Photo real paints?

[McLovin]

How do you guys do a photo real paint scheme? I know that you find pics of what you want but how do I apply it to the texture? Ive never done this sort of work b4 so I would like a good thorough walk thru on how to do this. If theres a forum or a great tutorial plz let me know.

Bret

[Dr.bob7]

Ive only done one and it was of a cessna at a local flight club I experimeted a bit then lassoed the decals of the cessna onto my repaint and straitened them out (the color was uneven so i paint bucketed it) and I used the normal text for the tail number

[todayshorse]

Ive only briefly attempted anything 'photoreal' and it was a logo on the tail of a 767 that i couldnt find on the companys website and my limited skills just couldnt recreate it any other way. I found a clear photo of the tail and simply cut and paste it to my psd, used the eraser round the edges to lose the aircrafts tail colour from the photo so i was just left with the logo. Then i used 'alt+t' so i could begin to move it and resize on the tail so it fitted!

Seemed to work out ok, but i gather full photoreal is far more complicated and involves using the whole side of a aircraft photo and manipulating, blending and all sorts of things to get it looking right on the model.

Ive come across some tutorials but right now i cant find them! when i do ill add them here......

[H]

You mean something like this? Need A Little Help

Final results:


Unfortunately, the model was for FS2k (I've even edited its files for use in CFS1) and we may need a new model for FSX.

Because of the way textures are applied in the program, an exact application of a photo is not usually feasible. I have to sample sections of the photo and correlate meshes between textures, as well, then stretch, speckle and reshape accordingly.

8-)

[SkyNoz]

Because of the way textures are applied in the program, an exact application of a photo is not usually feasible. I have to sample sections of the photo and correlate meshes between textures, as well, then stretch, speckle and reshape accordingly.



8-)

One line a repainter dreads to hear from a developer.


I've done several photo real repaints, the goal is to find a good set of photos to modify and work with. In repaint files, there is like a pattern of the fuselage, wings and various exterior parts. So just cut, modify and paste the photo in the texture template then the chances of making a detailed repaint, outweigh the problems you would have trying to paint it yourself.

[H]

I've done several photo real repaints, the goal is to find a good set of photos to modify and work with. In repaint files, there is like a pattern of the fuselage, wings and various exterior parts. So just cut, modify and paste the photo in the texture template then the chances of making a detailed repaint, outweigh the problems you would have trying to paint it yourself.

If goals were always, even usually, met then most all games would have tie scores and still in unending play.
For exact application, the model would need to be shaped exactly to scale with true curves (the model is less precise the earlier the FS modeling program) as well as a 4D set of square-on photos -- and the only template I've seen is for an FSX version model, which I haven't directly dealt with at this point (we're rather attempting a backside-to with someone who does). I did make a personal template of sorts for the pictured CL604 to assist matching surface locations and shadowing.
I've done a few panels from photos, as well. Since they were not square-on, again, I had to sample and square the visual. However, unless they have exceptional contrast, photos do not usually make good panels as is -- they tend to look like, well, photos, so the corrective embellishment actually provides automatic contrast enhancement.

8-)

[garryrussell]

It's much easier just to paint it and that gives a better result anyways.

The resolution of the photos is just no high enough and you need to get matching pics of both sides as they are different.

The details never fully line up, not  always due to model problems but parallex distortion....also often looking at the top or bottom shows a mismatch.

Unless it is for small confined specific areas it does not work well at all and going close to the aircraft in FS shows a less than good result.

It can be used as a base for texture areas, as in metal fuse but the work involved afterwards means it highly edited so better just to paint the livery on over that base

Garry

[YSHT]

whilst browsing through forums i came across this topic and thought it might be worth asking if anyone knows how i could get 24-bit .bmp's working rather than having to make it a 256-color...

[garryrussell]

I take it you mean in the Sim............you need to use a programme call DXTBMP.  Open it up in that, make sure the mips box is unchecked and then resave as either an extended bitmap 32 888-8 or DXT3.