Photo Terrain & Default water PART 2

[Guest Stormshadow]

Had to start a new topic , it was becoming congested. OK I got my DXT3 + alpha channel bmp. Ive followed the steps and got my bmp.The problem now is that resampler fails to open this bmp! In the SDK, author says that the bmp must be 24-bit only. If i convert to 24-bit I lose the alpha channel.Storm

[bob.bernstein 0]

Haven't read the other thread, but it sounds like you need this method: export your alpha channel to its own bitmap. resample twice, once for color image, once for alpha channel. then with imagetool or Elrond's FStexconv, do a batch conversion of the two sets of files from bmp into textures of dxt3+alpha, or dxt1+alpha.

[Guest Stormshadow]

Hmm thanks for the suggestion, but FXTexture COnverter is telling me that the resampled bitmaps are not valid.Storm

[bob.bernstein 0]

Hey Storm, assuming you used the sdk resampler, you should have 193kb (or so) files as bmp. If so, the files are fine. Probably what's happening is that you didn't put the bmps in their own folder. FStexconv gets fussy if there is an odd file present. Isolate your texture bmps in their own folder, and try again.Bob B

[Guest Stormshadow]

Lo Bob,Actually, I ran resampler etc (the phototerrain process) on the original image right, than repeated the process on the alpha 24-bit image (which does not contain any alphas, just the white and black regions). Resampler produces all the files, a batch for the original image and a batch for the alpha one. I put these in separate folders and tell Texture convert where the directories are. Easy. When I run the tool I get the error msg - your guess as to why this is occurring.Storm

[bob.bernstein 0]

can't guess, you could send me a zip containing part of the texture set (make sure that for every texture you send the corresponding alpha is sent). Because the names are the same, you may want to send two zips. perhaps I can find what's wrong if I see the files.bob.bernstein@comcast.net

[bob.bernstein 0]

Storm, don't have ur email at work...cuz of the timing of my use of resample.exe (predating the fs2k2 sdk), I've always used the older fs2000 resample.exe. That give me output of the bmp slices you've seen, and the output scenery file is in TMF form. You have to convert it to bgl using a utility in the fs2000 sdk called tmf2bgl.exe. It has several advantages over the fs2k2 version, and I strongly recommend you go get the fs2000 sdk and use those tools.As far as "pre"resampling goes, any of the good graphics programs will do this. Elrond Elvish wrote an awesome utility that provides some of the very best resampling routines, I'm afraid he called it imagetool also, which is a bit of a confuser, but look around, you may find it.I wrote all this to you at home this morning, and went looking for Elronds utility to send you, and managed to infect my computer with gator spyware on entering Elronds main site. It was early and I was rushing around, and clicked on the wrong button on my firewall, and actually let the beast in.I was so bummed out and running late for work, that I don't even think I sent you the email I was writing.Bob Bernstein

[Guest Elrond]

Man Bob... I appologize if that happened from my (very old) public site still forwarded to from elvish.cjb.net. It was and evidently still is hosted on GeoCities from back in the '01 timeframe when I was actively keeping it up and I wasn't even aware it was still available until I just tried it. Evidently Geo (or whomever owns it these days) sucks worse today than they did back then.I'll remove that site sometime this weekend so it won't happen to anyone else. Again, sorry for the crappy infection - theres nothing more I detest than spyware.As for imagetool, it was never released except to you since it was only a part of an experiment I was doing to find out if higher quality resample routines actually helped with photo scenery in FS (I must have thousands of tiny one-shot projects throughout the years that I never fleshed out into real apps). Feel free to give it to whom you wish as you desire of course, but its not available on my old site or avsim... I don't even have a copy or the source anymore beyond one of the obscure backup CDRs I probably burned two years ago.Good to talk at ya Bob regardless of the circumstance... I hope all is the absolute best with you and yours.Take care,Elrond

[Guest Elrond]

Hi Storm,As long as the input images/slices are those that were created from your runs in resample.exe, there should be no problem with the conversion in TexConvert. The only thing I can think of that you may get an error on is if you haven't installed TexConvert properly... ie: you haven't installed the support DLLs as the app requires. Check the readme for the download url if that is indeed the case.Good luck,Elrond

[bob.bernstein 0]

Hi there, Elrond...a pleasure to see you on the board. No worries re the ol pesky gator...I choked him with spybot. Things are going good here, hope the same for you.Bob

[Guest]

Well Hello Elrond It is nice to see you around hope all is well with you. Your friend Dan

[Guest Elrond]

Hi Dan...Great to hear from you again too. Skimming through the board I notice your increased competence and confidence with Max and other design topics. I'll assume that means school has gone well for you and you are enjoying it - I'm glad to hear it if so. Keep up the good fight brother and I wish all the best to you and yours. Send a warm hello to Jim as well next time you "see" him.Best to you,Elrond

[Guest]

10-4 Elrond done lots cool things(not all flight sim related of course) and have even done some stuff for local T.V station (done in Maya Unlimited) and will be entering to 10 second club Feel free to email if you wish. Dan