Hi - bit of a newbie type questionI am designing some buildings in gmax using 512x512 bmp per main building(converted to DXT1).Once a number of buildings are placed, will using 512x512 bitmaps hinder performance compared to, say 256x256? Or in todays era of GHz machines and 512M+ memory does it matter?

Size of the textures always does affect performance. It is tradeoff between quality of picture vs. speed. However, I always make my textures in highest resolution (1024x1024) and then resize them down usually 512x512 or 256x256. I safekeep archive set of hi-rez textures for the future. With faster yet processor and graphic card I will have then quality and speed. Hi-rez is specially important for good phototextures. Hand painted textures do not need that as much.Ted

As Ted already noted it is always a trade off between quality and performance.For my airport object I ussually use 512x512 textures. But I always try to collect as many pieces as possible in one texture (just till it is full). I ussually use a certain resolution for my textures (x pixels per meter or so). For a nice GA airport I then end up with about 6-8 textures or so (depends on the amount of buildings there of course).For objects outside the airport I ussually use a smaller resolution and so they also use less texture space. This is because you will never be that close to these objects to see all the detail.Hope this helps (a bit),Arno

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Member Netherlands 2000 Scenery Team[link:home.wanadoo.nl/arno.gerretsen]Arno's FlightSim World for scenery design hints, tips and other tricks...

Hi!I'm use actually a few textures of 1024x1024, because I put all faces in only a few archives. Also the format of textures is always DTX1, And for the buildings outside of airport I use low resolution textures.Pablo

thanks for your replies. I think I will downgrade from 512 to 256/128.I wonder whether the mapping of bmp texture to the object in gmax using UVW unwrap is relative - If so I could replace a 512x512 bmp for a rezized 256x256 bmp and not have to remap the texture to the object in gmax. Something to try...

I think it is relative and should give no problem.In the BGL it is relative for sure and I think GMax does it the same way.Arno

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Member Netherlands 2000 Scenery Team[link:home.wanadoo.nl/arno.gerretsen]Arno's FlightSim World for scenery design hints, tips and other tricks...

>I think it is relative and should give no problem. Yes it is relative and this gives you a good way to check the different resolutions and how they look like in FS. You don't need to compile (export) the objects from Gmax all the time again. Just work on different texture sizes in your texture folder and see what happens.Rainer

Yes I tried it. So from now on I will use 1024x1024 in gmax and resize the DXT as required ... a good practice I think.

Speaking of textures and Gmax models:Let's say I have created 3 objects in Gmax, all using the same texture, and I have combined them to 1 bgl library file with FS Regen, then using the objects placed in the scenery just by calling the library objects.Now...How does FS behave regarding the texture? Does it load the texture 3 times or just once and using the one texture in the memory frame for all objects?Rainer