, download DTXBmp (it's free).  Open up your texture within it and then do the following:

- Click on Alpha from the menu at the top and then choose Send Alpha To Editor.
- This will open up your bitmap editor (mine is MS Paint), within that window you apply the greyscale.  The lighter the grey, the less shiny or more opaque; the darker, the more shiny or transparent.
- Save this greyscale (just do file/save) and then go back to your texture opened in DTXBmp's main window.  Click on Alpha once again, this time select Apply Alpha To Image.  
- Save your texture as Extended Bitmap > DTX3 format.  This will ensure you have reflectivity/transparency in the texture.  

Note that with DTXBmp (as far as I have found) you can only alter the transparency of a texture, not the "shine".  To accomplish this you need to ensure your project has reflective parts enabled.  I work with FSDS-v2 and whatever parts need to be reflective are designated as such in the project design phase, by ticking a checkbox in the part properties dialogue box.  Then, if an alpha channel is applied to such a part, it becomes "shiny" rather than transparent.  You mentioned your project had reflectivity added already but thought to mention this as it can be confusing if doing it for yourself when new at the game.  If there is a way to do this directly in DTXBmp hopefully someone more knowledgeable can help.  

OOps-didn't see the above post, will leave this here in case it is of any assistance as well...

Yeah just like CAFedm said, download DXTBmp then learn the alpha channel. As useing black you make a chrome, then if you just want a shine you use a lite gray. then export the alphachannel as a DX3 and the texture that you painted as a DX3 format. Also, if you get the program you will be able to open textures that didn't show up.

[McLovin]

Hey guys thanx for the support and help on my problems. I have almost finished my repaint but these show the repaints that I have done so far for the 1st Release. Thanx so much, I now know how to add a shine effect and its easy as pushin a button. Thanx agian.

http://www.simviation.com/cgi-bin/yabb/ ... 1118635041

Cheers Brett