Attention all skinners!

[Pat Pattle]

That's very interesting news indeed Daniel!

At this point do you know if the bump map will be the same type used in fsx? There's an explanation of the different map types here:

http://www.fsdeveloper.com/wiki/inde...l_map_creation

Although in this case it needs to be assigned through the gmax material editor which it sounds like Ankor has cunningly side stepped for cfs3 :0)

[Pat Pattle]

...and thinking about it, would it work on all dds textures, thinking building and terrain types?

[Steven190]

This is good news, I have a couple aircraft which would be great to try this on.

Thanks

[AnKor]

Hi!
Thanks gecko for posting it here.

Sorry, I'm too busy today to explain all details.
FSX format is supported - it is common format for storing normals. For this test though a simple grayscale height map saved as bmp will do (I will convert it as needed).

You will be able to attach new texture to any model without editing its m3d by following a naming convention:
If main texture is called "spitfire_ixc_t.dds" the FSX style normal map should be called "spitfire_ixc_t.+nm2.dds". I will explain these codes later.
Additional texture can be applied to any m3d model, but NOT to the terrain or auto-generated scenery.

[MajorMagee]

Thanks. Is this going to be implemented in a similar way to what was already done to simulate bump mapping? We need to watch out for Moire Patterns being created. For example, the current shader makes the JU52 skin corrugations look really bad when viewed from a glancing angle.

[hairyspin]

That is outstanding news, wish I was home right now and I could try this!

[AnKor]

Thanks. Is this going to be implemented in a similar way to what was already done to simulate bump mapping? We need to watch out for Moire Patterns being created. For example, the current shader makes the JU52 skin corrugations look really bad when viewed from a glancing angle.

Moire patterns are very hard to avoid.
My shaders use anistropic filtering which makes textures sharper at glancing angles, and the stock CFS3 renderer just blurs textures in this case. Sharper textures naturally lead to moire effect.
However I believe it is also aggravated by how CFS3 creates composite textures (if you apply any paint scheme to them, or to show damage marks) - they don't have mipmaps even if the source dds had them. This causes additional shimmering.

I enabled automatic mipmap generation for ground textures in WOFF 2.0 and even then I still had to limit the anisotropic filtering there or the shimmering became unbearable.

Is there a way to get that JU52 for tests? Maybe I should enable those auto mipmaps everywhere, but I need to see if there is really a benefit.

This said, custom made normal maps should provide better quality than current color-difference ones. I still don't know to which extent though and that's why my humble request for a test sample still stands

[BorekS]

I am a newbie relating to the graphical CFS3 enhancement (shader settings modding) and with a stuff available here I got (aside the nice shiny effect) also a strange airplane texture bump/normalmap effect which I dont like - I even noticed it doesnt make it from the "_s" texture (which I could accept yet), but from the "_t" texture. this makes my airplane insignias looking in a "3d" form, for example...
so any bit more serious solution would be welcome

as to the DDS mipmaps - it means CSF3 does not use them? I am creating my textures alwayas mipmapped for all games, except some full screen / 2D sprites (non CFS3 stuff related).