Any tutorials out there for adding effects to ac

ian elliot

ian elliot

SOH-CM-2024
Just wondering as im trying to add basic effects to Itos Mig 17, contrails, engine smoke, lights, that sort of thing, maybe afterburner, although not sure if the 17 had one, some sources say it did and others say it did'nt :mixedsmi:.
cheers ian
 
Vapor trails are automatic on turbines. If the outside temp is -39°, FS activates the trails in the correct position according to the engine location(s) in the cfg. If you want to alter that temp or activate the feature in a piston plane (such as a propliner), add this line to the [General_Engine_Data] section:

max_contrail_temperature= (you chose the temp)

I generally go with -20 to enable the trails earlier. There's not too many things cooler to see in FS than a nice Connie flying along at FL230 with vapor trails!

As for other effects, the best reference is the Aircraft Container SDK. Tip: Run the installer to a temp folder, copy the Word doc to your desktop, then uninstall. The only thing that the installer gives you is the doc and a readme with all the legal stuff. The doc contains all the stuff you need. Here's the link:
http://download.microsoft.com/downl...a29-2ab00f676ba6/aircraft_container_setup.exe

One note - the smoke section says you can control the position in three axes, but in reality, there's a but that only allows you to position smoke in the XY plane. To raise or lower it, you have to edit the smoke effect file itself, which is pretty easy to do with Notepad.
 
Ian

I have spent a good bit of time adding effects to sim aircraft, and have come up with a "standardized" system for adding A/B effects, wing vortexes, smoke, and such. I use a number of gauges to control the effects via the Lights section of the aircraft.cfg. All of the gauges I use for effects are freeware and can be shared...even the newly written AB effect gauge that Rob Barendregt wrote up to my specs (it was very very close to an AB gauge he had previously developed, so all he had to do were a couple minor changes).

I need to run some errands, but when I get home I will sit myself down and write up a simple, easy to understand guide to implementing my "standardized" effects setup and will bundle all the gauges I use into a nice package and get the "OBIO's Standardized Effects Kit" uploaded ASAP.

OBIO
 
Thanks Tom, just figured the engine smoke, thats the easy one but usful info on the rest. intresting about contrails, are you saying any plane in the sim can have them without adding a third party effect by just playing with or adding the max_contrail_temperature= (you chose the temp) line.
cheers ian
 
Yep - just about all of my propliners have the effect enabled. Matter of fact, the Connies by Manfred Jahn and his team come with the effect already enabled.
 
My "standardized" effects set up fits single and twin engine planes only....due to the limited number of Lights available. Nav Lights, landing lights and cockpit lights are reserved for those lights, but Recognition, Taxi, Cabin and Logo lights are used for Wing Vortex (recognition), engine heat effects (engine 1 uses Taxi and engine 2 uses cabin) and After Burner (Logo).

One folder of gauges I use contains gauges that came with the freeware Alphasim jets...most of them I have modified into new forms or adjusted to better fit my taste as to when the effect kicks in. The other two gauge folders are by Rob Barendregt. One package of gauges is the RENO_FX package that came with the RENO Racer Mustang or some such...can't remember exactly what plane I installed that had that gauge folder. remaining gauge is a the "new" After Burner gauge that Rob put together for me. It goes into the RCB-gauges folder that contains many many gauges that Rob has created. This new AB gauge is different that the usual AB control gauge. This gauge does not activate the AB effect unless the engine is at full power with the throttle being 98% advanced AND the pilot actually has to engage the After Burner. This gauge allows you to go to full power without having the AB effect showing or having the AB kick in automatically.

I have the gauges collected into a folder and will write up a tute on how to set up the various lights for wing vortex, engine heat (using the IRIS Heat.fx that comes with a number of their freeware jets) and after burner.

Having ACM makes getting the lights/effects into the desired place easier, but doing it without ACM is still possible, just take a good bit of trial and error to get them in the right location.

OBIO

Once this thread is developed, it will be moved up to the FS2004 Tips and Tweaks subforum for safe keeping and easy access in the future.
 
sounds like im going to have some fun with this, thanks for putting this together,
one thing though, if im adding gauges to panel cfg's, will things still work if you only have a 2d panel and no vc ?
cheers ian
 
Ian

In the case of a plane without a VC, what you will have to do is create a virtual virtual cockpit....which is nothing more than a section of code placed in the panel.cfg:

//--------------------------------------------------------
[Vcockpit01]
Background_color=0,0,0
size_mm=256,256
visible=0
pixel_size=256,256
texture=$dumby

gauge00=Xxxx
gauge01=Xxxx
gauge02=Xxxx
gauge03=Xxxx

Here's an example pulled from one of the Alphasim jets, where a virtual VC was created just to keep the effects gauges separate from the flight gauges....just to keep the gauges list cleaner in the real VC:

[Vcockpit02]
Background_color=0,0,0
size_mm=32,32
visible=0
pixel_size=32,32
texture=$Fake

gauge00=AlphaSim!Alpha_exh_smoke3, 1,1,1,1

I came in to the office after I got done with my running around and after making a late supper for the Mrs. and I.....the heat here today drained me of all my Superhero powers and I fell asleep slumped over in my office chair. Not a comfortable position to spend 4 hours or so.

OBIO
 
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