Repainting Ques - Top Of Fuse & Tail

[sddjd 117]

Hello all,I'm working through my first NG repaint and am having some trouble understanding how to continue textures from the tail downwards onto the "top" texture, then down the sides of the fuselage. In this instance I have a semi-detailed pattern that continues down the sides similar to Hawaiian's tail (which I'm NOT trying to paint ). Can anyone point me to a sort of guideline on how to add and cut textures to do this correctly? In particular it's the area where the very rear of the fuselage texture and the top texture pull away from each other. Any help is appreciated!One other, anyone else suggested a repainting subforum?

[Richard Sennett 1,970]

Post some screenshots of your problems and we can go from there please.

[JokersWild 34]

Blending the textures at the top and bottom of the tail is the hardest part to learn, in my opinion. I still struggle to get it right. Lots of trial and error.

[Richard Sennett 1,970]

"Lots of trial and error" is an understatement Chris must have loaded the ngx 300 times. Guess theres no problem loading her anymore from main menu thats for sure.

[sddjd 117]

So no one's found or used a template or guide system for this area? Hard to believe the texture mapping was done in this way if 300 trial-and-errors are necessary to get it right.Pretty much makes one want to abandon the project compared to the exact and straightforward 744 kits (when you KNEW you had it right)...

[marijn747berg 1]

In the layers of the ngx master.psd, there's one called horizontal stabiliser, it gives you a rough idea of where the tail is,

[Richard Sennett 1,970]

"Pretty much makes one want to abandon the project " Cant tell you how many time I thought of doing this, kit is a real pain in the arse.

[JokersWild 34]

I was thinking of painting a grid pattern over the tail area in the paint kit, then outputting the textures to a "test plane" so I can see how the grid bends and breaks around the curves.

[sddjd 117]

Was thinking the same thing (the grid pattern). I'll likely keep at it, just a bit disappointing to find guesswork is the solution where every other aspect of the product is so beautifully exact.On to trial and error.....

[JokersWild 34]

Tis frustrating. Makes me shy away from repaints with lots of stripes that go from the fuse to the tail.

[NM5K 1]

What I usually do is find an example paint job that is doing aboutwhat I'm wanting to do. :)Then I go by that example with trial and error until it looks right..I've never used a paintkit, so I couldn't tell you nuttin about that..I do all mine by sense of smell... :/Another method could be using the "test" grid as JokersWildmentions where you place test lines and then see where they end up.If wrong in one direction, start tweaking it to the other.. etc..That's pretty much what I've always done, except I can usually prettymuch tell from the actual paint stripes which way I need to go.

[JokersWild 34]

I've got a nice grid rendered. I'll get you guys a PSD file soon. I want to output it to a test plane first.

[Richard Sennett 1,970]

Awesome Chris looking forward to this, thanks :)

[JokersWild 34]

Hey guys, I'm posting this in the main livery availability thread so the other repainters can see it also.

[Crankpin 15]

To make a grid... and save Chris the need to post a 12288x4096 grid :)If you are using Photoshop start a 'New' pic @ 50x50 pixels, draw 1 pixel wide a line down the right side and bottom of the 50x50 pixel grid. Color to contrast against the colors you'll need for the paint. This is a single 'cell' of our grid.Use Edit/Define Pattern to create a new pattern from our 50x50, name it GridRed or whatever.Add a new layer to your work, and use Fill (using the pattern fill option) to fill the layer and you'll have a whole overlay grid layer that you can turn on and off at will and will show all over your aircraft. It helps a lot to see whats going on. You can further refine the grid pattern with a few more 1 pixel 'marks' along the 50x50 edges for more accuracy but 50x50 works pretty well for most needs. I've ended up with a few versions of this grid cell pattern in red, black, yellow etc , it shortens the 300 trials to more like 30 :) but there ya go.CheersJohn