Hello eveyone!I've spent the last 3 hours mipmapping every single texture on my PMDG aircrafts, the results are astonishing! The Virtual Cockpit is amazingly sharp, same for the outside textures. Here is a before and after comparaison:Before: http://static.bf2s.com/files/user/34941/Ohh%20Baby!.jpgAfter: http://static.bf2s.com/files/user/34941/German%20Queen.jpgNotice on the second picture that the textures are much more smooth!So this brings me to these questions:1: Why wasn't this included by default?2: I've already mipmapped AF/LH/BA/BO - AFF/GSS/VC25/BOF - AF8i/LH8i/BA8i/AF1 - AFF8i/LHF8i/GSS8i/BOF8iFF/ Are you people from PMDG interested in using them?

Did you just mipmap using DXT BMP? Are the VC textures much sharper if you stand at the rear of the flight deck?Very cool experiment, might try this out later myself, thanks.

Did you just mipmap using DXT BMP? Are the VC textures much sharper if you stand at the rear of the flight deck?Very cool experiment, might try this out later myself, thanks.

I used Photoshop CS3 with a Nvidia plugin':http://developer.nvidia.com/object/photoshop_dds_plugins.htmlI haven't walked to the back of the cabin yet, but the textures in the no longer have any staircases, its all super sharp now ;PFor an example, from the left seat, looking at the right mcp buttons, you can see it as if it was real, no longer fuzzy as before, crisp and clear ;) Also appears to increase performance by a tiny bit, like 1 FPS.

1: Why wasn't this included by default?2: I've already mipmapped AF/LH/BA/BO - AFF/GSS/VC25/BOF - AF8i/LH8i/BA8i/AF1 - AFF8i/LHF8i/GSS8i/BOF8iFF/ Are you people from PMDG interested in using them?

Answer 1) The reason we didnt include this by default was because some people don't run their PCs with very high filtering, and as a result, they get a lot of blurries on the fuselage, especially when viewing from sharp angles. Also, if people run the sim without the master texture slider full right, the sim will default to a lower mip map, creating massive blurries. Both of these create three things: forum backlash (why are you guys making such blurry textures.. ), Support nightmares (why are my textures blurry? FIX IT!), and decreased enjoyment and altered perception of our products for those who run their systems at lower settings, but don't realize that there is something better waiting for them if they drag a couple of slider.Answer 2) See answer 1 :( .. but thanks for the offer. Enjoy!I'm curious.. did you see a performance gain as well?

Answer 1) The reason we didnt include this by default was because some people don't run their PCs with very high filtering, and as a result, they get a lot of blurries on the fuselage, especially when viewing from sharp angles. Also, if people run the sim without the master texture slider full right, the sim will default to a lower mip map, creating massive blurries. Both of these create three things: forum backlash (why are you guys making such blurry textures.. ), Support nightmares (why are my textures blurry? FIX IT!), and decreased enjoyment and altered perception of our products for those who run their systems at lower settings, but don't realize that there is something better waiting for them if they drag a couple of slider.Answer 2) See answer 1 :( .. but thanks for the offer. Enjoy!I'm curious.. did you see a performance gain as well?

Ahh! I understand now!As I said, one FPS is all I gained. from 32 to 33, you really have to love W7, those used to me the frame rates the 8i ran at, now, I haven't even tested it, i'm sure I won't be dissapointed though :)Still, if you guys want it, its all packed in two files which will now be always reaplied each time i reinstall FSX ;D

how do u do this?!?i havent got photoshopis it possible?Alex

how do u do this?!?i havent got photoshopis it possible?Alex

Try DDS Converter if you aren't on W7.First, set up the options in DDS Converter:1. Open DDS Converter2. Click Options3. Set up the options as in the picture belowBuffer: 30000/ Filter Trilinear/ JPG QualityCompression 99%/ Mem/Spd tradeoff: speed/ tool: nvidia/ DXT format: DXT5/ Build Mipmaps/ save alpha.If you open a texture folder and it contains DDS textures1. Open DDS Converter2. Create two folders on your desktop, call them 'input' and 'output'3. COPY the original textures you want to edit into the input folder4. Click the 'output folder' button in DDS Converter and select your output folder5. Navigate to your input folder in the main DDS Converter window6. Select the files to convert and click on convert7. Copy the new files from the output folder to the original aircraft texture folder8. Make a backup of the files in the input folder so that you have a copy of the original texturesNote - Sometimes developers incorrectly save DDS files. This causes DDS Converter to crash when you select the texture.If you find a bad DDS file, open it up in Photoshop or with DXTBMP and export/ save it as a 32 bit BMP. Then open this 32 bitBMP file in Photoshop and save it as a DXT5 DDS file with Mipmaps. If you don't have Photoshop, you can use DXTBMP to dothis but I have had more success with Photoshop. The nvidia DDS plugin works better and is more reliable. If you ever get theerror in Photoshop whilst saving DDS files 'too many channels to export', Flatten the image first and try again.

I'm interested in a cockpit conversion....is that possible?Could you do that (hopefully with not too much work) and upload or mail me, please?thank you very much!

im on windows 7, what software do u needDDS Converter i cant find this?

could you post some before and after pics of the cockpit?

Unfortunately, DDS Converter does not work with W7 so you're out of luck unless you grab Photoshop.I could do a conversion, or easier, I could upload what I worked to PMDG. But I'm really willing get approval from PMDG before doing any of this, because I've modified every single texture file made by PMDG and wouldn't want to violate the eula.Cockpit shots? Sure!A bit later though, I have a small problem with my EXT Backup Drive.. :(

I did this a while ago, back when we were all still trying to find a fix for the disappearing textures. I did a few complete aircraft, all of the textures in both the default Texture folder as well as the Texture.xxx folder of the AC I was testing. The end result was very sporadic visually and resulted more in cases of the blurries like Vin mentioned. There was 0 difference with cockpit textures so don't waste your time. But all means experiment away,,, I loves to experiment with all my addons and has taught me tons.Oh and also, then end result in my opinion wasn't worth it at all, but FS9 did benefit visually slightly which for a while had me doing my FS9 liveries all with mips, but after many trials I also came to the decision that it wasn't worth the time since again the result was too little and blurries more often than not.PS. Alex, DXTBmp can save as dds but you will probably also need to use imagetool from the FSX deluxe CD (SDK). I listed a lot of this info in the paint tutorial as workarounds for those without PS and have the links there as well.

Alright guys! here are the screens I promised, sorry for the delay but I had a little problem with my External Hard Drive, but CHKDSK fixed it all. (also a "phew" moment since it contains every single addon I've ever used in FS)The VC Before mipping: You can see the right hand of the MCP is very jaggy.http://static.bf2s.com/files/user/34941/MiP/VCB4.jpgThe VC after mapping: Jaggies? where?http://static.bf2s.com/files/user/34941/MiP/VCAF.jpgThe External model before mipping: Same scenario, lots of jaggies.http://static.bf2s.com/files/user/34941/MiP/747B4.jpgThe External model after mipping: Remember the days of FS9? ;)http://static.bf2s.com/files/user/34941/MiP/747AF.jpg:)

If you want to try this and you don't have Photoshop, do a search for 'paint.net' which is a rather good (and free) alternative to Photoshop. It has built-in support for DDS textures. If you open a texture in Paint.net and then choose to save it as a DDS file, you will get a pop up asking you if you want to create mipmaps.Al

@ Loanwill some of your textures be available for the common flight enthusiast, i would love to see the results myself, but dont have the toolsyou say you have a BA livery?