Defining Water Areas in FSX

[NZCOASTER 0]

Hi to allI,m a little stuckI am fairly sure I can use Global mapper to create the water class mask and export it as Geotiff?But where I'm confused is colors to use and export format plus the infWhat I think is right is this (please correct me) Black is water white is land?export 8 bit greyscale or 24 bit?Do you make the Aerial Photo and waterclass all in one inf file or are they seperate with there own bgl"sI simply want to get the FSX Sea in a Harbour and then once I have that move to the variations of waterclass if I canI really appreciate any info you can help withIf someone can direct me a little or provide an inf for a water areaThe area I'm working on is shown herehttp://picasaweb.google.com/nzcoaster/FSXW...areiDreamBeachsThanks HeapsGreg

[scott967 62]

Load your source data in GM, and set to geo projection / WGS 84 datum. Export as GeoTiff, also select create a world file (tfw).Edit the Tiff in an appropriate image program (I use GIMP) and create an alpha channel. Use the program's tools to create the channel so that water is set to 0, and land is set to 255. Save the file as Tif (with alpha channel).In a quick check with GIMP, my tiff file lost its tags after editing. I used Geotill header examine to put the data from thw world file back into the Geotiff. You could load it into GM and re-export as GeoTiff to achieve the same effect. By default if you use the example inf from the sdk, it will create a single bgl with all the LODs appropriate to your photo. This will allow water to show through. When I tried this, I notice the water is using a different texture than the default. Don't know why.Also, the sdk shows how an additional channel can be used to create a blending mask. This uses all values of 0-255 to set different levels of transparancy. Haven't tried this yet.Photo without alpha channel:http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/161169.jpgPhoto with alpha channel:http://forums.avsim.net/user_files/161170.jpgscott s..

[NZCOASTER 0]

Thankyou ScottReally appreciate the help that you gaveSome things seem so much more easier with a little help from those who knowAwesomeCheersGreg