Tidbit for painters
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  1. #1
    SOH-CM-2024 Mick's Avatar
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    Tidbit for painters

    My new confutor is built and running. What remains is to finish loading up all the software, a lot of tedious drudgery, but I'll soon be back to painting airplanes.

    One little item I've installed is called "otoya 128" aka "winevdm" (don't ask me what those names mean or stand for) that I got from Allen (thanks Allen!)

    It awakens sleeping code in Windows up through at least Win10 (don't know about Win11, but maybe) that allowed older Windows operating systems to run old 16-bit programs. One such program is Shiny, Jeff "WuhWuzDat" Delhaye's update of Ivan Hsu's Shine. That's the program that allows you to add reflection to model files, or to set the specular gloss level at none, semi-matte, semi-gloss or glossy.

    Shiny is in the library here.

    You can get otoya28/winevdm at Github, which seems to be a reliable source.

    https://github.com/otya128/winevdm/releases

  2. #2
    Mick, seriously, check out FS Repaint.

    https://www.simflight.com/2020/06/30...painting-tool/

    There are things it does really well. Like, try an edit on some DXT textures.

  3. #3
    SOH-CM-2024 Mick's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Sbob View Post
    Mick, seriously, check out FS Repaint.

    https://www.simflight.com/2020/06/30...painting-tool/
    There are things it does really well. Like, try an edit on some DXT textures.
    Can it enable reflection in the model file, or set the level of specular gloss like Shiny, or change the color of untextured bits of the model like Mdlmat? I can see how it would be convenient to be able to do those things within just one texture painting program. I need to paint in DXTbmp with an imagery program, do reflectivity or gloss level with Shiny, and Mdlmat if model material must be painted. I don’t often have to fiddle with the model file but sometimes it’s essential.

    As for trying it out on DXT textures, no thanks! I wouldn’t touch a DXT texture with the proverbial ten-foot pole. (I never actually met a ten-foot Pole, much less touched anything with him, but if I did it wouldn’t be a DXT texture.)

    I haven’t used DXT textures in at least fifteen years. The DXT formats are a lame solution to the problem of marginal processor and video card power of computers way back almost twenty years ago. They are compressed files that save disk space and computer power but they are a very lossy format. Every time you save a DXT texture file it gets a bit corrupted. After even one edit and save you can see some color shift (often towards green) and you’ll see jagged little sawtooth effects along any line that isn’t perfectly straight vertically or horizontally, or around the edges of any shape. Those effects quickly magnify with every save.

    There’s no way around it except to not use a DXT format. If you can handle the limited colors and don’t need an alpha channel you can use 16-bit textures like they had use to several FS generations ago. To be able to paint anything you want to, with no limit on colors or complexity, and have it not get all corrupted, you can use 32-bit textures. They never get corrupted no matter how many times you open, work on and save them. And they look crisp a sharp on the model in the sim no matter how close you look or how fine the detail.

    Fifteen years ago one might work in 32-bit them convert the final product into DXT3 to reduce upload/download speed and reduce disk space, but the need for that is long gone. Those were real concerns back then but modern computers and high speed interweb connections can handle them easily. Modem computers measure their disk space in terabytes and processors are so powerful and use RAM so efficiently that they don’t even need a video card. With the power of even ten or fifteen year old computers, there’s no reason to sacrifice quality to save bytes.

    OK, rant over. I’ll be quiet now.

  4. #4
    Just snag it as an eval and try it with an open mind.

    I know it sounds like heresy, I still do my detail work with PSP and DXTBMP but FS Repaint is the bomb for doing quick and dirty work.
    I wanted to add some squadron shields to an F-15. I had it knocked out in about two minutes. And, I wasn't sure where I wanted to add them.

    You can quickly map out textures for new projects. I run FS Repaint and keep it linked to *gasp* MS Paint and it does great work. MS Paint has gotten better in Win 10 and 11.

    One thing, still, about DXT textures. They "stick" to the MDL better and display better at high offset angles. Stuff like when the tail texture turns blurry, etc.

  5. #5
    Senior Administrator huub vink's Avatar
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    Good to hear you have a running computer again. Looking forward to see you repaints starting to appear again.

    Please let us know whether you have managed to get "shiny" running again. It is a small utility I still miss.

    @sbob, the utility called shiny has noting to do with repainting. It changes the properties of a model file in a very simple way. You can add, increase or reduce gloss and shine, with a few mouse clicks. I think FS PAint is a similar very easy to handle programme, but it changes textures, not the properties of the model file.
    Ivan "Archisoft" Hsu's MDLC, which is actually the engine behind shiny, became very popular as it could make the non-reflective models made for CFS2 reflective in FS2004. However the original utility was difficult to use as it worked with line commands like an old DOS program. Several above average skilled persons created more user friendly environments to use this the original utility.

    Cheers,
    Huub

  6. #6
    SOH-CM-2024 Mick's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Sbob View Post
    Just snag it as an eval and try it with an open mind.

    I know it sounds like heresy, I still do my detail work with PSP and DXTBMP but FS Repaint is the bomb for doing quick and dirty work.
    I wanted to add some squadron shields to an F-15. I had it knocked out in about two minutes. And, I wasn't sure where I wanted to add them.

    You can quickly map out textures for new projects. I run FS Repaint and keep it linked to *gasp* MS Paint and it does great work. MS Paint has gotten better in Win 10 and 11.

    One thing, still, about DXT textures. They "stick" to the MDL better and display better at high offset angles. Stuff like when the tail texture turns blurry, etc.
    I don’t understand what you mean by DXT displaying better at high offset angles. What you describe is something I’ve never seen or heard of before. It sounds like some kind of system issue. Even so, it would seem that an imperfection that could only be spotted at certain angles isn’t as bad as the reduced definition, corrupted details and color shifts all over at all angles all the time. I’ll continue to avoid DXT textures like the plague.

    Seeing the skin on the model without booting it up in the sim would be nice, but I don’t know how much time it would save me. It only takes maybe seven seconds to boot the sim and check the work on the model.

    Mapping out textures for new projects sounds useful but that wouldn’t do me any good since I don’t have the knowledge or skills to initiate new projects. I don’t have enough time to paint other people’s projects. And I never have time to fly anyone”s projects. I thought that I’d have time to make my own models and to do some flying, but noooooo. I feel busier and more pressed for time now than I did when I was working. I know others who found the same thing when they retired. And I know of a couple modelers who gave up the hobby when they retired because they no longer had time for it.

    I still use MS Paint too! I use it for everything that doesn’t involve angled or curved lines, things that need to be antialiased to look smooth. We’ll, almost everything else. For more complex things I use PSP.

    Despite my scorn for the old DXT format, I do like old some old things, like Paint and PSP. Many years ago Paul Clawson gave me his PSP7 when he got PSP8. That was when PSP came on a CD-ROM complete with a hard copy manual the size of a medium-sized city’s phone book. (Remember phone books?) I still haven’t completely learned it but I love it. Recently I’ve started to learn to use it for photo work as well as FS textures. Some time later I received PSP10 as a gift and I hated it. By then the franchise had gone from Jasc to Corel and I thought Corel ruined it. Ten struck me as being clunky, cluttered and bloated, and more difficult to use. I stuck with seven and passed ten on to David, who seems to be OK with it, probably because he wasn’t spoiled by seven, and because highly complex and detailed paint jobs aren’t in his job description.

    I loved Paint though my WinXP rig. When I got my Win7pro confutor I was appalled at how bloated, clunky and user unfriendly they had made Paint. I made myself a copy of Paint, set it to run in XP compatibility mode, called it OldPaint, and it works that way in Win10pro.

    Once in a while, usually with photos rather than textures, I use MS Photo Editor, which came with MS Office 97 and was written for Win95. I have a few other software items that go back to Win95 that I still use. When we moved from MS Office 97 to Office 2000 I found it loaded with Microsoft bloatware. I was surprised and happy to find an item in settings where with a click in a checkbox I could “turn off all features introduced since Office 97.”

    Yeah, I yearn for the days of wood burning confutors and simple software. Some would say that all of us in the FS community are mired in old, simple software. But I do prefer FS9 to earlier versions. Yet I feel no desire to move on to FSX or 2020.

    I see that Win10pro includes MS 3D Paint as well as regular Paint. After I get the new rig all set up I’ll have to check it out.

    Anyhow, I have no doubt that FS Repaint is quick and easy. It just doesn’t sound very much quicker or easier than doing it the usual way.

  7. #7
    SOH-CM-2024 Mick's Avatar
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    Well, the new rig is up and running but I haven’t finished setting it up and cramming it full of software. I still have a lot to do, and there are still a few things that I’m dependent on my friend Rob to that are beyond my ability, like hooking up a new solid state drive, cloning the new system drive onto it and removing it for safe storage. I lack the tools and knowledge to do anything under the hood like that. And when all is done I’ll need Rob to haul the rig upstairs so I can hook up my peripherals and reclaim my office and my kitchen table. The thing weighs a ton and with my back trouble and the fragility of age I wouldn’t dare try to pick it up and carry it. Rob’s more than thirty years younger than me so he can do the lifting and carrying.

    Yes, I have Shiny running in Win10pro. That’s thanks to Allen, who steered me to a little program called otoya128 that awakens some sleeping legacy code deep in Windows’ DNA that allows it to run old 16-bit programs like Shiny.

    You can get otoya28/winevdm at Github, which seems to be a reliable source.

    https://github.com/otya128/winevdm/releases

    But I’d say that Shiny has something to do with painting. If you need reflective textures for a model that wasn’t made reflective, or need to add or reduce specular gloss for a paint job, it’s a job for Shiny.

    On my old Win7pro rig I ran Shiny in 7pro’s XP virtual machine. It was the only program I ever got working in the XP VM. For this new rig I have an XP virtual machine that I got from VMware. It should be superior to the lame MS VM and should let me run programs that won’t even load into Win10 so that otoya128 can let them work. I haven’t installed it yet. First I have to make a drive partition for it to live in.

    I wanted to build a new rig to run Win7pro, but that turned out to be impossible. Modern motherboards have evolved too much to run such an old operating system. Annoyingly enough, it was possible to get Win7 installed and booted up but it was impossible to get it to respond to the keyboard or the mouse. It lacked the required drivers. We got those drivers but when we tried to install them Windows popped a box asking if we wanted to install these drivers, click yes or no - and without a working mouse…

    So I got OpenShellMenu (also thanks to Allen) which replaces the cluttered, gaudy and impossible-to-rationalize Win10 menu with a menu in the style of your choice of Win XP, 7 or 8, both in looks and the ability to set up and sort menu items however you wish. I use the Win7 style because I like it best and I’m so used to it.

    The way I went about setting up the rig reminds me of the tag line used by whoever at The Old Hangar was making gauges for old planes many years and several FS versions ago: Making New Things Old Again.

    I’m still busy setting up the rig and installing software to do any painting but I hope to be back at work on the B-45 project soon, hopefully within a couple weeks.

  8. #8
    I've worked with PSP7 since my Win95 days.
    Apollo's Aircraft Factory (the original FS design software) came with an eval copy of PSP7.
    After I bought this Win10 rig, I found an original (unopened!!) PSP7 boxed set on Amazon and HAD to buy it.
    The manuals ARE thick, but it was funny the first time I read them.

    "Yep, knew that. Yep, yep, no, that's not how you do that. Man, that color palette is primitive ..".

    Like I said, I can understand why you don't want to use FS Repaint. Just try it. It has its limitations but it WILL save you time.

    I need to get back to my Earth Pig (the other thread) and do some more test flights.

  9. #9
    SOH-CM-2024 Mick's Avatar
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    The Pursuit of the Wild Goose

    I'm sorry if I sent anyone on a wild goose chase, but even with the 16-bit enabler I mentioned, Shiny does not work in Win10 after all. I thought it was working but it was only starting the process, not finishing it.

    After I'd loaded otvdm, the 16-bit enabler, I right clicked on a model and the menu came up so I figured it was working. I didn't select any option because at the moment I wasn't trying to gloss up a model, I was just seeing of Shiny would respond. I'd already tried several other old 16-bit programs that wouldn't run in W10 (or in W7 before it) and they worked properly so I dug no deeper.

    Just now I tried to actually gloss up a model - the Filper - and when I right clicked on the model the DOS window opened and some lines of code appeared, the automatic unaltered copy of the model appeared, then Windows popped a box telling me that this was a 16-bit program and this computer can't run it. Drat!

    I thought it might be due to running a registry cleaner this afternoon, so I uninstalled otdym, rebooted, re-installed it and the V+++ runtimes, and tried Shiny again with the same result.

    I don't understand it. I can run my other 16-bit programs but somehow Windows blocks Shiny.

    So if you were thinking of trying this little hack, don't bother - unless you have some other old programs you'd like to run. I have half a dozen or more working and so far Shiny is the only one that won't.

    Drat.

  10. #10
    Redding Army Airfield Allen's Avatar
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    Otvdm is for Windows 16 bit programs. It doesn't work with 16-bit DOS application like MDLC.
    "Let Being Helpful Be More Important Than Being Right!" Some SOH Founder.

  11. #11
    SOH-CM-2024 Mick's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Allen View Post
    Otvdm is for Windows 16 bit programs. It doesn't work with 16-bit DOS application like MDLC.
    Well, that explains a few things!

    Thanks for the clarification.

    For my next trick I have an XP virtual machine that should run Shiny. It ran in the Microsoft XP virtual machine that was built into Win7pro. The one I have is from VMware and should be better than the early and rather lame one in W7pro. I expect it to run Shiny and maybe a few old programs I have that won’t even load into Win10. Like my most very favorite photo program that I will weep and moan if I can’t get it installed and running.

    I haven’t installed the VM yet, as my new confutor is still in the final stages of completion, but I hope to get it in there soon, hopefully before the week is over. I will post about it when I have some news to share.

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