Have really gotten into FGFS, but this is my very first post about it.After figuring out how to create a gosh darn SGI format (.RGB extension) texture-map file for FG on my PC, (solution: get GIMP opensource paint program [binaries]), I've created my first "reskin" of an FG plane!Now I want to share it! Is there a way FG'ers do this?I know that in the car-sim "Racer" (also open source) community I'm part of, there are agreed ways of doing this, including issues of etiquette.I haven't found anything in the FG forums about aircraft maps! Should I upload the texture map, perhaps on this forum?What about the original author(s) of the plane being reskinned? (Come to think of it, what about the photographer over on Airliners.net who's B737 side view shot I'm mapping onto the plane?)The author of the Boeing 737 did a nice handpainted United Airlines livery texture map, but one can adapt photographic resources to really enhance the realism of the aircraft!Attached pic: (top): original author's handpainted texture map.(bottom): my tweaked and massaged and generally adapted map made from actual photo(s). Friendly feedback welcomed. ;-)

>Have really gotten into FGFS, but this is my very first post>about it.>After figuring out how to create a gosh darn SGI format (.RGB>extension) texture-map file for FG on my PC, (solution: get>GIMP opensource paint program [binaries]),Just in case that it took you any significant amount of time to figure that out, it's really a good recommendation to search the mailing list archives at flightgear.org and this sub forum before spending much time trying to figure something out that may be very simple to do by actually looking into previous discussions.On the other hand, it would probably not harm at all if these things were also "officially" mentioned in some specific readme file within $FG_ROOT/Docs, i.e. something like README.textures> I've created my first "reskin" of an FG plane!Congratulations !>Now I want to share it! Is there a way FG'ers do this?Yes, indeed there are some ways to share FlightGear specific files, if you have created genuine work, you would preferably license it under any GPL compatible license, so that your work may optionally even be included into the official FlightGear base package and may become part of future releases.On the other hand, if licensing your work under the GPL may not be an option, for whatever reasons, you may still license your files under your own license and make your files available via a simple download using some simple webspace (in case that you don't have webspace yet, make sure to google for it, as there are numerous hosts offering free webspace).Alternatively, you may consider making your files available via some of the user-run aircraft repositories, in that case you'll probably want to search flightgear.org and its mailing list archives for the different possibilities (repositories, that is).>I know that in the car-sim "Racer" (also open source)>community I'm part of, there are agreed ways of doing this,>including issues of etiquette.>I haven't found anything in the FG forums about aircraft maps!I'm not sure I'm getting you right.What do you mean by "maps", the textures/liveries?In that case, there's no dedicated place to share such things as of now, however usually they will quite well fit into the individual aircraft's folder itself.>Should I upload the texture map, perhaps on this forum?That's probably also not a bad idea at all, simply because any privately hosted files may be subject to removal sooner or later if users cannot afford to maintain the webspace, also given the insignificant size of these plaintext ASCII files, this looks like a very feasible option.>What about the original author(s) of the plane being>reskinned? Indeed, the author(s) of individual aircraft may probably be another potential way to actually "re-lease" your modifications, at least if those people are still around (within the FlightGear community), you may want to search the FlightGear mailing list archives to check whether the corresponding people are still "active" or not, in the latter case, it might also be a good idea to simply consider sending your files/changes (i.e. a diff patch) themselves to the FlightGear Devel mailing list (as long as the files don't exceed a certain size, i.e. 10 kb)>(Come to think of it, what about the photographer over on>Airliners.net who's B737 side view shot I'm mapping onto the>plane?)This may actually be the most criticial issue at all, airliners.net is known to have authors copyright their images, amongst others also for sale. So in that case you are most likely using copyrighted work, which in itself shouldn't be any problem if you are only using that work for your own personal purposes, however as soon as you intend to make these modifications publicly available, this may indeed cause significant problems. Hence, your best bet would probably be to contact the photographer(s) of the images that you used, explain to them what you've done with their images, and what you'd like to be allowed to do. And preferably, they might even consider releasing certain images explicitly under the GPL for FlightGear incorporation.In any case it would probably help tremendously if you provide a short introduction about FlightGear, its purpose, its goals/philosophy (i.e. FREE) and enclose some screenshots of your final work to illustrate to the photographer(s) what you've done.That way, it will be straight forward for them to see what their artwork would be used for.>The author of the Boeing 737 did a nice handpainted United>Airlines livery texture map, but one can adapt photographic>resources to really enhance the realism of the aircraft!I agree, the attached image looks really very cool and I'd personally love to see this officially added to the base package.>Attached pic: (top): original author's handpainted texture>map.>(bottom): my tweaked and massaged and generally adapted map>made from actual photo(s). Friendly feedback welcomed. ;-)Just in case that none of the previous suggestions should turn out not to appeal to the photographer(s), it's still an option to simply package the corresponding definition files, i.e. the XML file, the actual MAP and a link to the image that you used, that way each user could personally re-create the modification without you having to package the actual binary file.

Apart from that, I really like the idea and think that this could attract other users, too. So, it would probably be really a good idea to automatically allow for multiple livery/texture definitions within the XML files, that way users could switch at runtime what livery/textures should be applied to an aircraft. This would also have the advantage of being able to specify or reference multiple liveries for one single aircraft, without requiring different folders or sets of files for otherwise identical aircraft.

Hi,today I discovered by chance that AVSIM already has a FlightGear category with 4 subcategories in the File Library!!!One FlightGear user had already uploaded a nice 747 repaint Newzealand "Lord of the rings" (in the wrong subcategory but this doesn't hurt as there aren't a lot of files).For all users this might be another possibility to share FlightGear related files which cannot cover all official FlightGear GNU license requierements (similar to most other uploads from other sims).Just a thought ..Would be fine to get your nice repaint :-)RegardsGeorg EDDW

Thanks much to "hfitz" for the excellent, (and thorough), feedback and suggestions in this thread. Thanks also to HeliFLYer for high-speed Beta testing, high over the virtual, and in the real; Bremen, Germany, ;-) (on the other side of "the pond" from here.) I am pretty new to the flight sim world, (but NOT the computer graphics world...c.1984), so I'm not too familiar with what seems to be the busy world of reskins for other sims, like Xplane, and something called FS. ;-) Besides being a "starving artist", which has gotten me into "free" sims, I'm finding that the most attractive aspect of things like "Racer"car-sim and FlightGear are the world-wide collaborative, "hands on" creative aspects. Great!I've written to a some folks whose work in part I am combining with my own to do my part contributing to FlightGear.Thanks to Innis Cunningham, author of the FlightGear Boeing 737 3D work, for his approval, (and endorsement), of my offering replacement texture maps, (outside of the basic point of GNU GPL licensing.)I've uploaded four liveries, (one imaginary), which I've created for the 737 on my site, here:http://home.maine.rr.com/millerdesigns/You might have to use some savvy to get files in the correct place and renamed appropriately, (especially so to get the ground shadow added.) I can't give too much technical support. (BTW, I have it on good authority that the FG B737 is in the virtual hanger for an overhaul.)Enjoy. "RealWingo", AKA Mark (KPWM)

Very nice work!But there is only one thing that you should know because it can save you a lot of time. :)The cvs version of flightgear now supports realtime shadows that are calculated on the fly by using the 3d model data.Shadow maps are no more necessary.

Thanks for the update Honkar. I'll have to see about updating my version of FlightGear.I just wanted to let people know I've uploaded to my site another couple of repaints I've made. (I'm a FG newbie, I haven't quite figured out the FG mailing list forums, CVS, and all that.) One repaint is for the 707, one is for the very nice (but unpainted) Cessna 150 from the CVS forum which someone sent me. Considered these GNU-GPL licensed, although I'm still figuring that out too. Please note these are kind of experimental, not really polished, but I think they work pretty slick for the most part if I may say so. (Also see my logo for a theoretical FlightGear Academy of sorts.)http://home.maine.rr.com/millerdesigns/Enjoy, "RealWingo"