hairyspin

Attaboy! Booleans give such a neat tidy cut when you get them right. And it's a gmax problem I think, not Z buffer - are you sure there's not a poly or a set of twisted edges hanging around there?

More coming on Booleans in due course.....

Editable mesh and editable poly are different ways of working with your model. The model is made up of vertices and edges joining them in groups of triangles - this is the mesh. Polygons have more than three vertices and edges, but each poly is made up of two or more triangles, the building blocks of your mesh. Working in Editable Poly or Editable Mesh depends on what you want to do. You won't get access to the individual triangles except in Editable Mesh, but Borders are only directly accessible in Editable Poly. Slicing polys is best done in Editable Poly, extruding edges in Editable Mesh (brilliant operation) and Flipping Normals (language! ) to turn polys inside out can only be done in Editable Mesh. Experiment to find out what works, like Conrad says. Editable Patch is something different which I'm still learning about, but has to do with bending and stretching within the confines of a defined mesh. CFS3 doesn't mind whether your model is all Editable Meshes or Editable Polys or a mix of both with some pre-defined shapes (box, cylinder, teapot etc) thrown in for good measure. As far as building your model with separate objects versus extrusions from a starting object; well, that argument will go on as long as gmax/3dsMax have users. Don't be forced one way or another, we all use both methods to some extent or another. When it comes to making the model fit for export to CFS3, you're going to break up your gorgeous single object into fuselage, l_wing, r_wing, rudder etc and the 'collection of objects' modeller will have to make sure there are no annoying gaps in the model - viewing the scenery through a gap between engine cowling and fuselage detracts somewhat from the immersion factor. Large parts which overlap will also cause serious skinning problems. 3dsMax is just the big brother to gmax - originally gmax 1.2 was 3dsMax 4.2 minus the rendering facility and NURBS (whatever that is....) but Max is a whole lot more capable these days. If you think gmax has a heap to learn.......! But, the Max modeller has to get his finished model back into gmax before it can be exported to CFS3, unless he's still using Max 4.2. And I know you gentlemen save your work regularly, but I always pass on the Save As Plus tip:- In the Preferences for gmax, Files tab is an option to Increment on Save - this means that if your file is named Halberstadt01.gmax, when you save it it will be saved as Halberstadt02.gmax. The other option is Save As - when the dialogue box comes up, there is a '+' button next to the 'Save' button. Click this button and MS_AI.gmax will be saved as MS_AI01.gmax immediately. I have hundreds of files which are the building history of my current model. HTH

I might be a bit late, but you have a long email waiting on forming the cowling. I get busy weeks too, this was one!

The SDK is really designed for people who already know what to do. If it’s any consolation, all the FS SDKs are the same that way; I’ve just got FSX and it’s no better! Names, eh? If you read the Modeling Aircraft and Vehicles document from the SDK you’ll get a section on External Aircraft Naming Conventions. Jumping around a bit, look first at Visibility Test Names. These are the all-important names used in the model’s structure and control how the model behaves in crashes, when shot at or flying into something else. For example, if the model is one object named fuselage and crashes you’ll see the model, still complete, half-sunk in the ground and burning. If the model had a number of different parts – fuselage, l_wing, r_wing, tail, vertical, nose organised in a hierarchy like this:- fuselage l_wing r_wing nose tail vertical then the next time you try flying through the scenery, you'll see the fuselage sink into the ground and burn while some or all of the rest scatter to the four winds. If the model were not an organised hierarchy, this breaking behaviour just doesn't appear. You can add all sorts of other objects to the hierarchy to make up the details, but these must be linked to one of the Visibility Test Names to behave properly in the sim. Next the Rotation Animation Names. These are for objects which the sim animates all by itself, all you have to do is make sure the pivot is properly aligned and the rotation range is specified in the aircraft’s config file. Obvious candidates here are rudder, l_aileron, r_aileron etc. Then Keyframe Animation Names which are applied to parts you have to do the animations for in gmax (lots of fun and yet more headbanging, you’ll find!). Again you can link more objects to these animated parts, but any object which moves independently of another in an animation must be named with a valid Animation name. Then there are the Weapon Names and Damage Endcaps. If the node (a gmax Dummy object) is not properly named, your Parabellum will be a dud, a replica, a piece of uselessly heavy scrap metal. I once read of someone giving up when the guns on his model fired backwards, so make sure the pivot points the right way. This all sounds like the SDK respouted, so here’s one I made earlier:- which highlights your other problem. Hierarchy? What hierarchy? You’ll like this… Padaaaa! You can now see just how ‘tis organised: the node l_wheelwell perched at the top of the undercarriage hierarchy as a typical visibility test name. l_wheelwell will disappear when the gear is fully retracted, so the sim doesn’t waste processor time rendering the gear behind doors which fully hide it anyway. When it does disappear, so will all the child objects linked to it. Farther down the hierarchy are various l_gear_x objects which have all been animated with keyframes. Amongst them are CrankDummy, OleoRodL etc which move with the animated objects they are linked to, but do not move independently. They can have any name you like, other than the pre-defined ones in the SDK. Also in the hierarchy are Rotation Animation Names l_tire_still and l_tire_blurred which both are the wheel. When the pivot is aligned correctly, the sim will rotate these for you as the aircraft starts to roll for takeoff. Once the speed on the ground builds up, l_tire_still is hidden and l_tire_blurred is shown instead. Once in the air, the wheel stops turning and l_tire_still reappears. So the naming problem with wires and struts is easily solved: call ‘em whatever you like, just link them to the wing, fuselage, whatever visibility test name you want them to break off/disappear with when shot away or similar. And you should now find the (fully linked) Ju88 and P47 models more understandable! I’ll send the bitmaps tonight. HTH

It takes time, but it does come. And the more you learn and practice, the more you understand gibbering old modeller's drivel, like mine!

Gentlemen, it’s time to read the SDK! But seriously… There are more ways to build a model than there are tutorials, so these are but a few random thoughts. You could build the entire model as a single fuselage object and then select elements or groups of polys such as ailerons etc and Detach them, giving them appropriate names as you go. You could also build your model from separate objects, taking great care where one part butts up to the next to avoid overlapping polys. I think most of us use a combination of both approaches. Overlapping polys:- For major components of the model, overlaps are indeed a no-no; but for small details like wires it matters little. A common small object in WW2 aircraft, which I model, is a pitot tube. I just make it and sink the end ever-so-slightly into the wing. No big deal. Unless you’re extruding wings directly from the fuselage, bigger objects like wings are built partly sunk into the fuselage, then two Boolean operations between wing and fuselage will cut both and allow you to remove the overlapping polys from each with a perfect joint between the two. See Milton Shupe’s C162 tut for the details of this. That’s also what I’d do with the struts between upper and lower wings, and the struts between fuselage and upper wing in this model. Model hierarchies:- Before getting tied up with this, consider what happened when a biplane lost a top wing: did the a/c carry on with just one wing or was the structural integrity so compromised that the lower folded up almost immediately? I don’t know, but I’m sure there are those here who do. The structure is clearly dependant on the cross-bracing and struts between the two to form a structural whole. If the a/c could carry on for a bit, you need to ask the bi/triplane modellers here about naming upper and lower wings, because the SDK is silent on the subject and names are everything in getting the CFS3 sim engine to do what you want. Then you can work out which objects are parents and which children relative to each other. In BH’s example, the aileron and outer inter-plane struts will be carried away when the wingtip is destroyed, but it will take the destruction of the wing itself to remove the inner inter-plane struts. The purpose of the hierarchy is to govern how the sim handles damage, amongst other things. If you add objects to the model without organising them in the proper hierarchy, they will display in the sim but not behave properly as you crash/get shot down/zoom external views in and out. The only objects which should be added in this way are the boxes for the damage model. The SDK is especially terse here, the best way to learn is to study the P-47 and Ju88 models supplied. If you find it helpful, I have the hierarchies of both models in bitmap format for viewing. This includes all the LOD (Level Of Detail) sections so you can see what that’s about. Aileron mechanisms:- I don’t think you’re going to get the bellcrank mechanisms animated in external views; the CFS3 aileron animations are limited to standard rotations, this is not FSX. However, it should be possible to animate the mechanism in the VC, which uses keyframes, and would be really cool.

Yep, sheer magic. What can also happen is you buy a new printer, scanner, whatever and plug it into a Win7 rig and the OS goes off and gets the drivers. Just the drivers. No crapware, ultra-stoopid photo editors, web publishing wizzurds, picture gallery organiser drivel you don't actually want but get anyway whether you want them or not if you use the driver disc. Just the drivers. Refreshingly simple!

You'll learn more with each model, keep going!

That's not what I found with my 9800GT when installing Win7 - it just went off and got the right driver without any disc input. Updated it too, within a day or two of completing the install.

No, CFS3 ETO expansion. There are plenty of answers here about OFF, just a little info on CFS3 since it was asked about

Running a 512MB nVidia 9800GT and no problems. Would like a monster card(s), and i7 processor/motherboard/16GB of ram to go with it - wouldn't we all! - but this does fine at 1680x1050x32bit colour in CFS3 ETO expansion. Oh yes, and sliders at 5 apart from clouds (2) In CFS3Config untick dual-pass render and tick High resolution Z-buffer.

The CFS3 FM does allow for washout - wing twist - so keep modelling!

The link for Finn's tuts is over at SOH Aircraft Design and Animation forum, sticky threads:- http://www.sim-outhouse.com/sohforums/forumdisplay.php?f=22 Oldies but goldies!

There's a known bug in CFS3CONFIG.EXE - if you change settings and just click the close button, they will be lost. Always use File/Exit. HTH

You have Maya and 3dsMax? I want your wallet, hand it over!

Oh, by all means use 3dsMax if you like, I'd love to be able to myself. One thing might sway your choice just a little - gmax is free and 3dsMax costs several thousand dollars (or several thousand pounds in the UK) unless you can buy a student licence. Even then, you're looking at a couple of hundred dollars - similar in sterling - for a permanent licence. Even on eBay it costs a lot for a kosher copy. Once you've got the model built, you'll still need to export to gmax to build the .m3d files.... You might also consider that gmax is overkill in its capabilities for CFS3 modelling - 3dsMax is overkill by several megatons!

Gmax is used to build the model. The model then needs to be mapped, which can be done in gmax or via LithUnwrap. This yields a template or 'paint kit' which can be painted with Photoshop, PaintShop Pro, Gimp, Paint.NET, MS Paint, A.N.OtherBitmapEditor and finally the painted textures are saved as .dds files Nothing to it really .... hahaha! As far as Maya goes, see particularly Bzhyoyo's remarks here:- http://forum.combata...plane-tutorial/ and .m3d files are a one-way street: you can make 'em, but you can't edit 'em!

To see how a master of his craft might do it, see the Puss Moth's wing here:- http://www.sim-outhouse.com/sohforums/showthread.php?t=1778&page=5

Something odd is happening, I keep getting XP (creak, creak) updates and patches coming off the net. From some oufit called - lemme check - microsoft: anybody heard of these guys????

Just to muddy the waters, I have - and use - both XP Pro 32-bit and Win7 64-bit on separate drives. I really like Win7, but some of the tools I use don't work with Win7 (or Vista). In particular, the .MOS editor for CFS3 needs Managed DirectX, so only XP will do to develop scenery and damage effects for CFS3/OFF.

It's not the amount of screen, it's the number of textures. With the VC showing, there are more textures to render and this is what slows down an old game engine like CFS3. Crysis is a more recent title written to take advantage of recent GPU advances.

Apologies if this has been posted already, but I have a Sidewinder FFB2 and am running 64-bit Windows 7. This USB stick installed without a hitch and force feedback works as well as it ever did in XP. If you have one, you needn't worry at all.

Not half! Shouldn't have to cover the stone with wet sacking, mind you. I hope you've got the dog on a short leash!

Hello to you all from a Sim-Outhouse regular and occasional poster here. CFS3 will work in multiplayer IP to IP games in Windows 7, according to news from Tailwind and Blacksheep-ghost03. Instructions for how to set it up are here:- http://www.sim-outhouse.com/sohforums/showthread.php?t=25661 Hope this helps!