GMAX Thorp T-18

[N2056 33]

I've been at this for over a year, and am finally far along to put together a page showing my GMAX rendition of my dad's project. Many thanks to this forum for all the info provided to the community. I'm gonna be posing a lot of questions soon to try to get this plane finished.http://home.nethere.net/kerr/virtual.htm

[Guest]

That is a sweet looking model! Be sure to install gauge backlighting for the VC before you're finished... :) BillAVSIM OmbudsmanFounder and Director,Creative Recycling of Aircraft Partshttp://catholic-hymns.com/frbill/FS2002/images/fartslogo.jpg

[John_Cillis 2,406]

Welcome!It is looking fantastic... -John

[N2056 33]

Can you enlighten me on gauge backlighting? Right now I'm working on the prop. Got a good still one, but need to figure out a good slow & blurred. BTW, thanks for the complement.Robert

[N2056 33]

Thank You, John-I've been reading this forum for a long time and am looking forward to getting more involved in this part of the hobby.Robert

[N2056 33]

Found the info (tough to miss at the top!). I shall read & learn & incorporate it into my project. Thank You for the advice.Robert

[Guest FelixFFDS]

You're of course working on the new technique of making a semi-transparent gauge, and a candle part behind it, right?>That is a sweet looking model! Be sure to install gauge>backlighting for the VC before you're finished... :)>>>Bill>AVSIM Ombudsman>Founder and Director,>Creative Recycling of Aircraft Parts>http://catholic-hymns.com/frbill/FS2002/images/fartslogo.jpgFelix/FFDSPegasus Aviation Design

[N2056 33]

Felix, to be honest I was clueless about the topic. Bill steered me to the backlighting. I currently have a basic virtual panel created by learning how to manually add the VC gauges by editing the panel.cfg file. Bill has a great how-to tutorial, but it uses fs panel studio, which I do not have. Is there an alternate way to get that lighting effect? Robert

[Guest]

>Felix, to be honest I was clueless about the topic. Bill>steered me to the backlighting. I currently have a basic>virtual panel created by learning how to manually add the VC>gauges by editing the panel.cfg file. Bill has a great how-to>tutorial, but it uses fs panel studio, which I do not have. Is>there an alternate way to get that lighting effect? You do not have to have FSPanel Studio to use the technique, but it sure makes the job easier!An alternative would be to 'hand edit' the locations of the gauges, export only the gauge poly you're working on, then snap a "picture" of the gauges as they are displayed in FS2k2. Make sure your Zoom is set to 1.0 as well!Use the 3d view and use the usual commands to position your eyepoint so that you're 'facing' the panel poly w/ gauges directly, and use Shift - and Shift + until the panel pretty much fills the screen. You can then use the crop/resize feature of your paint program to adjust the image to 1024x1024. I suggest this file size for initial creation of the 'mask' simply because of the increased accuracy in pixel placement. After you're satisfied, you can use the paint program again to resize the image to 256x256.The chief disadvantage of this technique the the tedious nature of placing gauges by trial-and-error (major emphasis on the 'error' part!).If your panel does not use XML type gauges, you can use the old freeware version of FSPS, CfgEdit, which is still available.HINT: If you need to use XML gauges, substitute a .gau type file temporarily that's approximately the same size/shape, and then hand-edit the panel.cfg to enter the actual gauge name. This way, you at least have the approximate x,y,w,h coordinates to work with! :)BillAVSIM OmbudsmanFounder and Director,Creative Recycling of Aircraft Partshttp://catholic-hymns.com/frbill/FS2002/images/fartslogo.jpg

[Guest Valid_Andy]

Looking great so far!:-wave