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Can a subset of an aircraft model's textures be prefixed with the model name?

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unitedkingdom
Hi. I have used ModelXconverter for a while now. I can rename ALL the names of the aircraft model's textures with a prefix of the model name .. BUT is there a way of selecting only a subset of the textures?
I am using ModelXconverter, Library Creator and P3D V4 SimDirector to place aircraft models (ie eye candy!) around my airports. As you are aware, a model will have several liveries. Each livery (ie texture file) has not only textures unique to that livery but also textures common to all liveries (especially attached weapons).
If say I have a model with 10 liveries, there may only be half dozen or more unique textures for each livery but there could also be 20 or more textures common to all liveries. If I am going to place all 10 liveries around the airport, I need 10 complete sets of textures in my texture folder. When I place multiple different aircraft models all with their sets of liveries, the texture folder gets bloated.
It would therefore be nice - for any aircraft model to have just ONE copy of the common textures in the texture folder.
(Hope the above makes sense).
John
 

=rk=

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You can have a common texture folder. For liveries most artists use the fallback designation, basically aliases to a texture folder in the aircraft parent directory and for scenery most artists place common textures in Addon Scenery\Textures
 

arno

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Hi,

Not, at the moment the prefix option can only be applied to all textures at once in the material editor.
 
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109
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unitedkingdom
Thanks for the replies chaps. Unfortunately, it seems the shared texture folder(s) only works with the texture.cfg file in the areoplanes texture folders. Placed anywhere else and the sim ignores.
 

tgibson

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Can't you rename the desired textures one by one in the Material Editor, and keep the others common?
 
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unitedkingdom
Tom - blow me! Did not realise this could be done - have just successfully tried. Same old story - "I should read the manual!" Many many thanks for your comment.
 

n4gix

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Thanks for the replies chaps. Unfortunately, it seems the shared texture folder(s) only works with the texture.cfg file in the areoplanes texture folders. Placed anywhere else and the sim ignores.
Every texture folder must have a texture.cfg file, and that file will fallback first to the "common texture folder." That's how the system works.

Here is an example. The aircraft.cfg file calls for a specific livery's unique texture folder:
Code:
[fltsim.2]
title=Cessna 310R CGTER
sim=Cessna 310v4
model=
panel=
sound=
texture=CGTER
...
This will tell the sim to look here first for the livery specific bitmaps:
BIZJ8.png

This is the texture.cfg file used in my texture.CGTER folder:
[fltsim] fallback.1=..\texture fallback.2=..\..\..\..\Texture fallback.3=..\..\..\..\Scenery\Global\texture
BIZyd.png

The sim will look in the /texture folder and find all of the "common files" that are used by all liveries.
If it cannot find some bitmaps, it will look first in the named \texture.CGTER folder for the livery specific bitmaps
For any other bitmaps it cannot find it will then look in the sim's \Texture and \Scenery\Global\texture folders
 

tgibson

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Hi Bill,

Note that he is creating scenery versions of these airplanes for eye candy, and thus all the textures for all liveries are inside one folder. So in this case the texture.cfg file will not work.

John,

And you are welcome. :)
 

n4gix

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Ah Tom, I somehow missed that detail. I was still thinking as if these were going to be AI aircraft, not static models. :ziplip:
 
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109
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unitedkingdom
Hi guys. Thanks for all your input. With Tom's suggestion, I now have no duplicates in my texture folder.
One small point for Arno, whilst creating the eye-candy models, I forgot to change the GUID for each livery. I noticed when I inputed them to Library Creator the library save failed as the GUIDS were all the same. So, reloaded each model in ModelConverterX, changed the GUID and re-saved each livery model over the existing one. Inputed them again to LibrayCreator and the BGL.exe kept failing again. Ok with one model, but failed when inputting 2 or more models. Looking at the GUIDs again, I could see they were all duplicates of the original model!
Don't know if ModelConverterX is working to design, but when re-saving an existing model, the old GUID does not get overwritten with the new one. I have to delete the original model and then save the revision. All models (with unique GUIDs) now successfully loaded. Hope this makes sense!

One final comment - apologies if everyone knows - using P3Dv4 SimDirector its really easy to place any eye-candy. Providing the model libraries (scenery or planes or both) are defined in the scenery.cfg in Program Files/Lockheed Martin, then all eye-candy libraries show up for selection in SimDirector. Furthermore, in SimDirector you can create/save GROUPS of eyecandy. Why do this - well you can create PERIOD groups. Say for, RAF Leuchars - you could have in the same scenery folder, using the one ADE airport (it would be a "GROUP" on its own - you could create a different ADE for each period as well!)..

a WWII Group with buildings, vehicles and planes for this period.
a JAGUAR (60s/70s) similar group
a Tornado similar group
a Eurofighter similar group

Just have to enable only one period group and block (block by renaming eg. spitfires.bglBLOCK) the other period groups in the relevant scenery folder and you can then fly your Hurricane, Jaguar, Phantom, F35-B or whatever in the corresponding period.
 

arno

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Hi,

MCX has an option to preserve the guid on export. That's to prevent accidental changes, for example if you convert a SketchUp model twice. But you can disable this behavior in the options.
 
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