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Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

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mbscjohnp
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Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by mbscjohnp »

JYAI KC-13J’s, MCAS Iwakuni Japan for FS9, FSX and P3Dv4 by John Young and Brent Newman
Didn't need the Japan package, but sorely needed these beautiful C-130 Harvest Hawks for P3Dv4 and VMRG-252, MAG-14. 2ND MAW, at Cherry Point NC (KNKT) and correcting tail and wing ID, adding our beautiful tail flash and VMRG-252 under United States Marines and painting the warheads yellow was simple. Got them flying round trip to Guantanamo Bay (MUGM) which I had corrected years ago in FSX and reconstituted in P3Dv4.5. Our "Otis" folks will be proud. Thanks again for the hard work in this one (saving lots of time for the rest of us). John
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John Young
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by John Young »

My pleasure John. Sounds like you have an affinity with the subject and that's always good to design for. Will you be sharing anything?

John
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mbscjohnp
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by mbscjohnp »

John: As soon as I get the tail flash correct. It is the horse Sagitarius surrounded by stars and a little difficult to create from a shoulder patch <grin>. John
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mbscjohnp
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by mbscjohnp »

John: Advise on sending dds and jpg and you can have what I have John
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John Young
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by John Young »

I've PM'd you my e-mail address John, so that should make it easier for you to send me what you want to.

John
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mbscjohnp
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by mbscjohnp »

John: No PM received. My profile lists my email which is at sc.rr.com goodness gracious <grin>
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John Young
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by John Young »

Apologies John, it's not in my sent items either so I guess it didn't go. I've just re-sent it and I can now see it.

John
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mbscjohnp
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by mbscjohnp »

John, friend, no problem. In error, I just sent you everything using my wife's email. If you didn't recognize it and deleted it, I will be happy to resend with my email instead. Getting old really sucks! BUT I sent you a pic of the actual tail on the KNKT runway from my email just now. John
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John Young
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by John Young »

No problem, I have all the files you sent. I've sent you a couple of observations in the reply.
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mbscjohnp
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by mbscjohnp »

John: I am using the same technique on the C-40 to park it at MUGM with USMC insignia. I don't know any other method and it has worked for me for years. John
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John Young
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by John Young »

One of the reasons for switching to FSX/P3Dv4 is the far superior graphics qualities compared to FS9. It's a bit of a pity to forego the RGB paint kit and repaint a Dxt5 texture and compress it again. The degredation is quite noticeable.

John
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mbscjohnp
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by mbscjohnp »

My friend John: I really do appreciate your message and all the work you folks do for the rest of us. My renditions are simply statues sitting on the tarmac at MGUM, when I land there. They only move in the middle of the night one day a week, because that is the way to program them to sit there the rest of the time and look "good enough" (similar to the fire station that I placed there). I got tired of only black C-40A AI's (flipping and that other mumbo jumbo), so I located a free flyable one, left out its sound and panel, created a quick midnight fly out and back for it, and it looks great sitting on the tarmac. But, I will take your suggestions to heart and see what I can do with the RGB paint kit and an ancient purchased Paint Shop Pro that I found still on my puter (not about to pay an annual rental fee for a new Paint Shop Pro) and give it a shot. At my 80 years of age, you might just have convinced me <smile>. You are even more appreciated! John
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clickclickdoh
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by clickclickdoh »

Now that my move from heck is done. I can take a look at making a VMGR-252 package for you with custom flight plans. Shouldn't be too much of a fuss since I've already been working with that paint kit.
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mbscjohnp
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

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clickclickdoh: I am in the process of learning with the paint kit and Paint Shop Pro. I have already erased the ID and placed BH on the tail. I am now figuring out how to change the color of the text. Then I have to figure out how to paste the Sagettarius horse and stars tail flash onto the tail. It took hours to "fix" a copy from a shoulder patch. I am trying my best. There are pictures of the tail at the Marine web site. John
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clickclickdoh
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by clickclickdoh »

Sounds great. It's always good to see someone trying to learn how to do repaints.

Remember, layers are your friends.
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mbscjohnp
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

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Re-did Sagittarius from the patch and background painted it in the color of the tail (stupid color pick gave me the wrong color figures in Paint Shop Pro, so I used those from Paint) and that worked fine when I placed them on the tail in Paint Shop Pro with a layer named Sagittarius. Going to do the tail ID's tomorrow after working all day on learning this by failure attempts. Once I have all this done, have no clue as to how to compress it again. Hopefully I will recall that tomorrow after my Physical Therapy for my rotator cuff surgery. Once I get these instructions written down for the next project, I'll make John happy and do it right. John
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John Young
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by John Young »

Good to see you are getting there John.

You convert the texture in the same way you did for the Dxt5 as the source. Once you have the paint done in PSP, save a copy as a .bmp file. If you are using the paint kit it will be in 2048 x 2048 format. Load that into PSP and resize it (smart resize) to 1024 x 1024 and save it. Now open that file in Dxtbmp, add the alpha channel, flip both vertically and save as .dds Dxt5 in the aircraft texture folder.

John
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mbscjohnp
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by mbscjohnp »

OK, I have everything done and it looks great in PSP. I have it in 1024 x 1024 and have saved it as .bmp. I opened it in Dxtbmp but how do I "add the alpha channel". I didn't do anything about an alpha channel, but I flipped (both??) vertically and saved it as .dds Dxt5 and placed that .dds into the texture folder with a result of a black aircraft. I did really good with PSP and the layers (changing ID and adding the tail flashes all in their layers). The saved .bmp looks ok. Was I supposed to resize the .bmp in PSP before I saved it? The problem has to be the process of creating the .dds, as when I replaced it with my (badly created and degraded) prior .dds, that aircraft shows up correctly.
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clickclickdoh
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by clickclickdoh »

The primary cause of a black model in the sim is because the texture is missing or unrecognizable. The two quickest checks for that are:

1) Make sure that the texture folder has the same name as the texture call in the aircraft.cfg file
2) Make sure the texture inside the texture folder hasn't been accidentally renamed away from what the model is looking for.
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mbscjohnp
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Re: Thanks for the KC-130 Japan Package

Post by mbscjohnp »

Friend clickclickdoh: You are the greatest. The problem was that I had downloaded KC-130 MCAS Iwakuni Japan and had made John unhappy with my "degraded" renderings <smile>. That proggy had textures titled "KC-130J" with which I was dutifully working with PSP and Dxtbmp, after saving as "KC-130...." and resulting in a black aircraft. After following your suggestion, I noted that the downloaded models had textures named "C-130...."
After renaming my KC files to C a beautiful aircraft appeared on the tarmac. Thanks to you and John, this 80 year old dude, after "converting" actual ID 15-6514, is now ready to "convert" actual ID 16-6381 for VMGR-252 at MACS Cherry Point SC, with its "Sagittarius and stars" tail flash (copied from their shoulder patch). Oh yeah, I found the Alpha channel in the Paint Kit.

Even an old dude can shout out: I DID IT! John

John Young: I misplaced your email, if you would like my rendition.
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