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FSX modeldef.xml

I have no place to hide this chute unless we can get it half the size that it collapses. I am lost on how to achieve this. I do under stand that once we get the chute smaller i can just use frame 0 and 1 for fast animation.

I am going to try a new test!

Will update soon!

DG:eek::stirthepo
 
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Strange!

I have a test box that works but the location changes!

I make a mesh with skin and attach 1 bone. Then i animated the bone to
flaps. Then I make another box with a fsx material and check skin. i attach
the hide tag on this box.

Then I link the mesh skin to the box.

When i test it in the game the flaps control the animation and the visibility.
But the animation makes the mesh have a new location but works.

If I use my part with 16 bones it make the chute look like cotton candy as you increase flaps. but flap 1 the chute is fine and flaps off the chute hides!

So you can hide skin parts! But I need help on why the link is causing the distortion and new location?

SG:eek:
 
I have no place to hide this chute unless we can get it half the size that it collapses. I am lost on how to achieve this. I do under stand that once we get the chute smaller i can just use frame 0 and 1 for fast animation.

Using your working example, manually set a key at frame 1 for all bones.

Select ALL bones, add an X-Form modifier to the stack, then...

With the time slider set to frame 0, click on the "Animate" button.
Use Uniform Scale tool to shrink the entire set of bones down to as small a size as your need. Un-click the "Animate" button.

Right-click and "Convert to e-poly"

Compile and test.
 
Well, what you're really doing is reseting the x,y,z coordinates for each bone while at frame zero...

By adding the X-Form modifier, the objects (bones) aren't really being scaled.
 
Still nothing.

When I scale down the bone after adding a xform what am I scaling down?
Which should i have selected, the bones editable poly or the xform?

When i created frame 1 I had to add a manual frame using scale.
Then when you scale on frame 0 it only shrinks the bone and i have to
add a frame key manually using scale.

I am testing with 1 bone and 1 poly.

i used a skin and added the bone and the envelope was long a hard to adjust!

DG,:eek:
 
That is one brilliant animation. Glad to see you are getting it working.

New territories, pioneering efforts of new directions, can really be frustrating, but great to see progress.


In scaling (reading the earlier posts), we could always 'accidentally' get a thing like tires to accidentally compile with scale effects, but when we wanted to do that, we couldnt, and it wouldnt compile. Bill Leaming once said 'if only we knew how to do that exactly, so we could make this work.' That always stuck in my mind. The way is there, we just have to figure out how we did it by mistake every time, lol...

With the tire issue, if somehow it wasnt Reset on the Scale, as the tire turned, it would do things like get really fat, then at TDC, it would be back to round again, changing every 90 degrees to a wild blob, then back to normal again 90 degrees later. Hilarious to watch. But what if you could harness this to do things like unpack a giant parachute via a hidden technique....



Bill
 
Hi Lion,

Your name is bill too?

Well I am using morph now and no animation on chute opening.
Just animation effects like wind and position.

I have a question. I made the upper chute have animation and it causes the
lower chute to move with it. I set this up like i would in gmax fs9. So I am confused.

This FSX game pack is tricky. Then the upper chute started to share the lower chute texture until i finally made the upper chute an fs9 texture. Then it would show the new texture.


Well i am moving like a snail with some progress!


DG,:eek:
 
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test4.bmp


Here is a pic ....strange! If I export the pod ONLY it's perfect.
Must be somthing doing this. I figure it's my crazy chutes that have tags and animation!

Can anyone tell me the method to make an FSX material that will always be hidden in game. For my animated boxes!

I do get a warning on the 2 chutes when exporting...high buffer

Help!!!

DG.:eek:
 
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Create a tiny texture in Photoshop with 0,0,0 for the color and 0,0,0 for the Alpha channel. 32x32 pixels is more than enough.

Create an FSX Material and put your transparent bitmap in the Diffuse Color slot. Move down the material editor's menu and click on "Set Default Transparent."

Done! Now select all your tiny control nodes (boxes) and click "Apply" to assign your transparent FSX Material to them.
 
That's what i needed...Transparent button!

Thanks Bill...:duck:


By the way i am having a great time converting over to FSX even at a snail pace...

How many poly's can i use on an exterior model???

---------------------

I renamed all the materials with custom names.....
Seemed to fix all my texture problems.....


Except I have a new problem with flap keys. I have set up 0,25,50,75,100 in my aircraft.cfg
I match the keys in frames and and tried other ways too. I never get what I want.
How do you set up animation to only animate on flap3 or flap 4.

I tried to put frames at 50 and 75...... no luck
I can get the flap to work on flap 1....but i need only flap 3 or even flap 4.

HELP!


Take a look:
test5.bmp


DG:eek:
 
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works

Well, what you're really doing is reseting the x,y,z coordinates for each bone while at frame zero...

By adding the X-Form modifier, the objects (bones) aren't really being scaled.

I did get your method to work. A bit tricky but does work....
But only works on a simple box. It shrunk really fast too....was cool.

So I tried to make a simple chute and it does not work!

So maybe there is a limit to the amount of poly's that can be used?

I will try another object today!

Update! That trick works good, just not for my complicated chutes.
So i came up with a method like my skydiver! i will post a video tonight.
Works really good!

Thanks for the help and check back for a video link!

Thanks DG,:eek:
 
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Nicely done!

I have to ask though why the cover from the chutes is floating above the capsule completely unsupported?

Did they have anti-gravity back then? :duck:
 
That's because i have not added my animation yet.....

Just a test on the chutes.
I will make it spin as it blows upward!


Thanks Bill!
 
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