Re-Painter's Page

RE-PAINTERS

The Dash 7 Project phases will deliver six liveries through both releases. There are many, many more that need to be done. Time would not allow us to do all that we would like, so we want your help. Re-Paints of the Dash 7 are encouraged. We would love to see every livery ever flown on this Dash 7.

For this we have come up with two packages of texture templates. You may decide which one suits best your needs!

Pack 1 - Basic texture templates for general graphic software.

These are the base texture templates generated by GMax, in bitmap format: After the process of applying materials and textures to a 3D model (called "mapping") GMax can generate a set of textures. These clearly indicate which part of the 3D model is covered, thus making it easy for the repainter to acurately tell where each paint scheme part should go in.

You may use your preferred graphics software to paint over these textures; then, you must convert them to one of the various formats accepted by FS2002; this conversion may call for application(s) available in freeware form, like Imagetool or DXTBmp - that is, if you're going to use anything other that straight 8bit (256 colors) format, no reflections... But this will be just the same with Pack 2

Pros of Pack 1

This is a straightforward and easy understandable pack, that you can use with the graphics software that you're most accustomed to. In fact, this is the pack that I used :-) ...and that after many months became into the official Dash7 livery textures and ... into Pack 2 ;-)

Cons of Pack 1

Everything must be done from "scratch"; You won't be able to use many of the elements present on the standard release textures like fuse panels, door outlines, rivets, shadings and light effects.

Pack 1 Copyright, Milton Shupe. General use permission granted. DOWNLOAD PACK ONE HERE

Pack 2 - Paint Shop Pro, 6.0 or above, and PhotoShop multi-layered texture templates.

I've always used Paint Shop Pro to create my textures. After version 6, PSP came with layer capabilities and after I find out what these were and their infinite potential I started painting aircraft. Not many, so far, as I guess it takes me about 2 months to deliver each one. Just to give an idea, my Dash7 fuse texture template features over 50 layers, or 50 coats of paint, as you prefer :-) I can throw in paint in a very free way and in the end be like a sound engineer behind the mixing console, adjusting levels (transparencies) or adding effects (burn, dodge, light, etc etc).

Pack 2 is a compact version of my texture templates. It features various mapping layers (that are used for reference and also for pasting the final blend into the final textures), a PAINT HERE layer (where you may very freely add your own Paint Scheme, or add more layers if you want), a DARK layer and a LIGHT layer. These latest 2 feature already all the structural elements and many light effects.

Pros of Pack 2

You already have much of the hard work done. You may concentrate on the scheme itself, painting 'underneath' the structural elements without deleting them! It works like a charm and the final result may be, well, at least as good as my own ;-) ... that is if you liked it!

Cons of Pack 2

You must have Paint Shop Pro ver 6 or higher. You must know how to work with layers or, at least, be willing to find your way around. You must deal with my own idiosyncrasies in terms of method... you must perform a series of not so orthodox steps to paste the final result into the final textures (based on Pack 1 and also provided here). I won't be doing any kind of technical support beyond the initial readme's.

To get Pack 2, download instructions and your kit of choice below.

Please drop me a line to alaskanwinds@yahoo.com if you have any question about using the below pack.

To finish, let me just say that this is a wonderful bird, wonderfully crafted by a wonderful Team :-) It deserves the best from you because it was made for you! Enjoy and let me wish you my most sincere ...

Good Luck!!

Joao Paz DOWNLOAD PACK 2 INSTRUCTIONS - .8 MB

DOWNLOAD Paint Shop Pro PACK 2 - 1.9 MB

PHOTOSHOP PACK 2 - 2.8 MB