P3D v5 Converted gltf becomes black in P3D

[tsgucci]

Hi Guys! Hi Arno!


I'm trying to convert gltf objects to P3D v4.4 mdl. In MCX everything looks fine but in the sim the entire object is black.
If I export the object from 3DS Max P3D v4.4 plugin to .X file and convert it with MCX to a P3D v4.4 mdl than the object is completely okay. So it is not a missing texture issue. Somehow if the origin is a gltf something gets off and the textures are not loaded on them.

I'm attaching an example.
The .X file is 3DS P3D v4.4 export
the gltf is 3DS MSFS Babylon export
the mdl was converted with MCX from the gltf

Any idea?

 

[arno]

Hi,

Your MDL file still references the PNG texture from the glTF model. You need to convert the textures to DDS before exporting to MDL.

 

[tsgucci]

Hi,

Your MDL file still references the PNG texture from the glTF model. You need to convert the textures to DDS before exporting to MDL.

Thanks Arno. I thought the extension is not important. How do I convert them? I mean is there a way in MCX to convert the .gltf file referencing with png to dds?

 

[arno]

Hi,

In the material editor you can change the texture format. That will update the references in the model and also convert the textures themselves and save them in the folder you indicate.

 

[tsgucci]

Hi,

In the material editor you can change the texture format. That will update the references in the model and also convert the textures themselves and save them in the folder you indicate.

Hi Arno!


Thanks for the reply. To be honest I do not find this option in MCX. Moreover I do not want to use MCX to convert textures, I do it externally (the normal map of P3D and MSFS is different, the Mettalic Map of P3D and MSFS is different, and also as png has transparency in dds you need alpha channel).
I just want that if I convert a gltf to a P3D mdl than the texture is referenced as DDS. To be honest I thought the extension is ignored by P3D because earlier we could convert BMP textures to DDS extension and FSX/P3D was showing the textures anyway.
In my humble opinion when an MDL is exported the texture extension should be automaticaly changed to DDS/BMP becuase FSX/P3D does not read any other format anyway.

I want to convert relatively high amount of objects and if possible I want to avoid any manual action.


What do you think?

 

[arno]

It's on the textures tab of the material editor. You can select the format you want to convert to there.

FSX and P3D consider BMP and DDS to be equivalent, but they do not completely ignore the exention. So if you use JPG or PNG or something else the texture will not be found.

I don't feel it is the responsibility of MCX to automatically change texture names, that is something that the developer should do on purpose IMHO. I can check if I can add a feature to only update the names and not save the textures themselves. Those two actions are combined now.

If you have multiple models to convert you can always use the batch mode to not have to do it manually.

 

[tsgucci]

Hi Arno!

Thanks for your reply and help!

I can check if I can add a feature to only update the names and not save the textures themselves. Those two actions are combined now.

That would be extremely helpful!

 

[tsgucci]

Hi Arno!


Just an idea for this.
If the pop-up menu would contain a "Change extension" with a submenu of the different format it would be nice. Similar to Format convert.

 

[arno]

Yes, that would work I guess. Or instead of Save textures in the toolbar have an option there to only change the names.

This feature request is on the todo list.