Real NZ Runway Textures

[greaneyr]

Robin's obviously the best person to answer this. What do you use for runway textures in Real NZ Wellington Scenery? I'm very impressed with the quality of markings on the runways and just wondered what tools you used to do this with.

[toprob]

I use GMAX, and create everything as flat polygons. There is normally one GMAX file with one big texture which is repeated down the length of the runway, and the markings are overlaid with another GMAX file. I'd post a screenshot of the GMAX file, but it is quite ugly on its own:)
The secret to this type of ground polygon is the old FS2002 GMAX gamepack. The output from this gamepack is 'hacked' a bit to remove the 3D coding and shadows, so that what is left is 'glued' flat to the ground. This technique has worked up to FSX, although there are some limitations now. Microsoft are a bit concerned about techniques like this, which are outside the normal SDK techniques, and have warned that it may not be usable in FS11. The 'recommended' technique is to use default runway textures on top of photo textures, but a lot of people consider this a backward step. Paraparaumu was designed this way, just to gauge the reaction to a fully SDK-compliant design, but I will continue to use the old GMAX FS2002 hack for FSX scenery, and keep my fingers crossed that MS will come up with a workable replacement technique for FS11.
Incidentally, the GS2002 gamepack is very difficult to come by, as it is only available with the FS2002 Deluxe version CDs.

[greaneyr]

Well what you've done in Real NZ looks absolutely superb, with the added bonus of being 'solid' rather than having the shortcomings of the recommended method. The reason I ask is because I've spent a lot of the weekend playing around with sythetic textures and paths in Photoshop and thought it could be a usable solution to the problem of non-AFCAD supported runway markings.

How much work is involved in making runways, taxiways and aprons photoreal? For this project, I am thinking it would be nice to settle on a technique for modelling runways. Say, by default we use vanilla AFCADs but for the more advanced airports, use xyz. If we settled on GMax ground textures, it sounds as though the only 'bad' thing about it is that it won't necessarily be compatible with FS11. In this case, would we consider the time spent on existing airports to be time 'wasted'? Personally I wouldn't, as in between the airport being released and FS11 being released a great number of users will have used the product successfully to great satisfaction. When FS11 comes out and doesn't work with GMax ground textures (though bear in mind this statement could be like"'the next version of Windows which won't have a DOS prompt" that people keep promising but never actually arrives) then we re-write the scenery for it. I'd suggest if they're going to do that, they're also going to give us sloped runways in which case we'd probably have to re-engineer them all anyway.


I'm sure you've done this equation in your head as well, having obviously settled on GMax for your own work. What are your thoughts on this?

[toprob]

Oops, I put this aside for a bit of a think.
The problem here is the availability of the FS2002 gamepack. Those who don't already own FS2002 Deluxe would need to buy it. I dunno how easy it is to find.
However, once you get it, it's easy enough to build ground textures this way. It is a bit tedious, though, as the FS2002 gamepack is not the most intuitive, things have come a long way since then:)
You will need high quality aerial images, I always take my own photos. I guess it would be possible to source a good selection of NZ runway textures, and mix'n match them for new runways.
Runway lights are an issue, since the photo textures cover up the default runway lights you need to make your own lights. This is a real nasty job, I wouldn't attempt it myself. Wellington, for instance, uses a trick to retain the lights -- the runway is cut into strips, and the two strips which cover the default lights are made to disappear at night. Not strictly by the book, but quite effective:)

[greaneyr]

QUOTE (toprob @ Mar 2 2008, 07:03 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Runway lights are an issue, since the photo textures cover up the default runway lights you need to make your own lights. This is a real nasty job, I wouldn't attempt it myself. Wellington, for instance, uses a trick to retain the lights -- the runway is cut into strips, and the two strips which cover the default lights are made to disappear at night. Not strictly by the book, but quite effective:)

Does this trick also apply when the airport is IFR?

[creator2003]

Hi guys ive been looking into this and got my old copy of deluxe out and unsure how you install this gamepack ,ive got fsx/fs9 installed just fine but this one stumps me a little ,all it has in the gamepack on the disk is plugins and in gamepack folder "imagetool" but no gmax shortcut to 2002 gamepack ?
I would like to have ago at 2002 polygon ground maybe just to lay a bit of grass down between the runways and taxi ways as im forever getting asked to do something with the ground ,
first of all am i on the right track or should i be doing something else ,or using something else to achieve that ..


EDIT:ive worked out what i needed to do after some painful mistakes thanks anyway..