SceneryDesign.org This evening I took my first (baby) steps into scenery design for FlightGear. Having done scenery design for Microsoft Flight Simulator for such a long time, it takes a little time to get used to the differences. Let me start with the good news, in the end I was able to see my objects. In […]
Coordinate confusion – part 2
After all the theory I blogged about yesterday, I thought it might be a good idea to illustrate the difference today. So let’s take a quite common example. I have taken the threshold coordinates of runway 06-24 from Amsterdam Airport Schiphol. And I have chosen the reference point to be near the middle of the […]
Coordinate confusion
OK, I got a question for you. What kind of coordinates does your 3D modelling tool use? I mean a tool like GMax, FSDS, SketchUp or 3DS Max. Ah, that is an easy question you must think now, all of these programs use a 3D axis system where you model your object in meters (or […]
AC3D support in ModelConverterX
I have added support for a new format to ModelConverterX today, this new format is the AC3D format. It is commonly used by FlightGear for aircraft and scenery models. In the next development release you will find a reader and writer for the AC3D format. There are a number of limitations at the moment: Shaded […]
FlightGear on FSDeveloper
Last week we opened forums to discuss X-Plane development on FSDeveloper. And this week we have added a new subforum again, this time to discuss development for the open source FlightGear simulator. So from now on you can also discuss development of scenery or aircraft for FlightGear on FSDeveloper, we hope you enjoy those new […]
Effects with an offset
A topic that has been raised frequently on the FSDeveloper forums recently is that effects attached to an object in FSX have an offset in their placement. Especially when you use these effects for your taxiway lighting or approach lights that is an annoying “feature”. So tonight I did a little experiment to see if […]
Oops a mistake, undo please!
It’s probably on of the key combinations most used in computer programs, Ctrl-Z, to undo your last action. Until now ModelConverterX did not have any undo functionality. When I started with the tool an undo function was not really needed, since it was an object converter. You loaded an object and exported it into another […]
X-Plane forums at FSDeveloper
We have opened two new sub-forums at FSDeveloper to discuss the development of aircraft and scenery for X-Plane. You can find the announcement for these new forums here.
Performance indicator render mode
I have added a new experimental render mode to ModelConverterX. This mode gives the object a colour based on the amount of texture vertices at a certain location. So this mode should help you to see where your object can be optimized further to increase performance. I have made a quick video to demonstrate it, since […]
The return of DrawCallMonitor!
In my previous post I already mentioned that the object statistics shown in the DrawCallMonitor tool and in the Object Information form of ModelConverterX differ. I have done some more studying on this and it is hard to say which one is better. DrawCallMonitor gives the right statistics if you want to know how many […]