Experiences with FS2004 aircraft import/export

[arno]

Hi all,

I have a few issues now that seem related, in the sense that all issues are related to a trimtab animation. So I was wondering if there is anything special about these animations that a FS2004 aircraft developer has to take care of? Let me explain the situations a bit more.

Two are about the trimtab_rudder animation. This animation seems to animate along the X axis (which the MakeMDL SDK also documents), while the rudder itself animates along the Z axis according to the SDK. In both of the models with this issue (the Anson @gsnde provided and a A320), if I let the trimtab_rudder animate along the Z axis like the rudder is shows perfectly fine. But in the MDL file the code says it should be along the X axis.

The second related issue is about the trimtab_elevator. This time the rotation axis is fine, but in FSX after conversion the elevator always has the maximum negative trimtab deflection and it seems I can not control this. Since in this model the actual elevator animation is after the trimtab animation, the whole elevator has too much down reflection.

So if this rings a bell for anybody I would like to hear

 

[tgibson]

It’s been a long time since I dealt with animating FS9 trim tabs, but I remember them being a bit odd. I never modeled a rudder trim tab, so I don’t know about that. And the plane with elevator trim tabs did indeed not convert well, so I fixed the trim tab animation during the conversion. Sorry I can’t be more help.

I assume the rudder X axis issue is handled in the sim, probably working around a bug In the compiler?

 

[arno]

Thanks Tom, it might indeed be that the sim does some special magic with this animation. Maybe I should just leave it like this then, it is possible to fix it manually by editing the animation keys. Or I should let MCX flip the axis. Let me check how FSX handles this animation,

 

[ToniH]

Im trying to extract VC from FS9 plane which is in VC model, but after i selected gen_model 1, it still does not show/load the VC part from plane.

 

[tgibson]

Try using the latest development release, there you just load the model and use the green arrows to choose the VC model. You may need to change the setting in Options so the visibilities box does not appear. Not at my computer so I don’t remember the details.

 

[ToniH]

Try using the latest development release, there you just load the model and use the green arrows to choose the VC model. You may need to change the setting in Options so the visibilities box does not appear. Not at my computer so I don’t remember the details.

Thanks, that helped me

 

[Firebird]

It has been quite a while since I have posted anything here but I have now got a question.
I am not sure whether it is something that MCX doesn't handle well or whether I am doing something wrong.

It is to do with AttachedEffects. The mdl was originally P3D and has been converted to FS9.
It has two AEs, both lights, and these are both set as LOD '-1' and are both attached to parts that have LOD set to '-1'.

A user testing a change has reported that the lights only seem to be attached to the top LOD (100) and not the others (50, 25 and 10).

So firstly am I right that the LOD '-1' means that it should be viewable on each LOD ?
If not, what should it be changed to, and how do I make the change?

 

[arno]

Hi,

LOD -1 indeed means any LOD. But be aware that attached effects are not exported to FS2004 aircraft MDL files, they are converted to the supported BGL light types, as specified in the light_mapping.ini file. These lights should also be visible on any LOD.

 

[Firebird]

Thanks, Arno.
At least you have confirmed that I understood it correctly.

The AEs that I was talking about were the two that were left AFTER the conversion to FS9, taxy and landing lights, so maybe there is something that means that below a certain LOD a lighting effect does not show.

 

[arno]

I might need to check if they are exported correctly to makemdl. When you import the FS2004 MDL are the lights then shown on lod -1 again?

 

[Firebird]

I have loaded up one of the mdls into the latest developers version.
I have tried to check each of the LODs individually but the lights do not appear attached in any of them when the 'Only Show active' option is selected. So I guess the question that I have is how do I show Lod '-1' items?

Alternatively if you think it will be quicker then I can pack up one model and the textures for you if that will help.

 

[tgibson]

You should be able to see them in the Hierarchy Editor, and the LOD is at the top of each part's listing?

 

[Firebird]

Hi Tom,
Yeah I am using the HE but although they show up there with Only Show active unselected and the default top LOD, of 201, in the main MCX window.
Now selecting each one of the LODS, even down to 10, does have the lights being shown and highlightable in the Attached Object Editor. This would seem to indicate that they are working as expected.

The thing that is gnawing at my mind though is that once the One show active option is selected in HE the lights never appear for any LOD, including the top one of 201.
Now the obvious answer is that the HE doesn't show parts with LOD of '-1' with that option, whereas I think that it should show the selected LOD plus LOD '-1'.
Hope this makes sense.

So I guess from my original issue - I THINK that the lights are attached to each LOD but how do I prove it?

 

[ElCid97]

Sorry to bring up an older thread, but I've run into a possible issue with FS9 regarding the new export possibilities for aircraft.

I'm assisting another user in updating an Fw-200 "Kondor" to look like the one that is being restored in Berlin by Airbus. In the process we have removed all the military equipment from the wonderful "C4" version found at SOH and we've been slowly working on updating the model once again with a new panel, radio station, glass, etc.

We're also updating the interior to an extent, but nothing too spectacular.

In the process I've run into the following issue with regards to lights in general:

As you can see, there is no option for the landing light using either of the "light" options that have been discussed in other threads or that are listed in the "ini" file found in the main folder.

The landing light in the original model has been isolated, exported as 3ds, worked on and made into a real landing light with animation, planar, etc, and then exported into an "mdl" file directly from GMAX. It is then imported/merged into the "base" model in MCX, then exported to both FS9 and FSX mdl's just for comparison.

In the FSX model it keeps the visibility condition regardless of what it is tagged as. In the FS9 model, it will only keep the visibility condition if it was "light_taxi_vis" or one of the other "regular" conditions. I haven't been able to keep something like "light_wing_vis", for example, in the FS9 mdl.

When I export the whole thing with the landing light changed to "light_taxi_vis" it keeps and is shown as a spotlight in the exterior view and the 2D panel view in the sim. I haven't been able to see any spot lights in the VC view, however.

When I try to add it to the VC view in MCX, it just disappears in both the interior and exterior views.

Should I try to change the name of the light's attachment in the attachment editor? Would that have the light show as a landing light instead of a taxi light? I'm asking because I can get the light to extend and fold in with the landing light command (Crtl+L) as well as the landing light switch in the 2D panel, but it doesn't light anything up. The only way to turn the light itself on and off is with the taxi light switch.

Thanks for looking into this and any feedback would be welcome!

Jorge
Miami, FL

 

[tgibson]

In the MCX light_mapping.ini file the line:

light_wing_vis Wing

says that the FSX visibility condition during conversion is mapped to an "FS2004 Light Category" called Wing.

In the FS9 SDK the way to create such a light is to name the part LIGHT_WING and MakeMDL will do the rest. I'm not sure how MCX replaces this process. I doubt if the wing lights have been tested yet, though. I certainly didn't do any more than landing and taxi lights.

 

[arno]

Hi,

The wing light probably has not been deeply tested indeed. But let's take it on issue at a time.

MCX ensures that some light visibility conditions are always present, as these are used by MakeMDL. But light_general_vis and light_landing_vis are not part of that. These two definitions normally come from the modeldef.xml file. For landing lights the default FS2004 visibility condition is general_light, and that one should always be in the list.

The way MCX maps to the FS2004 lights is that it indeed only supports a handfull of visibility conditions. For those the lights are mapped to the FS2004 BGL_LIGHTs. All lights with other visibility conditions are ignored, unless you add an extra mapping in the light_mapping.ini file yourself.

I am not an expert on the FS2004 light types, so I don't know which one is supposed to spot light something and which none is not.

 

[tgibson]

As far as I know, only landing lights and taxi lights light up the ground. All other lights are simply balls of light.

 

[ElCid97]

Thanks Tom and Arno.

I was referring to the fact Tom has mentioned "landing lights" before in the thread, but I'm not seeing that as an option in the dropdown of MCX. The option for "light_land_vis" is not available in the dropdown, nor is the "light_general_vis" option either, despite being in the "light_mapping.ini" file.

The "wing" light was just brought up as an example of an option available. We don't plan on adding that to the model.

Tom is correct, from what I understand, regarding the landing and taxi lights being the only ones that light up the ground in FS2004. What I'm trying to figure out is why there is no "light_land_vis" in the dropdown of MCX when it is clearly in the "light_mapping.ini" file AND it was properly mapped to the planar as "LAND_LIGHT" when the initial model was exported from GMAX to the "mdl" file.

The "light_taxi_vis" works as advertised, despite the fact it is being assigned to a planar that was "LIGHT_LAND" in the mdl file.

The "general_light" option doesn't seem to work when I select that particular option and export after merging the mdl files.

I'll try again this weekend to see if I can reproduce and will post an update in the next day or two.

Thanks again for the help!

Jorge
Miami, FL

 

[tgibson]

In my experience, the general light tag worked for me for FSX. I have created a different tag for my conversions because that doesn’t work for P3D.

 

[jetpilot1980]

So I wanted to post an interesting observation and not sure what might be the cause...? I was tinkering with MCX... While I have long since finalized my last version of the NBAI F-14 Tomcats and moved on... When I was doing testing and observing them I first noticed an issue with the way my new moving exhausts displayed in the AIAE OWL viewer they looked as though they had jagged teeth:

I reached out to Martin about it who informed me that he uses Arno's MCX viewer in his program and asked me to tinker around with MCX settings and see if I could find the issue... As at the time both in sim and in MCX my new animated exhausts looked great:

In MCX:

In sim:

After doing some tinkering today I finally found what is causing the issue and was able to replicate the "jagged teeth" effect in MCX today:

The answer I finally just found as to what the difference at the time between MCX and OWL... If in MCX "object model settings" "Optimize" > "disable optimize" is set to "false it will cause the "jagged teeth" issue and the animation positions to be off in MCX itself as well... I guess the reason I did not catch this previously is that I didn't realize that changing MCX settings only take effect after I re-load the model; not in real time... I guess when I built these latest models I did it with the "disable optimize" set to "true" not "false" and setting it to false causes the "jagged teeth: issue... While I am happy these models are working just fine in the sim... Wondering what would cause the viewer and the animations to behave very differently between these two settings so as to cause this issue??? As a developer / converter this could prove very confusing... Thanks!