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FSXA Why on earth does the text string not light up at night?

Zeiten

Resource contributor
Messages
444
Country
norway
As the title says, non of then light up at night making them hard to read.

Here's a sample from one of the codes
Code:
<Gauge Name="N2_Engine1" Version="1.0">
   <Image Name="9245_Background.bmp" ImageSizes="92,45,0,0"/>
   <Element>
   <Visible>(A:ELECTRICAL MASTER BATTERY, bool)</Visible>
   <Element>
   <Visible>(A:TURB ENG N2:1, Percent) 100 &lt;</Visible>
      <Position X="8" Y="0"/>
      <Text X="84" Y="45" Length="5" FontHeight="45" Font="Digital-7" Fixed="No" FontWeight="5" Color="orange" Bright="Yes">
         <String>%((A:TURB ENG N2:1, Percent))%!02.1f! </String>
      </Text>
      </Element>
   <Element>
   <Visible>(A:TURB ENG N2:1, Percent) 100 &gt;</Visible>
      <Position X="8" Y="0"/>
      <Text X="84" Y="45" Length="5" FontHeight="45" Font="Digital-7" Fixed="No" FontWeight="5" Color="red" Bright="Yes">
         <String>%((A:TURB ENG N2:1, Percent))%!02.1f! </String>
      </Text>
   </Element>
   </Element>
</Gauge>

Can remember they worked before?
What settings have I been playing with??
:confused:
 

taguilo

Resource contributor
Messages
1,585
Country
argentina
So what does happen is they show at night but as if Bright was ignored, right?

Tom
 

Zeiten

Resource contributor
Messages
444
Country
norway
Correct, they show at night as well, but very dimmed. Just as the light tag is ignored.
 
Messages
440
Country
us-wisconsin
They will be bright in a 2D panel. If it's in a VC then it needs Fr.Bill's emissive lighting technique in order to be bright.
 
Messages
10,088
Country
us-arizona
Just illuminate it like a regular gauge. Its the exact same thing. Make a light map that is for your $pan texture, apply it in the 3D design program, export, place the light map in your planes texture folder and check it. Should show up perfect at night with a bit of light in the window of where the font will be displayed via the gauge.

Note; lightmaps that are for gauges ($pan file overlays), will need to be flipped rightside up instead of upside down (for FSX/P3D) and upside down (flipped vertically) for FS2004.
 

Zeiten

Resource contributor
Messages
444
Country
norway
Yes, it works with the panel light switch, but look at this!
Looks awful o_O

It's only the gauge poly that lights up, not the text.
Even with the a uniform white over the entire lightmap gives that effect!

Gauge Lightmap.jpg
 

n4gix

Resource contributor
Messages
11,674
Country
unitedstates
Here is an example of how I backlight text on a single gauge. The same concept may be used on an $VC_image.bmp and it's corresponding VC_image_L.bmp of course.

KY4j7x.png

QLFDhL.png
 
Messages
10,088
Country
us-arizona
Zeiten,

Make sure you are putting in Bright="Yes"

Example from some of my stuff;

<FormattedText X="114" Y="34" Font="Arial" FontSize="16" LineSpacing="17" Adjust="Left" Color="0x00FF00" Bright="Yes" Tabs="17R,49R,49">
 

Zeiten

Resource contributor
Messages
444
Country
norway
@Mr Lion.
Yeah, got the brighty stuff included in the code.
Just look at my first post.

@Mr Leaming
Does that technique of yours work on dynamic text as well?
Since it's not static text as your example.

And what gives that distortion effect shown in the picture I posted?
 

n4gix

Resource contributor
Messages
11,674
Country
unitedstates
If you are asking about the "digital displays" on the screens...

I "detach" the screen polygon(s) then use a separate FSX Material for them so that I can use the dynamic text to "light itself" by using the $VC_Display dummy texture in both the Diffuse and Self-Illumination slots, and using "Additive" emissive mode. This allows the electric powered digital displays to be lighted always, as long as power is available and they are turned on.
Digital_Lighting.jpg
 

Zeiten

Resource contributor
Messages
444
Country
norway
Thanks for the clear up.

Okay, got it working again now.
I now see the mistake I did in the first place.

When the gauges light up I was using the same sheet in both Diffuse and Self-Illumination slots.
Replacing the lightmap with another one started the problems, because guess where I placed the new map????.........


To give you a hint.
My workflow:

1. Create/modify textures.
2. Convert to dds.
3. Drag and drop onto a shortcut folder named "textures"....

Edit:

Still no go, soon as I select another sheet the lights goes away.
Thought I hit eureka, but apparently all I hit was a wall :p
 
Last edited:

Zeiten

Resource contributor
Messages
444
Country
norway
Got it to work, but the other gauges turned really bright.
Then it hit me that I'm a stupid :censored:!!!

1. Forgot to make night textures of the gauge bitmaps...
2. The distortions was actually geometry behind the gauges since they turned slightly transparent.

Finally the work can resume again :)
 

tgibson

Resource contributor
Messages
11,324
Country
us-california
I'm surprised it's working. Often, FSX does not honor Visible statements using Text commands (in separate Elements). You have to either use nested Elements, or use Formatted Text and change the color using those commands. FS9 is fine, though.
 

Zeiten

Resource contributor
Messages
444
Country
norway
@tgibson

You mean because I'm using 3 visible conditions in the gauge?
Because it works just great here.

No power = no text, only the background image.
N2 less then 100 = orange text
N2 more than 100 = red text.
 

tgibson

Resource contributor
Messages
11,324
Country
us-california
It's hit or miss whether they work. Some of mine were fine, others not. It's placing visible lines in each of multiple Elements that causes the potential problem. I solve it by using Formatted Text commands.
 
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