MSFS MSFS materials

[arno]

Since last week ModelConverterX supports reading and writing of glTF files for MSFS. But this version did not yet support all the material attributes that MSFS has. There are 15 different material types that can be used in MSFS and each of them have a different set of attributes.

The latest development release of ModelConverterX adds support for all these material attributes. This means that you can read them from the glTF file and also export them to glTF again.

The material editor does also show the available attributes. To work with the MSFS materials you can best select the MSFS filter at the top. If you change the material type attribute to the different types that are supported, the attributes will be updated to only show the ones that are supported by that material type.

Since the MSFS materials are quite complex, I have not been able to test all attributes. So let me know if there is a bug in how certain of the materials are implemented.

Continue reading...

 

[TheJon182]

This sounds interesting I will give it a try. Anyone has achieve the normal map to work when importing a own material? Only Albedo map is working for me.

 

[BrBlazer]

Awesome Arno. Do you happen to know how we place the specular map, or what it's equivalent in MSFS would be? Thanks

 

[L3M0N]

Awesome Arno. Do you happen to know how we place the specular map, or what it's equivalent in MSFS would be? Thanks

There are no specular maps. There is a roughness channel though and that will do something similar to the old specular.

 

[CarlosHevia]

Thanks Arno, testing .....

 

[CarlosHevia]

Testing in MCX. Importing .ade (from sketchup) or .mdl generated by MCX from ade. Model convert X, places the "lm" textures as emissive. and everything works very well in MCX, however in MSFS, the night ones do not work for me, I am still missing something
thanks arno

 

[CarlosHevia]

I confirm, everything OK, except for the night textures, nothing is visible, all black and with the exception of the Drawcalls, once applied there are various failures in the textures.
thank you very much Arno.

 

[YohanNaz]

Testing in MCX. Importing .ade (from sketchup) or .mdl generated by MCX from ade. Model convert X, places the "lm" textures as emissive. and everything works very well in MCX, however in MSFS, the night ones do not work for me, I am still missing something
thanks arno

Are you setting Day/Night switch to "True"?

 

[CarlosHevia]

NO, horror, I'm sorry, thank you Yohan, I try it and comment on it

 

[arno]

Are you setting Day/Night switch to "True"?

Only the standard material type has that option, while others also allow emissive textures. So not sure if that is it, but looking forward to hear the result.

 

[BrBlazer]

NO, horror, I'm sorry, thank you Yohan, I try it and comment on it

I also noticed that the emissive color cannot be black. The lighter the emissive color, the brighter the night/emissive texture will "shine" at night.

 

[CarlosHevia]

Only the standard material type has that option, while others also allow emissive textures. So not sure if that is it, but looking forward to hear the result.

Arno, I'm sorry only with the True Day / Night, it's not enough, the results are the same, all black, however, regarding what BrBlazer says, I have the Emissive black color, I'm going to try by lightening it a bit.
Thank you all

 

[CarlosHevia]

I also noticed that the emissive color cannot be black. The lighter the emissive color, the brighter the night/emissive texture will "shine" at night.

OK BrBlazer, now yes, the lighter the more emissive color, the more light the object receives.
Now I'm going to test the operation of Arno's Day / Night Switch
Thank you

 

[CarlosHevia]

Only the standard material type has that option, while others also allow emissive textures. So not sure if that is it, but looking forward to hear the result.

Arno, apparently and according to my tests the D / N switch does not produce any effect on the standard texture, this in False or True, the night textures are seen or not depending on the clarity of the emissive color.
Thank you

 

[arno]

So the emissive color should by default be white I guess then, so that you see the emissive texture?

The colors are indeed an factor that is multiplied with the texture color.

 

[CarlosHevia]

So the emissive color should by default be white I guess then, so that you see the emissive texture?

The colors are indeed an factor that is multiplied with the texture color.

Arno thinks so and so it seems, I did some tests with different grays and now I'm going to try with white by default.

 

[CarlosHevia]

Yes, Arno, the Day / night Switch works, what happened to me is that with the day a little dark, in the middle of the day they turn on, (maybe a lot of sensitivity), but it works perfectly.
Thank you

 

[CarlosHevia]

Yes, Arno, the Day / night Switch works, what happened to me is that with the day a little dark, in the middle of the day they turn on, (maybe a lot of sensitivity), but it works perfectly.
Thank you

But with the switch on False, it seems on True it doesn't do anything, is it possible?

 

[CarlosHevia]

Maybe we would save a lot of mouse clicks, if you could set the emissive color to white by default for night textures.
Thanks Arno

 

[=Hollywood=]

Hey Arno, trying to do an convert to gITF of a bridge from FSX/P3D MDL and the texture has transparency, but in MSFS the transparent areas are solid black, is there a particular format I need to change the textures to? Like a specific DXT format?