Landclass - Texture Guide

[Pen32Win]

I know there has been some talk about the difference between between the Stock Ground Textures and the two different versions of PacTex.

During my ramping up to create Landclass/Waterclass projects in Ground2K and EZ-Landclass I created a MS Word 2003 Document which shows each Texture Series for the Stock Textures, PacTex1, PacTex2 and the Modifications that I use. It shows the first texture for each numerical texture series and what Landclass it is in the Southern Hemisphere. It is organized in four columns which makes it very easy to compare the three different texture sets commonly used in the SWP.

If there's any interest in this document I'll upload it for the community when I upload the PM and Airfield Building packages tomorrow night.

[Shadow Wolf 07]

Sounds good! Please do. I've always wondered on the difference between Pactex 1 and 2 - I'm currently using P-1.

[Jean Bomber]

I know there has been some talk about the difference between between the Stock Ground Textures and the two different versions of PacTex.

During my ramping up to create Landclass/Waterclass projects in Ground2K and EZ-Landclass I created a MS Word 2003 Document which shows each Texture Series for the Stock Textures, PacTex1, PacTex2 and the Modifications that I use. It shows the first texture for each numerical texture series and what Landclass it is in the Southern Hemisphere. It is organized in four columns which makes it very easy to compare the three different texture sets commonly used in the SWP.

If there's any interest in this document I'll upload it for the community when I upload the PM and Airfield Building packages tomorrow night.

this is :welcome:

I've already made also pactex screen shots for each LC WC value at begin for a personnel use and anothers for the Euro textures from the sdc's set but I 've organized them by folder for each category , i can also to make one pdf or world doc like your ,the only problem is actually to find some free moment to realize it ,so if you dwld it I'll take yours as model to make a euro landclass doc .
I will also be curious to see your pics ,cause these depend of the texture set used,this docs are needed to easily see the lcwc values results.

thanks

JP

[dvslats]

Oh yea...please post it. I have been messing around with swapping out different .bmp's this last week....getting odd results. :faint: Your doc would be a great help Pen.

[Pen32Win]

OK, in that case(s) I'll load it up tonight. As soon as I get home.

After it's posted the community is free to do with it as they please. Turn it into a PDF, add to it, delete the personalized column and repost it, what ever.... I'm just sharing something I found both interesting and helpful.

The weird results from PacTex and PacTex2 comes from the author swapping around the class textures. He has plowed fields for grassland, forest for marsh, etc... Many of the classes are swapped around. I've been working to return mine to their intended class without creating a lot of duplication of texture sets.

[Pen32Win]

It has been uploaded......

[Jagdflieger]

Thanks Pen. I've always prefered PACTEX 1 slightly. Using Rhumbaflappy's tropical land class files is a big help with most of Asia.

[Pen32Win]

I like PacTex2, they're sharper on my Rig though as the document shows I've done some mods to bring them back more inline with the intended Landclass. Still have more to do too.

I didn't even know Rumba made any PTO Landclass Set.... I missed that one. I'll have to check them out, thank you.

[PSULLYKEYS]

Great Pen! an excellent reference, thanks.:applause:

[Pen32Win]

Thanks PSK;

I hope you get some good use from it.

It's up in the New Uploads Section Now.

[Blue Devil]

Thanks Pen32Win, ...

This should be a great scenery aid.

As posted earlier, ...I have swapped a lot of Pactex v.2 into my Pactex v.1 land-class because of the enhanced bmp's.

Thanks again.

[Rami]

Attention all!

This is now in the download queue: http://www.sim-outhouse.com/index.php?loc=downloads&page=info&FileID=13451

Thanks, Pen32Win! :ernae:

[dvslats]

Hi Pen, first off..thanks for uploading all the great information you have put together. Nice job. Second I have a ??. Does this txt I saved from about a hundred million years ago :mixedsmi: still the combo you are using for your recent PNG fields? Reason being I noticed in your doc you list a series of .bmp numbers under the original CFS2 stock .bmp numbers. These do not refer to bmps the same as the attached text, as far as replacing? Is this series of nums just showing the landclass they apply to? With my experience in scenery (nill, nada, zilch) just wanted to make sure that there is no correlation between the two. :kilroy: Thanks.

[Pen32Win]

Hey DV;

First off, you are most welcome. I hope someone gets some good use from it. I'd hate to have wasted a bunch of bandwidth for nothing....:costumes:

The numbers below the Texture Series numbers are the Landclass. If you use those numbers in EZ-Landclass and or Ground2K you get the texture set listed above it in the Southern Hemisphere.

About the text you posted. I still use something very close to that. The second column in the document is where I'm at now. I still have some more work to do on it. I'm pretty happy with the way it is now but there are a few things I'd like to change. It's not a high priority right now so it may be some time before I really go after it. I've got a half dozen or so more airfields I'd like to do for PNG and a Gmax Project for an ETO buddie in the near future. I'd like to get these done before Pony Express kicks into high gear. Once it does I won't be doing much CFS2 stuff until the end of July.

[dvslats]

Kool, thanks for clearing that up. Please don't get the impression that my previous post was a request. I'm just a tinkerer.....some of this, some of that...a hobby for when...well, when you need a hobby. :d And remember, hobbies have no pressures. Just good old fashioned fun. Stay your course...what ever you put out is fine, and may I add, will most likely be gobbled up by us here Lol. Information like this is great when you and others go through the trouble of packaging it up and making it available.
:focus: You know, LC and WC plays into personal preference...everyone has their own idea of what looks good. The one thing that always got me was the iredescent blue that the stock CFS2 displayed in shallow water, near the shore. This morning, with the help of a paint program and DXTbmp, and knowing what .bmp's to attack, I'm starting to get something that looks good, at least on my rig. Some stock, pctx1, 2, and Jimko's. One thing that's kind of neat...try taking some .bmp's in a paint program, and layer one on top of the other...vary the opacity, adjust gamma and colors. One can get some interesting results. Here's what I've got so far...

[Pen32Win]

On the subject of different Texture set, I really do like the detail and look of the stock textures other that the fact that they are so bloody bright. If some one were to take the most offending of them into PSP and reduce their brightness I think they'd look much better.

It would also make doing Landclass projects easier. Less guess work trying to figure out what everyone else is going to see. That's the problem with PacTex, they changed so many classes. You develop a LC BGL to display a certain type of ground cover and everyone else gets something totally different. Hit and Miss I guess.

[crashaz]

:woot: Must go revisit my Oahu landclass! Thanks buddy!

[Pen32Win]

No Problemo Pardo;

While I was waiting for the celar door to reopen I updated the file some. I added the names in the Ground2K LC.txt to the Landclass numbers under the Texture Sets.

It really sheds more light on what CFS2 is doing with the LC Numbers, especially in the SWP here's a great example.

LC placed in PNG, Texture Set 052H2SU1-7 (there is no B Series for this one). It is a 95% grass to 5% Shrubs texture set (Stock). The landclasses that display this texture and their classifications are:

007-Tall Grass and shrubs - This one makes sense.
008-Bare Desert - What The???
041-Hot And Mild Grasses And Shrubs - Pretty Good here too.
051-Semi Desert Shrubs - Once agin we're back to What The???
052-Semi Desert Sage - ??? Again
059-Succulent And Thorn Scrub - OK, I can see that...

As you can see, it's all over the map.... I was messing around trying to get some desert textures to show up in the Western Deserts of Aussie Land and could not get them (LC 008 and 051) to work. Prior to making any changes, using TMFViewer, I located a huge area of Western Australia with Landclass 051. I then Slewed to the same location in my stock CFS2 install. It was nothing but very, very bright green grass. If you want Baren Desert in the SWP area you'll have to use LC's 139 and 140. They are classified as Airfield1 and Airfield2.

Now here's something else I found, which I didn't check out before... In Africa and South America, in the southern latitudes.... the desert textures for LC 008 and 051 do show up as listed. So it's not just a Latitude issue, there's something else at work here. Can't be E & W Lon., Africa is East, SA is West. Could this be a function of the lclookup.bgl???

Anyway, the more I look at this and look at what has been done in the PacTex Set the more I think I need to just take all of the PacTex Textures and renumber them set by set to match what they should be.

[Pen32Win]

Well I was in a mood to see if I could cook up a new brew this afternoon.
I wanted to see if I could rebuild PACTEX2 but more in line with the Landclasses as they are defined by MS in the stock textures.

So Far I'm pretty happy with the outcome. If you're going to do this start by backing up your current Root TEXTURE folder and your SCENEDB\World\Texture Folders. Then pull out a fresh copy of PACTEX2\Pacific. Create a new folder to hold all of the files after you get done with each series.

Here we go....

Ice-Snow Cap
001B - PacTex2 – No Change
001H - PacTex2 – No Change

Bare Desert
002B - Stock

Semi Desert
003B – Stock

Corn And Beans Cropland
004B – PacTex2 – No Change

Hot Irrigated Cropland
005B – PacTex2 – No Change

Grass –Undefined Crops
005H – Replace with PacText2 – 003B

Wet Grassland
006B – Replace with PacTex2 – 005H

Low Sparse Grassland
006H – Replace with PacTex2 – 003B

Rice Paddy And Field
008B – Replace with PacTex2 - 063H

Crops And Town
008H – Replace with PacTex2 – 025B

Crops Grass Shrubs
010B – PacTex2 – No Change

Cool Grasses And Shrubs
010H – Replace with PacTex2 – 047H

Moist Eucalyptus
011H – Replace with PacTex2 – 008H (To get rid of some of the brown spots replace texture #5 with a copy of texture #6.

Upland Tundra
013B – PacTex2 – No Change

Marsh Wetland
018B – PacTex2 – No Change

Montane Tropical Forests
019H – PacTex2 – No Change

Seasonal Tropical Forest
021H – PacTex2 – No Change

Conifer Boreal Forest
022B – PacTex2 – No Change

Cool Forest And Field
025B – PacTex2 – No Change

Forest And Field
025H – PacTex2 – No Change

Cool Mixed Forest
027B – Replace with PacTex2 – 010H

Southern Hemisphere Mixed Forest
027H – PacTex2 – No Change

Large City Urban Non Grid Wet
031B – PacTex2 – No Change

Large City Urban Grid Dry
031H – PacTex2 – No Change

Medium City Urban Non Grid Wet
035B – PacTex2 – No Change

Medium City Urban Grid Dry
035H – PacTex2 – No Change

Small City Suburban Non Grid Wet
047B – PacTex2 – No Change

Small City Suburban Non Grid Dry
047H – Replace with PacText2 - 062H

Tall Grasses And Shrubs
052H – Replace with PacTex2 – 006B

Rock Volcanic
056B – PacTex2 – No Change

Rock
056H - PacTex2 – No Change

Rock Volcanic
057H - PacTex2 – No Change

Woody Savanna
058H – Replace with PacTex2 – 008B

Rain Green Tropical Forest
059H - PacTex2 – No Change

Tropical Degraded Forest
060H – Replace with PacTex2 – 058H

Airfield1
061H - PacTex2 – No Change

Airfield2
062H - PacTex2 – No Change

Mangrove
063H – Replace with PacTex2 – 018B

Grassland
064H – Replace with PacTex2 – 013B

Irrigated Grassland
065H - PacTex2 – No Change

Cold Grassland
066H – PacTex2 – No Change

It's a bit of a chore but I'm finding it to be a good mix and they're closer in line with the LC's as they were designed.

If you do try this let me know, like it or not. If so I'll publish it.

[Oglivie]

Thanks Pen32Win!
:wavey:

[dvslats]

Hi Pen, The list you put together in a couple of posts up is just what Pactex needed IMHO. Swapped out the .bmps according to the instructions and got great results. Thanks! And of course some pics...:d A big panoramic for PNG and one for the islands. After an hour or so of flying around, ain't seen nothing that should not be there. Like water buffalo and farmer rolling down the side of a mountain after trying to plow it Hehee.

[p14u2nv]

Greetings all,

I am not a newbie to CFS2 but after a few years away and thinking about it I decided to fly again. I am simply amazed at how far along CFS2 has come. And I thought when the zone died so did any CFS2 following. Boy was I wrong. I flew in a squad with JFC back then; VMF514.

My interest lies strictly with the PTO and add ons to enrich this area only. Not interested in ETO, MTO, North Africa add ons etc. I have installed the converted FS9 texture files by Stiz and it looks ok at altitude but...I have also made some mistakes apparently and reinstalled CFS2 4 times already due to initialization files corrupted, missing this and that etc. I'm learning along the way though and that is what I want anyway so...I'm just hung up at where these mistakes are and what caused the corruption issues. Anyway...

My questions however are as follows;

1. Which mesh should I add and were does this go on the CFS2 scenery list for best results. I have recently read at the top or at the bottom just above cfs2 stock areas etc. Confusing.

2. Which landclass? Again where in the list does this go?

3. Textures? And yet again where in the list does this go?

4. What did I miss here in the "questions?

I am experienced in windows environment so placing files correctly is not an issue, however placing the correct files is! I'd just like to finally have CFS2 look as best as it can be. Thanks Pen for your posts concerning the files to use in this thread.

Thanks very much for the help guys...

Toshiba A105
1.7 M Celeron
2 gigs ram
64 MB onboard graphics
40 GB HD and 320 GB usb backup
and yes it works ok for FS9 too!

P14u2nv

[Pen32Win]

Thanks DV;

Good to hear. I flew the spine of Guadalcanal and PNG last night. Seems to be a very good mix. Not too much solid carpet jungle, lots of nice changes to the density, and as you said, no rice paddys going up the side of mountains.


Howdy P14, and :welcome:;

Let take your questions one at a time.

1. The best mesh, well, there's a lot of good stuff out there, I personally use Rolfs Mesh for most of the SWP and CBI areas. BUT, RhumbaFlappy just released a 4 part world mesh yesterday, it hit the D/L section just in the last 8 hours. I'll be checking that out for sure. Rhumba does get work.

Best place for mesh in the Scenery Library listing is as low as you can go. Push it right down on top of the "Terrain" Entry.

2. The native CFS2 Land/Water class is controlled by several bgl's in your root SCENERY folder. Developers can also overwrite it through add-on bgl's. They can either go in the Root SCENERY Folder or in a Folder in the SCENEDB folder. In the SCENEDB folder you can turn them on and off without uninstalling the files. Sander has done Land/Water Class for most of the ETO and Med. L/WC for the PTO is much more localized due to the nature of the AO. Each developer includes a READ ME with their projects and you should always follow their directions for the installation of each new scenery package.

3. Textures go in two places. A. The Root TEXTURES folder. You'll need to do this if you use any kind of LWClass scenery. The other place is SCENEDB\World\Textures. For LWClass scenery you'll need to copy all of the textures in this folder and COPY them into your Root TEXTURES Folder.

4. This is a never ending learning sim, we're always coming up with something new to improve our old warhorse. Time, Trial and Error are still our best teachers.

[Shadow Wolf 07]

Question: where can PacTex 2 be found?

[Pen32Win]

I got it at FlightSim.com, it's by Otis. pactex2a, b, c, d, and e.zip.

[p14u2nv]

Hi Pen,

Thanks for your quick response. I have dloaded 6.34 GB of CFS2 files in the last month or so trying to get up to speed. I saw as you pointed out that RhumbaFlappy had some new mesh which prompted my initial post today. Trial and error is my middle name so far!

Does mesh need to be added through the add scenery inside CFS2?

Should I dispatch the FS9 add on by Stiz and just use other files created just for CFS2?

I should copy all bgl's that I add to the SceneDB folder to the Scenery folder? Is that right?

Finally should any bgl's added to the SceneDB be in their respective and separate folders for easy ID of what area each represents? I have noticed that some developers say to do this and others do not mention it at all. Seems I am beginning to remember how we set things up years ago but it's all sort of fuzzy. I'd just like to have as uncluttered but efficient installation as possible.

Thanks so much for taking the time to help me out my Pen as it is much appreciated! This is a cool hobby (sickness?)!

P14

[p14u2nv]

Pen disregard the bgl in both Scenery and SceneDB folders question above as I now see it's textures that must be copied.

Must learn to read and comprehend correctly too I suppose...lol

P14

[Pen32Win]

p14;

1. Some mesh you do add through the Scenery Library, stuff like Rhumba's new stuff goes into the SCENEDB\World\scenery folder, so you don't. Stuff that goes into the Root SCENERY folder does not get managed throught the Library, it loads automatically.

2. I don't know anything about Stiz's FS9 add on. Sorry, can't help you with that one.

3. No, don't duplicate bgls. The copying we are talking about are Textures.

4. For the most part I stick with where the author intended them to go. There is no single piece of magic wisdom for that question. Different developers do things differently. Almost all for very good reasons.

[p14u2nv]

Pen;

I am trying to locate Rhumbas mesh now. Appears I am on my way finally...can't wait until this all comes together.

P14

[miamieagle]

Thank you my friend. I appreciate your good work!:ernae:

[Pen32Win]

No Problem;

The little test has resulted in a very harmonious outcome and I'm going to keep it. The more I fly around, the more I like it. I think I'm going to keep it and base all of my furture LC changes off of this set. It will work well with it, stock and the stuff Jagd uses, which is generate by a script to convert texture names.

I may even try to create a batch file to do this. That would save folks a lot of time......Hummmm...

[p14u2nv]

Quick newbie question here Pen, I am correct in understanding you in the examples in your post for say the "Grassland 064H – Replace with PacTex2 – 013B" above, would I change the name of the bmp from 013B to 064H and then add it to CFS2 overwriting the original or delete 064H and just add 013B? Just want to make sure I don't screw this up resulting in re-install #5!

Also I downloaded your 10 mb document but none of the scenery pics are showing. I have a Microsoft Word reader in place of Word and the text shows fine so it will read 2003. Any ideas?

Thanks in advance for your help my friend.