MSFS20 Painted lines - taxi, edge lines, etc - can we create a custom texture sheet for custom lines?

[RomanDesign]

My yellow is RGB 207/187/65 and alpha 212. My black has 0/0/0 and alpha 228. Something important maybe is, that the invisible portions are colored. Though they have alpha=0, the color channels nearly match the yellow: 206/186/64.

With that I get much nicer lines with a 2048x2048 texture.

Well, I tried it in several different ways (approximating your alpha values, no transparency at all, yellow or white all around the black), but got the same crappy result. I don't know what am I doing wrong... If anyone would be willing to share his file, I can compare directly. I promise not to use the file in my project, I will recreate similar file from scratch. But I need to see what happens if I replace my lines with your file and to find out if I'm chasing ghosts or what.

 

[GIAMPA]

Solved....

 

[RomanDesign]

Solved....

Very nice, but how did you solve it? Please share the file, or top half/quarter of the file as a reference if you don't want people to use your actual file. I tried everything I could think of, and it's still not good.

 

[GIAMPA]

Very nice, but how did you solve it? Please share the file, or top half/quarter of the file as a reference if you don't want people to use your actual file. I tried everything I could think of, and it's still not good.

I will gladly send it to you, then you have to choose the:
EDGE-SERVICE-DASHED, then superimpose it on the existing central line of your taxis and choose only the illuminated one, so you can also see it illuminated in green, plus you can break it to insert the marking on the ground.
2048x2048 transparent
Ciao

 

[RomanDesign]

I will gladly send it to you, then you have to choose the:
EDGE-SERVICE-DASHED, then superimpose it on the existing central line of your taxis and choose only the illuminated one, so you can also see it illuminated in green, plus you can break it to insert the marking on the ground.
2048x2048 transparent
Ciao

Thanks a lot! I will test it out. If it works, can I use it in my projects? If you don't want me to, I will recreate similar one from scratch, now that I have an example.

 

[RomanDesign]

I will gladly send it to you, then you have to choose the:
EDGE-SERVICE-DASHED, then superimpose it on the existing central line of your taxis and choose only the illuminated one, so you can also see it illuminated in green, plus you can break it to insert the marking on the ground.
2048x2048 transparent
Ciao

Thanks! I tried yours and it was crispest of all, but a bit cartoonish and uniform. I took it as a guide and created my own, slightly transparent and uneven color like the originals, and more transparent black. It came out as good as it can get I think. Not very crisp, as all of the lines of course, but at least without those ugly large squares I had before. I think that because this is the widest line the downsampling artifacts are less. So thanks for the idea. Now it looks as crisp as possible, while still being a bit dirty and not too bright. I tried making it less bright and more transparent, but anything more and it becomes too muddy and have too much downsampling artifacts. So I guess the more contrast there is in the original, the less articfacts will be noticeable. But there needs to be a balance to look natural as much as possible.

And it has to work for the rest of the lines too. BTW is there a way to replace the red in the hatched areas just for a specific airport? I know there are replacements for the whole sim, but there is no material assignment to make it work in the editor as lines are done. It would be interesting to know how to tone down the red hatchet areas a bit.

 

[GIAMPA]

Thanks! I tried yours and it was crispest of all, but a bit cartoonish and uniform. I took it as a guide and created my own, slightly transparent and uneven color like the originals, and more transparent black. It came out as good as it can get I think. Not very crisp, as all of the lines of course, but at least without those ugly large squares I had before. I think that because this is the widest line the downsampling artifacts are less. So thanks for the idea. Now it looks as crisp as possible, while still being a bit dirty and not too bright. I tried making it less bright and more transparent, but anything more and it becomes too muddy and have too much downsampling artifacts. So I guess the more contrast there is in the original, the less articfacts will be noticeable. But there needs to be a balance to look natural as much as possible.
View attachment 71870
And it has to work for the rest of the lines too. BTW is there a way to replace the red in the hatched areas just for a specific airport? I know there are replacements for the whole sim, but there is no material assignment to make it work in the editor as lines are done. It would be interesting to know how to tone down the red hatchet areas a bit.
View attachment 71871

I'm glad you needed it, unfortunately I think that in the coloring and color rendering phase it depends on an asobo script, for the group attenuation of the red lines I believe that the only way is to remake the existing ones. I saw a mod days ago that softens all the colors of the lines and earth markings, but I don't remember the name, maybe you can find it on the official forum

 

[GIAMPA]

Thanks a lot! I will test it out. If it works, can I use it in my projects? If you don't want me to, I will recreate similar one from scratch, now that I have an example.

it's available to everyone, imagine, I didn't invent hot water

 

[RomanDesign]

If you are interested I attach other missing lines to the sim:
APRON-BORDER in 3 different versions
ABL and ABL-DASH for Traffic separation.
If anything, you can modify them with various more or less intense colors.
Always using the EDGE-SERVICE-DASHED which is the most performing for the width of 60cm and 176px
Ciao

Thanks, I'll use them as guides for my own files. They work well. One thing is that the lines are a bit thicker than regulations, but considering how ugly the other ones looked, it's a good compromise.

 

[RomanDesign]

Playing with the FIELD BLUR effect and OPACITY at 70-80 percent in Ps will blur the crests

What do you mean, does it help with the blocky downsampling artifacts?

 

[GIAMPA]

What do you mean, does it help with the blocky downsampling artifacts?

Hi, probably bad google translation.
I meant that I used Photoshop with the filter called FIELD BLUR (shades with value 10) and I decreased the degree of OPACITY (with value 80%).
(EDGE-SERVICE-DASHED for PaintedLine )
Sorry for the previous translation.

 

[mrbump]

Are the white edges on purpose? If not it is because you blurred the color channels against white instead of having a gradient on the alpha channel. Even with crisp lines it's a good idea to have the adjacent few transparent pixels in the same color as the line (because of the MIP maps). Also make sure your editor saves the color values for transparent pixels (in GIMP it's called "save color values from transparent pixels").

 

[mrbump]

By the way: For a moment I thought always using the same line type might be problematic if you ever want to use the "LIGHTED" variants. Then I tried it out and found, that -at least for the moment- you don't want to use lighted... Seems to be another mess that asobo might clear up one day. But nevertheless something to keep in mind.

All "lighted" lines create either flat or raised blue lights at a fixed distance from the line. Hold short has yellow lights, that extend far beyond the end of the line.

 

[RomanDesign]

Are the white edges on purpose? If not it is because you blurred the color channels against white instead of having a gradient on the alpha channel. Even with crisp lines it's a good idea to have the adjacent few transparent pixels in the same color as the line (because of the MIP maps). Also make sure your editor saves the color values for transparent pixels (in GIMP it's called "save color values from transparent pixels").

Ah, that's interesting. Photoshop doesn't do that. I can't edit alpha channel separately, or at least I don't know how, which I should. Maybe I'll install Gimp and try to modify my files there.

 

[GIAMPA]

By the way: For a moment I thought always using the same line type might be problematic if you ever want to use the "LIGHTED" variants. Then I tried it out and found, that -at least for the moment- you don't want to use lighted... Seems to be another mess that asobo might clear up one day. But nevertheless something to keep in mind.

View attachment 71919
All "lighted" lines create either flat or raised blue lights at a fixed distance from the line. Hold short has yellow lights, that extend far beyond the end of the line.

Dear friend, these are all tests that I am doing to get the best result, I noticed that if you have lines with 2 different colors it is difficult to make a good overall image of the same if you do not soften the edges, otherwise they appear very jagged. I prefer to lose a bit of color charge rather than having ugly serrations, all this within the limit that the SDK offers me.
For the illuminated lines of the central taxi they must be green and accessible to the ground. For the side ones I see no problems.
If you can make the best lines could you post them so you can use them?
I enclose an image of the ENAC recommendations for the construction of the ground lines within the aprons.
I look forward to advice from all of you, thank you

 

[GIAMPA]

I enclose the ENAC recommendations regarding apron markings for interested parties, you may have already seen them.
Hello

 

[GIAMPA]

By the way: For a moment I thought always using the same line type might be problematic if you ever want to use the "LIGHTED" variants. Then I tried it out and found, that -at least for the moment- you don't want to use lighted... Seems to be another mess that asobo might clear up one day. But nevertheless something to keep in mind.

View attachment 71919
All "lighted" lines create either flat or raised blue lights at a fixed distance from the line. Hold short has yellow lights, that extend far beyond the end of the line.

I followed your very accurate mask to build the new lines.
I wanted to thank you for this huge work.
Also I read, maybe I'm wrong, that you have removed a program to change the lines to the taxiways, if true you can post the link to download it?
Ciao

 

[mrbump]

For the illuminated lines of the central taxi they must be green and accessible to the ground. For the side ones I see no problems.

I just realised that there is no way to get green lights just with painted lines. In the screenshot below you see (from left to right)

• Standard Taxiway "lighted"
• Apron with painted line "default lighted"
• Apron with painted line "default" plus taxiway (no surface, no centerline but "centerline lighted")

So, if you want custom taxiway centerlines with lighting option 3 is probably the way to go.

 

[GIAMPA]

I just realised that there is no way to get green lights just with painted lines. In the screenshot below you see (from left to right)

• Standard Taxiway "lighted"
• Apron with painted line "default lighted"
• Apron with painted line "default" plus taxiway (no surface, no centerline but "centerline lighted")

So, if you want custom taxiway centerlines with lighting option 3 is probably the way to go.
View attachment 71935

I had to resort to the trick of overlapping them and putting only the check mark on the illuminated line of the taxiway, so my yellow line and black edges remain with the green lighting of the taxiway center.
Do you think it is possible that ASOBO gives the possibility to vary / generate lines on the taxiway?
Thank you

 

[mrbump]

I noticed that if you have lines with 2 different colors it is difficult to make a good overall image of the same if you do not soften the edges, otherwise they appear very jagged. I prefer to lose a bit of color charge rather than having ugly serrations, all this within the limit that the SDK offers me.

I'm not sure blurring is the best option. What I found is that the problems with the high contrast lines can also be mitigated by

• making it all a bit less intense: Add a bit of alpha to the yellow (maybe 66-75% opacity). The difference in color is hardly noticable.
• making the black edges a bit wider. Maybe 15cm.

This shows 20cm/30cm/20cm - yellow is still at full intensity here, black has 50% alpha.