Specular on Scenery Object

[Anthony31]

Has anyone succeeded in getting specular highlights on a scenery object made with FSDS V3.5.1 and if so how?

I am making a hangar with a corrugated iron roof. I'd like the roof to have a specular effect like "Diffuse with Specular 1" as shown in the FSX Materials in the SDK.

I've tried setting the specular material in FSDS (using the material editor in FSDS) to a mid grey and setting the specular level to 50 as described in the SDK but it doesn't work in FSX. The object still appears with a matt finish.

Had a look at FSDSTweak and the material editor there doesn't even seem to have Specular Level.

Thank you in advance for any assistance possible.

 

[FelixFFDS]

Do recheck with FSDSxTweak, since, per the manual:

13.4 Materials
Section name: [texture.N]
identifier= {your texture filename, including .bmp or .dds extension} Note – this
is a unique name which exists inside your model, and is used to identify the
material for tweaking. This should always be the first entry in each section.
AssumeVerticalNormal= {0 = off, 1 = on}
ambient= {.bmp or .dds filename for this map}
BlendEnvironmentByInverseDiffuseAlpha= {0 = off, 1 = on}
BlendEnvironmentBySpecularAlpha= {0 = off, 1 = on}

(italics mine)


IF you still have a problem with specular issues, I believe that Dave Nunez checks here frequently, but you can also pop over to the FSDSxTweak Development and Support Board. Dave checks that frequently, as well.

 

[Anthony31]

Thanks Felix

I knew they must be some switch somewhere but what and where had me stumped. I'll give it a go and see what happens.

 

[Anthony31]

This doesn't work.

 

[Anthony31]

Hooray for me. I got it to work! After checking the freeflight forums I was able to find something by FSDSMan who listed the parameters in the .x file and I was able to find the switch. It is not "BlendEnvironmentBySpecularAlpha= {0 = off, 1 = on}" but is "BaseMaterialSpecular { 1; //AllowBaseMaterialSpecular }

Here is the .x file and I have highlighted/commented the parts that needed to be changed to get the specular to work.

Material DEFAULT_ants_YHBA_ConeStriped_bmp {
0.3; 0.3; 0.3; 1.0;;
50.0; // Specular level set in FSDS material editor
0.9; 0.9; 0.9;; // Specular colour set in FSDS material editor
0.0; 0.0; 0.0;;
TextureFilename {
"ants_YHBA_ConeStriped.bmp";
}
DiffuseTextureFilename {
"ants_YHBA_ConeStriped.bmp";
}
FS10Material {
0.3; 0.3; 0.3; 1.0;;
0.9; 0.9; 0.9;; // Specular colour set in FSDS
50.0; // Specular level set in FSDS
1.000000; 1.000000; // Detail and bump scales
0.190000; // Scale environment level factor
0; // Use global environment
0; // Do not blend env by inv diffuse alpha
0; // Do not blend env by specular map alpha
0; 1; 1; // Fresnel - diffuse = NO, Specular = YES, Env = YES
0; 0; 0.000000; // Precipitation - Use = NO, Offset = NO
64.000000; // Specular Map Power Scale
"One"; "Zero"; // Src/Dest blend
EmissiveData {
"Additive"; // Emissive Mode
}
DiffuseTextureFilename {
"ants_YHBA_ConeStriped.bmp";
}
BaseMaterialSpecular {
1; // AllowBaseMaterialSpecular
}
} // FS10Material
}

The process is pretty simple. Using the FSDS material editor I set the specular colour and level (refer to the FSX SDK for details about the settings you can use here. I've used nearly white for colour and a specular level of 50 in this example).

The next bit (which is where I got stuck) was to add the BaseMaterialSpecular switch which turns on the effect.

Hope this helps anyone else still using FSDS for scenery design

 

[FelixFFDS]

Thanks for sharing the information !