• Which the release of FS2020 we see an explosition of activity on the forun and of course we are very happy to see this. But having all questions about FS2020 in one forum becomes a bit messy. So therefore we would like to ask you all to use the following guidelines when posting your questions:

    • Tag FS2020 specific questions with the MSFS2020 tag.
    • Questions about making 3D assets can be posted in the 3D asset design forum. Either post them in the subforum of the modelling tool you use or in the general forum if they are general.
    • Questions about aircraft design can be posted in the Aircraft design forum
    • Questions about airport design can be posted in the FS2020 airport design forum. Once airport development tools have been updated for FS2020 you can post tool speciifc questions in the subforums of those tools as well of course.
    • Questions about terrain design can be posted in the FS2020 terrain design forum.
    • Questions about SimConnect can be posted in the SimConnect forum.

    Any other question that is not specific to an aspect of development or tool can be posted in the General chat forum.

    By following these guidelines we make sure that the forums remain easy to read for everybody and also that the right people can find your post to answer it.

MSFS Alpha material problems with Z-sorting

Misho

Misho

Messages
820
Country
ca-ontario
Does anyone have a sure-fire way of using Alpha materials so that they sort properly? I am using MCX to convert from P3D objects to MSFS, and while my Alpha materials worked properly in P3D, MSFS has a problem with sorting them - this is what I am talking about:

2023-05-22.png

The guardrail material is a simple texture with Alpha channel, the idea is to save on mesh complexity, by mapping guardrail on a simple 4-vertex poly. Note, I am using 2 polys, back to back, for front and back side, NOT the "Double sided" property in enhanced parameters material section. As you can see, the farther guardrail is overlapping the nearer guardrail.

Anyone knows the proper material settings to make this work properly? I did play with the "Alpha Test" parameters, but nothing yielded proper results.
 
S

sal1800

Messages
94
Normally, you control the alpha stacking with the draw order parameter. The rendering should go from the lowest draw order to highest. But in your case, it's not a "stack" since depending on the direction, either one should render first.
This is a tough one. Maybe keep the alpha texture version as a farther LOD and model it with more surfaces for the closest LOD.
 
rhumbaflappy

rhumbaflappy

Administrator
Staff member
Resource contributor
Messages
5,947
Country
us-wisconsin
I think you need to make the MCX material as double-sided and under PBR set the Alpha-mode as Mask (not blend).
 
Misho

Misho

Messages
820
Country
ca-ontario
rhumbaflappy said:
I think you need to make the MCX material as double-sided and under PBR set the Alpha-mode as Mask (not blend).
Click to expand...
That worked!! - Thank you, sir, you have saved me a lot of hours experimenting! (and, you probably meant "MSFS material", not "MCX material")

However, there is one caveat - If I make the material double-sided, both sides of the polygon get shaded the same way (unless I am missing another setting). This makes them look wrong in the sunlight, basically, the side that should be in the shade is fully lit. So, I resorted to not using "double sided" switch and making extra "inside" geometry, which gets properly shaded. Works perfectly with just "Alpha" as mask.

Now - Since I haven't switched to the latest 3DS MAX and I am using MCX to convert my models, I wonder if there is a setting for FSX material that is equivalent to Alpha-mode "Mask" setting? I would like then to set this property in 3DS MAX, which would save me time since I have to set this on every alpha material in MCX every time I update the model (which is often ;) )
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top