Multiple objects

Yesterday I continued working on a new feature for ModelConverterX that was high on the wishlist for a while. The ability to read in SCASM files with more than one object defined inside. So for example this would allow you to read in a SCASM object library definitation or just a SCAMS file that contains multiple objects (multiple Area/EndA commands that means).

I have made good progress on this feature, although there are still a few things to improve before it is ready for release. But I think this could be a useful feature for a lot of people. 

Transparent textures

Today I have been doing some work again on one of the main features still missing from ModelConverterX, transparent textures. In the FSX MDL format it is no longer enough to add an alpha channel to your texture file. You also have to specify in the material that is used on the object that you want to use that alpha channel. So that is something the user will have to specify when he converts an object with ModelConverterX. To do that I have added a form to edit the material properties. This will also allow people to easily add night textures to objects that did not have them before for example.

At the moment I am still fixing some minor bugs in the X file that give some drawing order problems, but hopefully I can get a new version of ModelConverterX with this functionality added online this weekend. With the support for transparency added I think most SCASM macros that don’t use special code should be convertable.

 

(Almost) time for a manual

I have just released an updated version of ModelConverterX, check out the thread on the forum to see all changes. This time mainy improvements in the reading functionality and some small new features. The bigger new features that are planned have not been implemented yet. Hopefully I can add some in the next release.

Another thing that is really needed now is a manual for this tool, as I start to get requests for features that have already been implemented (but not yet found apparently). So I started with the manual on the Wiki, although it is still quite empty at the moment. 

Here are your normals

I have added a new feature to ModelConverterX yesterday, the ability to show the normals of your object. The prime reason to do this now was that it gave me a good debugging feature to see if the SCASM code was read in correctly. But also for end users this can be useful, as it shows you if the normals of your model have been defined correctly. This has an influence on how your model is lighted in the scenery.

 

Another nice feature I have added is that you can save the preview image to your disk. So that allows you to use it as a thumbnail in your placement program for example. At the moment you have to save the image manually, but I plan to make it an automatic option as well (and include it in the batch convert functions).

Triangulation

Today I did some more work on the ModelConverterX tool again. There were some complex polygons that were not converted into triangles correctly, so I had to improve the triangulation algorithm. I did make such an algorithm a while ago for another tool, but that one was for 2D polygons only. So I had to convert it into 3D to work correctly with 3D objects.

This turned out to be a lot of fun in the end. With some nice vector and matrix manipulations  it seems you don’t even need that much code to triangulate a polygon. And it was a good reason to refresh some of my math skills again.

So that is another problem less, there are still some problems left with the normals and the sides of the polygons being drawn. Once these are solved I hope to release a new alpha version, as there have been quite some improvements by now. 

ModelConverterX – night textures

Two weeks ago I was able to produce a lot of updates for ModelConverterX quickly, since then it has been a little more silent. But that does not mean no progress is being made fortunately. Today I have been able to add some new features again.

The most important new feature is that night textures are now read in correctly from the SCASM macros and also applied correctly to the FSX MDL file. So your objects will no longer be dark at night. Another improvement deals with the default scale that might be set in the macro. That scale value is now read and applied by default. So most objects should appear fine when applied with a scale of 1 in your XML placement file.

Before I release a new test version there are some other bugs I want to solve though. Currently I am working on a transoformation bug, basically not all rotations and translation are applied correctly now (most simple objects are not affected by this bug). Another feature I would really like to add is the ability to specify which textures are transparant, so that they appear correctly in FSX. Hopefully I can finish these items somewhere during the week, so that I release a new version.

SimConnect and CIGI

For some while already I wanted to learn a bit more about SimConnect and this week I found a good reason to do so. I wanted to try if I could connect FSX to CIGI. CIGI stands for Common Image Generator Interface and this is a common way in professional simulations to talk between the simulation host and the image generators. At work we also make use of CIGI for this.

What I wanted to do is try to use FSX as an image generator with our simulation host, so for that I needed to connect FSX to CIGI. This is where SimConnect was very useful, after some hours of trying I am now able to control the user aircraft with the CIGI interface and I can also add other traffic (AI) and control them from CIGI as well. This is a nice demonstration that the concept works.

Until now I only tested it with the host emulator that CIGI delivers, so a next step will be to attach it to the real simulation at work. Should be interesting. Of course I am not ready yet, as other things like the weather should still be connected as well.

I guess such a CIGI connection might also be very useful for ESP, it would open a lot more possibilities in the professional flight simulation world.  Sounds like great fun to play with that some more at a later time…

Blender

What will happen when GMax is no longer there is a favorite topic for discussion on forums for a while already now. One of the alternative modelling programs often mentioned is Blender. Personally I consider that a good alternative as it is open source and seems to have quite a big user base. A little while ago I bought a book about this tool and I am reading that now. When I have read enough I will start making some models in it to see how it works. The interface seems a bit hard to learn (but we heard to same about GMax, right?), but from the book it sounds quite easy to work with once you know how it works.

And some interesting news is that a first version of a FSX exporter for Blender has now appeared. I find this a very interesting development and look forward to contribute to this exporter once I have learned my way around in Blender. I’ll keep you posted about my progress.

Which version?

 Which version? That is a question often asked on the [FSDeveloper] forums. And usually it is not the the original question, but the first reply because the thread starter did not mention is he is working with FSX or FS98. As we all know the answer might be different based on the FS version used. So to make things easier you now have to specify your FS version when you start a thread. That way other people will now it right away and can provide you with the correct answer. Read more about this change here.

Are they listening?

Complaining about the SDKs has been a favourite thing to do among developers for years. With previous versions of FS we always had to wait for ages to get them and of course it never told us what we wanted to know for our project (how could MS forget to include what I needed to know). I am sure you can all remember those good old time.

But that is enough sarcasm for now. With FSX things have improved a lot already, the SDK shipped with the initial release and I think I can say that the quality and usefulness of the documentation has also improved a lot. And things don’t stop there, no it gets even better.

The ACES team wants to know your feedback about the FSX SDK. For that purpose we have created a special subforum at the FSDeveloper site. You can use this forum to tell the ACES team about features you would like to see, about bugs in their current tools (not bugs in your files, really bugs in the tools) or about paint points, thing that are possible with the tool but just hard to do or inconvenient.

 These forums were made on request of some developers of the ACES team, so you can be sure that they will be looking at your suggestions. Of course nobody can promise that they will also implement them all in future SDKs.