Poor Mans Travel Air

M

Moto-Guzzi

Active member
Lucky me, I get to see a Vintage '29 Travel Air 4000 pretty often.

The closest thing to her on RF is (IMHO) an FW 44 Steiglitz put up by BrentG a while back.....Biplane, two seater, exposed radial....the Steiglitz is not as "familiar looking" as the Stearman, so I thought it would make a "close-maybe" to a Travel Air in the right colors....

So I painted her up like one I see and...Its ok, but its just not "there"...the wheels are too small, the engine needs to be larger, needs a bump map....Great plane, one of my favorite interwar Bipes, but its not a Travel Air, so I'm not sure if I will put this colorscheme on Swap...(Technoids Jenny has me spoiled for life!)

So, if anyone wants to chime in with advise or ideas, can help me with a bump map or feels like Modeling a '29 Travel Air 4000 from scratch, let me know...
 

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I think it looks OK....I like the colors, its very close to the Burnt Orange and Cream of the one I see regularly...(the ones I got off the web are more red)...

I like the shading I did for the ribs and stringers..Yup layers is the way to go...but without a bump and spec map, they only show at certain angles to the sun....

The Original was from way back in G-5, and has some weird "facet/depressions" in the top wing (visible in one pic) and on the bottom fuse. I guess the lower triangle count back then made smooth shaping a little more difficult?

Its an old favorite of mine, so I hate picking on it, but from G-5 its just its not up to Technoids Jenny (the current Gold Standard Crown Jewel in my hangar!)..

And, its not a Travel Air...

Its LIKE a Travel Air....
in the same way a perfectly respectable average woman is LIKE Grace Kelly...
but she aint no Grace Kelly, no matter how good the make-up! LOL!
 
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Moto-Guzzi said:
I think it looks OK....I like the colors, its very close to the Burnt Orange and Cream of the one I see regularly...(the ones I got off the web are more red)...

I like the shading I did for the ribs and stringers..Yup layers is the way to go...but without a bump and spec map, they only show at certain angles to the sun....

The Original was from way back in G-5, and has some weird "facet/depressions" in the top wing (visible in one pic) and on the bottom fuse. I guess the lower triangle count back then made smooth shaping a little more difficult?

Its an old favorite of mine, so I hate picking on it, but from G-5 its just its not up to Technoids Jenny (the current Gold Standard Crown Jewel in my hangar!)..

And, its not a Travel Air...

Its LIKE a Travel Air....
in the same way a perfectly respectable average woman is LIKE Grace Kelly...
but she aint no Grace Kelly, no matter how good the make-up! LOL!
Click to expand...

So if you want send me the template you used and a link to the plane, I will see what I can do for a height map ... spec maps with me are still hit-or-miss ...

I am not the best, but getting better with every attempt. Re-activating the dead grey matter. ;)

I don't know what program you are using, I primarily use Corel PaintShop Pro X9 Ultimate. I have others, but I am comfortable with PSP vs. Adobe Photo Shop.
 
I use GIMP...

As I understand it, the "xcf" file is the one with multiple layers where I do my "work"....when I periodically export it to Realflight (paint a line, export and look-see, paint another line, export and look-see....I spend weeks doing that!) it then becomes a single layer 'TGA" file that gets rendered in the sim...

I'm clueless on the _s.tga (spec map) and _n.tga (bump map) I know the older planes dont have them, but I dont get what you'd need to do to make one.....

I was able to "open" the Riley Model B and the Jenny bump maps (funky iridescent purple!?) and copied the image as a layer to guide me in shading some panel lines and wing ribs, but I dont know how they are created...

They look like CNC Machined blue-prints, very precise recesses, slots, rivets, and circles, I know I cant "paint" with that type of precision...

I'll send you the multi-layer XCF if you think its do-able, but I'm dumb as a rock... I'll need a 1-on-1 tutor to explain "conceptually" whats going on, and match that up keystroke by keystroke to "tactically" pull it off....I've watched tons of GIMP vids on Youtube and come away with more confusion than when I started! LOL!!

Just dont put any evil spells in my paint scheme...you know, try sucking my soul to hell through the innerweb with innocent "kitten pics", when its really Satan?

I'm on to that, Bro...you aint foolin nobody :D
 
Long time gimp user myself. Not sure about xcf files, but I know psd files maintain layers.

The purple image you saw for the _n.tga is created with a filter plugin that you have to DL and install in your gimp files. If you're interested in trying to figure these other files out I'll help you where I can. It's really simple to create a normal map, but the spec can be a learning experience since you've got the alpha channel to deal with now. Once you understand the concepts they're both really fairly simple.

Moto-Guzzi said:
I use GIMP...

As I understand it, the "xcf" file is the one with multiple layers where I do my "work"....when I periodically export it to Realflight (paint a line, export and look-see, paint another line, export and look-see....I spend weeks doing that!) it then becomes a single layer 'TGA" file that gets rendered in the sim...

I'm clueless on the _s.tga (spec map) and _n.tga (bump map) I know the older planes dont have them, but I dont get what you'd need to do to make one.....

I was able to "open" the Riley Model B and the Jenny bump maps (funky iridescent purple!?) and copied the image as a layer to guide me in shading some panel lines and wing ribs, but I dont know how they are created...

They look like CNC Machined blue-prints, very precise recesses, slots, rivets, and circles, I know I cant "paint" with that type of precision...

I'll send you the multi-layer XCF if you think its do-able, but I'm dumb as a rock... I'll need a 1-on-1 tutor to explain "conceptually" whats going on, and match that up keystroke by keystroke to "tactically" pull it off....I've watched tons of GIMP vids on Youtube and come away with more confusion than when I started! LOL!!

Just dont put any evil spells in my paint scheme...you know, try sucking my soul to hell through the innerweb with innocent "kitten pics", when its really Satan?

I'm on to that, Bro...you aint foolin nobody :D
Click to expand...
 
I thought '.xcf" was the default Gimp file extension...

I saved a color scheme I like as "airplane x_custom" in the sim...I open that color scheme tga from RF and started adding layers.... I'm painting and "exporting as" Airplane x_custom.tga back to the sim to see it in 3-D...

The whole time a Gimp file is open on my screen, gaining layers. When I finally want to "save it" to my desktop to continue later I click "save as" (NOT export as) and it "automatically" becomes "airplane X_custom.xcf".

So my perception is, by adding layers to a tga file and saving it OUTSIDE of the RF folder, it defaults to a multi-layered Gimp image called an ".xcf" that I can re-open later with layers intact.

How and when bump and spec maps get made, I dunno...if they exist in the original colorscheme, copies get "made" automatically when I first copy the color scheme with the new name in the sim...I dont pro-actively do anything to make that happen....

But what if its an older model that never had them? Do you need to make them in the BEGINNING, like create a "slot" for them in the file system so they know to "talk" to each other in the sim? Or can you do it last.

Concepts, and Tactics...I'm thick as a brick!
 
Moto-Guzzi said:
I thought '.xcf" was the default Gimp file extension...

I saved a color scheme I like as "airplane x_custom" in the sim...I open that color scheme tga from RF and started adding layers.... I'm painting and "exporting as" Airplane x_custom.tga back to the sim to see it in 3-D...

The whole time a Gimp file is open on my screen, gaining layers. When I finally want to "save it" to my desktop to continue later I click "save as" (NOT export as) and it "automatically" becomes "airplane X_custom.xcf".

So my perception is, by adding layers to a tga file and saving it OUTSIDE of the RF folder, it defaults to a multi-layered Gimp image called an ".xcf" that I can re-open later with layers intact.

How and when bump and spec maps get made, I dunno...if they exist in the original colorscheme, copies get "made" automatically when I first copy the color scheme with the new name in the sim...I dont pro-actively do anything to make that happen....

But what if its an older model that never had them? Do you need to make them in the BEGINNING, like create a "slot" for them in the file system so they know to "talk" to each other in the sim? Or can you do it last.

Concepts, and Tactics...I'm thick as a brick!
Click to expand...

Yes, xcf is the default gimp file. I've never used it though so I was unaware it preserved layers. I don't believe photoshop accepts it though if you ever want to share files.

Exporting as a psd file will allow you to preserve your layers as well. It's also a native photoshop file type. When I get ready to see my work in RF, I'll copy visible and paste onto the tga file and collapse the layers so I can export the tga file. The psd file stays in my folder with the max files I'm working on, and of course the tga is in the color scheme folder.

As for bump and spec maps, those can be deleted or added at any time. If you just work on the classic tga file, those files will automatically generate when the dds file is created if they were already present on the model. .
 
So if someone uses Photoshop, and wants to help with a bump map, and says "dude, send me your color scheme"...

Can I just change my file extension from .xcf (gimp) to .psd (photoshop) and they'll be able to open in and see/manipulate the layers? Or would they only need the "flattened" single layer .tga image from the RF colorscheme file to work from?

Would THAT file need any name changes for them to open in Photoshop, since I created it in Gimp?

I'd like to learn bump mapping because I've got many favorite interwar/golden age planes by BrentG and The Gibson that dont have spec or bump maps...

I've updated some color schemes for them that look better on my scaled up (50%) AV's but they could be better.

Thanks for the help, I've learned quite a bit from people on the forums, I really appreciate it :)
 
Yes, change the extension to .psd and they can use your layers just as you can.

Give me a few days and I'll try to work something up to get you going on the extra maps.
 
Thanks, been sick as a dog lately, just getting back on line...go thru this every winter, maybe by June I'll be able to breathe again...:eek:
 
Moto-Guzzi said:
Thanks, been sick as a dog lately, just getting back on line...go thru this every winter, maybe by June I'll be able to breathe again...:eek:
Click to expand...

Spring is just around the corner. It was in the low 60's here today so I got out to fly some of my heli fleet. I stuck mostly with the nitros and large 700's though because of the winds.

Get well soon.
 
Thanks BD! Gettin there...

Someone just posted a new 360 camera field on swap, beautiful Blue Sky everywhere not all gray and ugly like so many on FR...cant wait till the "world" starts to looks like that
 
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