oceanheightfield.bmp format answers needed..

[Guest philtm]

I'm hoping someone can help me. I've been trying to experiment with the above named file to cure some of the water tiling effects that are a problem with some of the addon water textures.Here's the deal: I have Photoshop 5.5, Corel Photopaint9, and DXTbmp for working with graphics.The original FS version of this file shows to be 8-bit, indexed color,uncompressed, at 512x512.. The file size is 342kb.When I try to save any of my reworks with my graphic editors, my file size is saved at 257kb. When I try to run FS9 with water effects on high, the sim crashes when textures are loaded. Works fine with the default FS version.I'm beginning to believe that this BMP has alpha information on it, or is stored in a different format. I'm used to working with alpha on targa bitmaps, but have never seen anything like this.DXTbmp shows the file to be a normal bitmap, but does show the alpha information to the right in that preview box. I can export the alpha, but I have no way of incoporating it into a bmp format that will work with FS.Is there a program that can open these types of files and save them properly? My photoshop and photopaint won't. Both save the files the same way. What am I doing wrong?Any help or ideas would be great appreciated.Phil

[Holger 0]

Hi Phil,The FS2004 Terrain SDK includes the "official" imagetool.exe, which allows to read and transform most of the FS texture file formats: http://www.microsoft.com/games/flightsimul...wnloads_sdk.aspHowever, you can also use DXTBmp's Alpha Export and Import functions to edit and reload alpha channel data.Cheers, Holger

[Guest philtm]

Holger, Thanks for replying with the information. I'm in the process of getting the Terrain SDK downloaded. I already have the other SDKS.I'm confused about using DXTbmp's alpha export and Import function for editing alpha channel data on the oceanheightfield.bmp file. Sure, I can import/export alpha, I can edit with photoshop or photopaint outside of DXTbmp, but the problem is that DXTbmp only has a "save 24 bit image" function, and the original (and other 3rd party) versions of the file are 8-bit. And if I do save a 24 bit and load it with one of my editors for reformatting to 8-bit, this alpha channel data must be getting lost because the file size is smaller than the original, and it will not work within FS9..I'll try to get the Terrain SDK and see if it can help me.Phil

[Guest luissa]

>The original FS version of this file shows to be 8-bit,>indexed color,uncompressed, at 512x512.. The file size is>342kb.>When I try to save any of my reworks with my graphic editors, >my file size is saved at 257kb. When I try to run FS9 with>water effects on high, the sim crashes when textures are>loaded. Works fine with the default FS version.Hello Phil,I am almost convinced that you missed the creation of the mip maps. A 521 x 512 8-bit bitmap can not have MIPs. The missing part, that causes the crash, is the lower resolution mips. Open the 257KB bitmap in ImageTool, Add Mips and Save again.I hope I am right, Regards, Luis

[Guest philtm]

The ImageTool fixed me right up. You were right about the missing mips. I took my version, added the mips, and the file saved at the correct size and format. I guess I need to learn a bit more about the useage of these mips which are new to me. Of course I'm no expert!My version works properly with the water effects on high. I might do some experimenting to see what I can come up with. I really want to thank you guys for the help. I had been asking questions all over the place, researching alpha-blending bmps, downloading utilities, even emailing creators of some of the water texture addons, with no luck. I was on the wrong track, and You guys really did me a great favor..Phil