Hi There! It's been too long since I last dabbled in any repaints and I'd like a refresher course; psd to dds etc. This is for the Sky Simulations MD-11 V2.0 paintkit by the way.. I've got a couple of paint requests posted up, but no takers so far (I am being patient :) ). So, I was also going to see if I've got the tools to do the job rather than having to buy any other packages.

I've got paint.net and DXTbmp. The MD-11 paintkit has photoshop files. Paint.net opens the psd files no problem and displays their layers, DXT does not.

How do I go about getting the paintkit file into FSX? I presume I need to save it in dds format once I've finished with paint.net - Do I need DXTbmp? Do I need to flip the psd file before editing it? It certainly looks that way when I compare it to a dds file in the aircraft texture folder.

Looking at the actual texture (dds) files for the aircraft (Lufthansa for example) I note that some parts are included which are not shown on the same paintkit file (for example additional labels and static port markers etc).

Thanks in advance.

This may be bad advice, but you can try saving the psd files as targa with alpha and then use DXT to convert them to DDS.  

GIMP not has limted DDS support in it's latest addition.  I haven't tried it.

I use Affinity Photo with Image Magick which works for me.  I'm not smart enough to use more than one paint program. 🙂

 

I use photoshop and am not familiar with paint.net.  

However, in your paint program, try merging all your visible layers into one when you have finished the paint job, and save that as a jpg.  If you can do that in paint.net, follow these steps:

1. copy the jpg (or relevant parts of it) from the textures in your paint program

2. load your master DDS file into DXTbmp and export it to your paint program

3. paste the copied parts from your paint onto the exported DDS file and flip it vertically as required

4. ensure your pasted layer is correctly aligned with the master DDS file below, then merge into one layer

5. save the single layer file (probably called norm, or similar) in your paint program

6. import that saved file back into DTXbmp and save it to your textures folder.

7. repeat for each texture file for that aircraft

Hope that points you in the right direction!

Cheers,

Brian

 

Thanks guys, but I'm still a bit confused. - Brian - step 2 - I don't have a master DDS file to load into DXTbmp, only psd files.

OK - the aircraft must have some default livery folders and in those folders you should find some DDS files.  

I would suggest copying the whole folder and renaming it to the livery name you are about to create.  Then use the DDS files in that folder to over-write your textures as explained above.

Cheers,

Brian

3 hours ago, HighBypass said:

Thanks guys, but I'm still a bit confused. - Brian - step 2 - I don't have a master DDS file to load into DXTbmp, only psd files.

Repaint using the psd. Save the psd as a targa with alpha, use DXT to convert the targa file to DDS.  Once finished painted with the targa, don't forget to flatten the file. 

Thanks Blue Star, I'll give it a go. Do I have to generate an alpha from within paint.net? I note that when saving as a targa that paint.net says it will automatically flatten the image.

Brian - yes there are liveries which come with the plane and I'd thought about using DXTbmp and paint.net as I have done on smaller jobs before. However the paintkit is a basic white airframe but with all the details layered on separately - no airline logos on it. A blank canvas. I suppose that's the entire point of a paintkit LOL.

Do NOT use the JPG format in airplane-painting.
Do not forget to edit the alpha-layer of DDS files accordingly to the changes to the duffuse-layer.

In all advices given above I am missing the alpha-part.

Open the DDS file in a painting program ( GIMP) , now you can edit the diffuse  AND the alpha layer.
When ready export DDS OR  to targa with alpha.
Then load this targa in DXTBmp and save as DDS DXT5 with mips.

 

 

 

Just to try something, I loaded the psd files into paint.net, flipped them vertically and saved them as dds files in a new aircraft texture folder (paint.net merged all the layers in the psd and flattened the image (it did warn me beforehand). I didn't try and create any alpha layers.

I fired up FSX and loaded that plane into it. It displayed as it should even with a bit of sunshine reflecting on the fuselage despite no alpha layer. One thing I noticed is that Sky Sim haven't saved the wing engine inlet front edge as shiny aluminium - it's the turquoise background colour used on the photoshop file... AAARRGH.

Oh well I got one step closer.