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FS2004 [ SOLVED ] Round Ball ADI with 2D Bitmaps

FSMuseum

FSMuseum

Messages
224
Country
us-kentucky
I'm fairly confident the problem I am about to propose is obvious from the title...

I want to simulate a round ball type ADI. They work very well because the curvature of degree gauge really helps to sell the feeling of pitch when examining the instrument.

I could just go with a flat bitmap... But I would really love to simulate the actual curving of the lines as they come around the ball. I seem to recall that the old PSS panels that had these instruments managed to achieve this effect, but I don't know how it would be possible without dozens of bitmaps.

Any ideas?
 
FSMuseum

FSMuseum

Messages
224
Country
us-kentucky
Addendum: I reinstalled my old PSS Concorde and lo-and-behold, it has a beautifully rendered ADI ball.

Note my key word there... rendered. Using resource tuner to exam the gauge files, the actual ball portion of the ADI has no bitmaps whatsover. Judging from the smoothness and clarity of the ball in flight sim, I would say that it is probably being drawn in real time via programming. A very impressive feat. I wonder if such an effect is possible even remotely with bitmaps...
 
DragonflightDesign

DragonflightDesign

Resource contributor
Messages
1,003
Country
northernireland
Not via bitmaps. The one in Concorde has to be GDI or GDI+. The closest you're going to get to the same effect with a bitmap is to wrap an alpha channel around it. In theory and according to Microsoft, that only works with a static image (icons etc.) but I've had it working with sliders and moving image. Not very well at times, but it did work to a certain extent. I'm pretty sure you can't do it with XML, but one of the XML guys can confirm that.
 
FSMuseum

FSMuseum

Messages
224
Country
us-kentucky
This is the result that I came up with. I used a shadow bitmap with an alpha channel to simulate the shading of the ball. I think thats about as close as one can get with a simple solution and I am happy enough with it.

1599695545157.png
 
DragonflightDesign

DragonflightDesign

Resource contributor
Messages
1,003
Country
northernireland
Increase the 'roll-off' on the alpha shadow and add the horizon bar to the shadow to give a better feeling of 'depth'.

adi.jpg
 
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