-
There seems to be an uptick in Political comments in recent months. Those of us who are long time members of the site know that Political and Religious content has been banned for years. Nothing has changed. Please leave all political and religious comments out of the forums.
If you recently joined the forums you were not presented with this restriction in the terms of service. This was due to a conversion error when we went from vBulletin to Xenforo. We have updated our terms of service to reflect these corrections.
Please note any post refering to a politician will be considered political even if it is intended to be humor. Our experience is these topics have a way of dividing the forums and causing deep resentment among members. It is a poison to the community. We appreciate compliance with the rules.
The Staff of SOH
new material in model converter X
- Thread starter LouP
- Start date
LouP
Flight Sim Junkie
Thank you Manfred but it only lists the textures that were in the original model to begin with. I'm trying to add a whole new texture for the glass. I applied the "default transparent" using the texture that the model part originally applied to but it's not vey transparent using that texture, so I wanted to reference a whole new texture and see how that worked.
LouP
LouP
awstub
SOH-CM-2023
You can definitely do this. If you click on the file name listed for the diffuse texture in the Material Editor, you can see on the right side a little button that allows you to browse to a different file, if you want to change it.
For making glass clear, I usually I swap in a different texture that works well for me......and I usually don't even have to change any other parameters. It just works.
For making glass clear, I usually I swap in a different texture that works well for me......and I usually don't even have to change any other parameters. It just works.
If a new texture is all you need (what awstub suggests), just change the texture name. From glass.dds to glassnew.dds for example. You can even type that directly into the Material Editor's slot.
Naturally, you must make sure a) to export the model from MCX using a name that complies with the plane's model.cfg, b) that you have copied glassnew.dds to the texture folder of the target plane and that that is the livery you are actually flying, d) that your FS is actually using the updated textures (re-loading may not be enough), and e) that the replacement texture is a suitable glass texture to begin with. Hopefully you made a backup of the original model in the first place.
For awstub's scenario you do not need any Templates. You shouldn't have "New Template 1 thru 3" either - the first thing you do after creating a new template from an existing material is giving it a meaningful name such as "glass from Cessna" or whatever. Oh, and a new Template will not become active unless you pick it from the Templates dropdown list and hit 'Apply'.
Naturally, you must make sure a) to export the model from MCX using a name that complies with the plane's model.cfg, b) that you have copied glassnew.dds to the texture folder of the target plane and that that is the livery you are actually flying, d) that your FS is actually using the updated textures (re-loading may not be enough), and e) that the replacement texture is a suitable glass texture to begin with. Hopefully you made a backup of the original model in the first place.
For awstub's scenario you do not need any Templates. You shouldn't have "New Template 1 thru 3" either - the first thing you do after creating a new template from an existing material is giving it a meaningful name such as "glass from Cessna" or whatever. Oh, and a new Template will not become active unless you pick it from the Templates dropdown list and hit 'Apply'.
awstub
SOH-CM-2023
There are people here who know much better ways to do this than me, but I have been having a good bit of success lately with converting FS2004 and FSX jets to work with P3Dv4.5.
I'm definitely no expert though and what I know is mostly from trial and error, or accidentally finding a post someone wrote somewhere, but what I do process-wise, once I open the model with McX is:
I first open Animation Editor to check them all and find out if any need to be taken care of.
To better see the animations as I go through them, I switch to mesh view. If I still have trouble finding an animation, I open Hierarchy Editor and type in the animation name. Once selected, it will show up on the mesh in red. Some animations need to be reversed, which is done through Hierarchy Editor by right clicking on the animated parts "SceneGraphNode" and selecting "reverse animation".
If I can't get an animation to work properly, and it's not a "must have", I'll "fix" it in whatever position I'm OK with freezing it at.
Sometimes you'll need to use a specific modeldef.xml file in order to get animations to convert properly.
I then open Material Editor and check for missing textures.
I check to see if the canopy glass can be made clear by setting it to Default Transparent. If it works, great. If it does not, then I swap in a different texture. My go to texture is "Glass_T" ..... I don't know it's true origin, but it works 99% of the time for me.
Something to note... unless the texture files are in the same folder as the model, the aircraft.cfg controls what textures will display in McX. So, if the textures files seem to be in the correct places but not displaying on the model, check the cfg file.
Once I'm satisfied with everything, I re-compile the model.....saving it with a new name, so that I don't overwrite the original model. You need to be able to start over, since sometimes things don't recompile the way you expect.
For exterior models, I usually just add "_P3D" to the original name.
For interior models I add "_Int" to end of the name instead of _P3D.
I then modify the models model.cfg file by changing "normal=" to the new exterior model name and add the "interior=" line with the interior model name.
This should allow the models to display textures properly when I re-open them in McX to verify that they compiled OK.
There are definitely others here who can do McX magic with material settings, etc... but I haven't figured out how to do any of that yet and unfortunately it seems that there isn't much in the way of tutorials that explains what can/should be done in this regard.
As wonderful as McX is, it's documentation is less than comprehensive and unless you know what you are doing it can be difficult to know what values control what.
Edited to add: there are a lot of other things not mentioned, such as dealing with attached effects, etc... but my intention for this post was to offer some "starter" info to help others who might be thinking of trying to convert something. Some conversions seem to be very easy and some seem to be very difficult.... but very enjoyable once you experience a little bit of success.
I'm definitely no expert though and what I know is mostly from trial and error, or accidentally finding a post someone wrote somewhere, but what I do process-wise, once I open the model with McX is:
I first open Animation Editor to check them all and find out if any need to be taken care of.
To better see the animations as I go through them, I switch to mesh view. If I still have trouble finding an animation, I open Hierarchy Editor and type in the animation name. Once selected, it will show up on the mesh in red. Some animations need to be reversed, which is done through Hierarchy Editor by right clicking on the animated parts "SceneGraphNode" and selecting "reverse animation".
If I can't get an animation to work properly, and it's not a "must have", I'll "fix" it in whatever position I'm OK with freezing it at.
Sometimes you'll need to use a specific modeldef.xml file in order to get animations to convert properly.
I then open Material Editor and check for missing textures.
I check to see if the canopy glass can be made clear by setting it to Default Transparent. If it works, great. If it does not, then I swap in a different texture. My go to texture is "Glass_T" ..... I don't know it's true origin, but it works 99% of the time for me.
Something to note... unless the texture files are in the same folder as the model, the aircraft.cfg controls what textures will display in McX. So, if the textures files seem to be in the correct places but not displaying on the model, check the cfg file.
Once I'm satisfied with everything, I re-compile the model.....saving it with a new name, so that I don't overwrite the original model. You need to be able to start over, since sometimes things don't recompile the way you expect.
For exterior models, I usually just add "_P3D" to the original name.
For interior models I add "_Int" to end of the name instead of _P3D.
I then modify the models model.cfg file by changing "normal=" to the new exterior model name and add the "interior=" line with the interior model name.
This should allow the models to display textures properly when I re-open them in McX to verify that they compiled OK.
There are definitely others here who can do McX magic with material settings, etc... but I haven't figured out how to do any of that yet and unfortunately it seems that there isn't much in the way of tutorials that explains what can/should be done in this regard.
As wonderful as McX is, it's documentation is less than comprehensive and unless you know what you are doing it can be difficult to know what values control what.
Edited to add: there are a lot of other things not mentioned, such as dealing with attached effects, etc... but my intention for this post was to offer some "starter" info to help others who might be thinking of trying to convert something. Some conversions seem to be very easy and some seem to be very difficult.... but very enjoyable once you experience a little bit of success.
Last edited:
awstub
SOH-CM-2023
I use the latest development release, which you can find here http://www.scenerydesign.org/development-releases/
LouP
Flight Sim Junkie
First, Thank you, you guys have been a wealth of information and I am having a blast tweaking stuff. I have an aircraft where the guages seem to be hiding just behind the bitmap of the vc panel. I need to either nudge the gauges a little further in or move the vc a little back. I was playing with the transformations and don't know if that's where I should be looking or not. Any more help will be appreciated.
LouP
LouP
awstub
SOH-CM-2023
I'm not sure what you mean. Normally, if you are not seeing instruments, it's because you need to set the background $ textures to be transparent..... otherwise they are just black, with no instruments..
awstub
SOH-CM-2023
What model are you working on? Maybe someone here has already taken a look at it and can offer you a tip.
The only way you can really move a model part would be to isolate it in McX and then export it into a format that you can then open in a modeling program.
For instance, you could isolate the part and export it into the .obj format (Wavefront, I think?) awhich will allow you to then import it into Blender.
You can then make your modifications and (after re-registering it with the texture map) export into .mdl format (if you have the free Blender2FXS add-on... and Blender is free too).
Once the part is back into a .mdl format you merge it into the model .....after removing the part, since you are replacing it with a modified part.
It sounds very complicated, but once you do it a couple times it's really not so bad. you can add/change pilots, VCs, gunsights, rockets, bombs, etc... this way.
The only way you can really move a model part would be to isolate it in McX and then export it into a format that you can then open in a modeling program.
For instance, you could isolate the part and export it into the .obj format (Wavefront, I think?) awhich will allow you to then import it into Blender.
You can then make your modifications and (after re-registering it with the texture map) export into .mdl format (if you have the free Blender2FXS add-on... and Blender is free too).
Once the part is back into a .mdl format you merge it into the model .....after removing the part, since you are replacing it with a modified part.
It sounds very complicated, but once you do it a couple times it's really not so bad. you can add/change pilots, VCs, gunsights, rockets, bombs, etc... this way.
Right, but in the case of this model, It looks really bad without if there. I was trying to move that piece back a bit or the guages forward. Maybe it can't be done. Learning so much with this thing.
LouP
Hi,
It is not correct.
If you just want to move an existing model part, use the "transformation" settings to move the model part in the desired direction, or even rotate it.
You should only isolate, export or delete a model part if you want to replace it with another.
Best
Jean
LouP
Flight Sim Junkie
I was playing with the transformations editor but there are so many variables to adjust, I wasn't sure which one to change. I just want to move the VC back a little bit but am now thinking that I may be simply moving the gauges back with the VC. I played with a few but none of the settings I tried helped. The model is the FS9 Avro Anson. I had another idea last night and am going to try a different gauge and see if that becomes visible in the vc.
LouP