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FSX Material Help

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289
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unitedkingdom
I have searched for answers but without success, I am having problems setting up the FSX materials for my model which was originally destined for FS9 so the fuselage was UVW mapped in two parts, left & right to fit on 2 separate texture sheets, so I have changed these to FlightSimX materials with diffuse, specular colour & bump maps, I then had to join the two fuselage halves together & this created a multimaterial.

The problem I am experiencing is that the left & right sides of the fuselage have two different shades when viewed in the sim as if there is no blending from sunlight to shade, I have not made a specific specular map yet but am testing with a dark grey texture with a slightly darker alpha, the bump map I made appears to be working OK, Also there does not appear to be any glossiness to the fuselage paint.

I have checked the "Blend environment by inverse of the diffuse alpha" & "Use global environment map as reflection" boxes, also set Reflection Scale to 20 & Specular Map power scale to 64, I have not changed any of the other settings, from what I understand is the "Specular Highlights" specular level & glossiness in the "Blinn Basic Parameters" section has no function if a specular map is being used.

I would really appreciate some help with this & when I get the hang of it I am hoping the results will be worth it.

Paul
 

Milton_Shupe

Resource contributor
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331
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us-newmexico
After joining the two halves, did you weld vertices?

If so, then check to see if edges need to be turned.
 
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289
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unitedkingdom
Hi Milton,

Great to hear from a master, I started modelling with your wonderful C162 tutorial project.

Yes I welded the vertices, but I have not checked whether the edges need to be turned & I am not sure how to this, I selected all the edges dividing the left & right fuselage sides & in the Edit Geometry rollout I selected Turn which turns orange & I don't know what to do next, I did a search for turning edges with Gmax but found nothing.
 
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289
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unitedkingdom
Thanks Milton, those tutorials are informative.

I tried turning the edges at the left & right fuselage joint but it just made things worse.

Below are images showing the part of the fuselage which is effected most.

PA-42  Shading Screenshot.png


Below is the mesh of the same area.

PA-42 Geometry Edges.PNG


I've never experienced this problem with FS9 models I have made.

Paul
 

Milton_Shupe

Resource contributor
Messages
331
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us-newmexico
Paul, it appears those lower center vertices are behind the outer ones from the shading but hard to determine based on the angle shown. If so, pull them forward or upward a bit to round that center bar.

Otherwise, what I would do here is simply delete those polys (retaining the vertices) and rebuild them. You might also try selecting the affected polys and smoothing them separately.
 
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289
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unitedkingdom
Thanks Milton for the advice, I pulled the centre vertices forward to round off the centre bar, but it made no difference.

The shading problem looks even worse in the FSX preview screen, here's a screenshot.

PA-42  Shading Screenshot 2.PNG


Could it have been caused when I joined the two sides of the fuselage & created a multi-material? In the "Attach option" dialogue box that popped up when I attached the sides I selected "Match Material ID's to Material".

I really appreciate your help with this.

Paul
 

Milton_Shupe

Resource contributor
Messages
331
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us-newmexico
Paul, being an FS9 modeler in gmax, I am unfamiliar with how materials are treated for FSX native modeling so others may be better to answer here.
I join fuselage halves all the time making multi-materials out of the front and rear fuse map sheets without problems but that may not be relevant here.
You might go back to the save before the join and review the mesh and the separate materials properties for correctness and sameness, then retry the join.
I cannot remember which join option I use for the materials; I usually have the mapped template applied and select the one that shows the textures applied correctly to both halves.

EDIT: I then weld the vertices and re-smooth to ensure all looks good.
 
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289
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unitedkingdom
Thanks Milton for your help, this is the first FSX model I am attempting having already done a few FS9 models.

I checked the materials before joining the fuselage sides & creating a multi-material & they had the same properties.

Maybe I will have to retexture the fuselage with the complete fuselage on one 2048x2048 texture sheet as I'm not now restricted to 1024x1024 textures as when the model was destined for FS9.

Paul
 

tgibson

Resource contributor
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11,327
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us-california
Did you select all the polygons of the fuselage (or just those that you want to be included in the smooth surface) and click the Auto Smooth button?
 
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1,049
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australia
Your texture isn't mirrored by any chance? FSX materials with bump mapping hate mirrored textures and will produce shading problems. The bump mapping causes the problem.

The obvious example would be to create a the right half of the fuselage and map a texture to it. If you then duplicate and mirror that to create the left fuselage then you would have problems with shading. In this case the left and right textures will be similar with nose on the left and tail on the right. Any writing on the left texture will be reversed.

If you created the right half of your fuselage and then duplicated and mirrored it and then textured both parts separately you shouldn't be having a problem caused by the material. In this case the actual left and right textures should mirror each other. So the left side texture will have the tail on the left and nose on the right and any writing will be the right way around.
 
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289
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unitedkingdom
No, the texture isn't mirrored, I textured the right side after being cloned from the left side.

I removed the bump map from the texture folder & the shading issue was no longer present but now the fuselage is semi transparent, I have an alpha applied to the diffuse texture which I don't know if is necessary.
 
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289
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unitedkingdom
I decided to remap the fuselage, as before using two texture sheets (I could have mapped it onto one 2048x2048 texture but I decided to have another try at putting it on two as I don't like giving up!!)

This is the procedure I performed.

1- UVW Mapped the two fuselage sides separately, making sure they were mapped identically.
2- Applied textures to each side with identical settings in the material editor.
3- Attached the right side to the left side creating a multi-material & welded together then auto smoothed.
4- Attached the r rudder to the l rudder & r rudder trim tab to the l rudder trim tab & welded, this created another multi-material entry in the material manager for each item.

Now I have a problem that when I compile a model no left fuselage textures are vivsible, I open the model with notepad & only the right fuselage textures are listed, I have checked that the left side textures are applied in the material editor with the blue & white checkered cube showing green. I noticed that the rudder multi-material ID name (#5) was the same as the fuselage multi-material name so I changed this to "Fuselage" as I thought this might be causing a conflict.

Could the problem be caused by not putting an edit mesh into the stack of the right fuselage when I attached it, I only put an edit mesh into the left fuselage stack & then attached the right side.

I will be most grateful for any advice.

Paul
 
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Messages
289
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unitedkingdom
As the two separate fuselage texture sheet method has not been a success I have remapped the complete fuselage onto one 2048x2048 texture sheet, I no longer have a shading problem but there is no glossiness to the fuselage, what setting in the material editor determines this, I have looked at the FSXmaterial html that is provided with the SDK but from what I can see It doesn't explain how to set up the glossiness of the texture or am I being a bit dim!!

Is there any tutorials available to help with the material editor settings for textures.

Paul
 
Messages
3,278
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spain
whem using mirror tool, use that of the modifier list not that of the tool tab, is a known issue that this make problems. I have read that fsx not work with multimaterials, anyway take a look to the fsx SDK, in this case could be of great help, look at "New aircraft procedures"/ texturing aircraft models and take a look too at "Fsx materials" It's a great help.
 

tgibson

Resource contributor
Messages
11,327
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us-california
AFAIK, the alpha in the Diffuse controls the amount of metal reflection (i.e. reflections of the scenery around it, although that is simulated by the environment map), while the Specular controls the sun shining off the surface.
 
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289
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unitedkingdom
Thanks, I was being a bit dim, I had another look at the FSX Material html & from what I understand it's the "Reflection Scale" & "Specular Map Power Scale" sliders that need to be set correctly to get a nice looking paint job, so I am experimenting on different settings to get the best result. I have not tried using a Fresnel map with any of the textures yet, is it worth using one.
 
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