Trying to repaint Kuznetsov

[Silvern]

New DCS version added support for ship liveries and I am trying to repaint the Kuznetsov, but I don't know how to prepare the description.lua for the ship.

 

 

Any help would be appreciated.

[Eight Ball]

Check this nifty little tool by uboats: https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/1744284/

[crazyeddie]

I will be interested to see if this can be done, as I understood it all this new feature allows you to do is add different ships numbers and names to an existing DCS skin.

 

Let us know how you get on.

[Silvern]

Check this nifty little tool by uboats: https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/1744284/

 

Thanks, that did the trick.

 

I will be interested to see if this can be done, as I understood it all this new feature allows you to do is add different ships numbers and names to an existing DCS skin.

 

Let us know how you get on.

 

Yeah, we are able to repaint whole thing. Like repainting planes.

New liveries then appear in the mission builder, same as with planes or ground units.

 

I got it to work.

 

You could take this repaint and just make a description.lua that would call these textures and you would have a selectable livery for Kuznetsov.

 

https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/760049/?auth_service_id=Twitter&check_key=a639f9c2de694395413ded104ae27aac

[crazyeddie]

Thanks Silvers, that is good news. :thumbup:

 

I have not had time to try it out for myself but I see great potential with this, Kutznetzov and Liaoning on the same model.

[VZ_342]

Oh, we all live in a yellow submarine...

 

*slaps self*

[crazyeddie]

I can't get this to work with any of the ships I have in my Saved Games Mods Folder, the game is not recognising the Liveries.

 

I'm pretty certain my Liveries instal is correct, the Ship/Mod is appearing in the game but no choice of paint jobs/Liveries. All I am getting is a default option.

 

How did you get it to work Silvern ?

[Eight Ball]

Are you sure you're using the right name for your folder in the Saved Games\DCS\Liveries\ folder?

 

With proper subfolder for each livery?

 

You've modified the description.lua accordingly, with a unique name and change each "true" to "false" when necessary?

[crazyeddie]

Yes. I'm doing a simple mod to see how it works but getting nowhere with it.

 

I'm using the Bahrain freighter as my testbed, it only has a few textures to change and I have created many Mods over the years so I'm pretty sure everything is correct, I have even changed things to be Not Correct to see if that made any difference. I have run out of ideas.

 

Normally the game will see a new paint scheme even if it wont load or you make a mistake in the lua but I'm not even getting that.

[Eight Ball]

Oh yeah, I know, I use a fair shair of your mods.

 

 

Before asking you all this I also maybe a quick test to see how it worked. Using a modded ship...the Bahrain freighter :P

here's the folder I've droppped in Saved Games\DCS\Liveries\

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1QpPHUDZSCcRmG9upHt2hGgBlUtsSPrZr

 

 

Edited November 14, 2018 by Eight Ball

[crazyeddie]

That's interesting, your skins are following the exact same pattern as mine but you have put them into your Saved Games Liveries folder, I was trying to get them to work inside the actual Mod Folder, and it was not working that way.

 

Many thanks for that Eight Ball, I know what to do now. :thumbup:

 

 

PS: I made a very simple mistake with my lua file, so simple it makes Homer Simpson look intelligent ... DOH !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! All these years playing around with the game files and the stupidest little mistake tripped me up.. I used the edm extractor to list the textures files by name and forgot to change it from bahrain.lua to description.lua, so I had copied the same mistake into every texture file.

 

Thanks guys, another lesson learned, possibly !!

 

I'm going to mess around with this ship now and see if I can create some better looking seagoing freighters with a bit of rust and weathering on them.

Edited November 14, 2018 by crazyeddie

[Eight Ball]

Glad you got it working :)

I'm going to mess around with this ship now and see if I can create some better looking seagoing freighters with a bit of rust and weathering on them.

I'd be curious to know if you can succeed. This was my plan initially but the UV map (no sure that's the proper term) isn't easy to work with.

Textures are either stretched over a large area (hull) or repeated over and over (bridge structure)

But I'm still very much a newbie with all this so maybe I'm missing something.

 

 

the Hull texture

 

 

 

The bridge structures (just one texture file covering all this)

 

[crazyeddie]

Yes, that is an issue, this model is actually a bit undersized, it needs to be grown by about 1/8 as well.

 

It can be made to look a little better than it is, but really it needs a complete rework and I do not have 3dmax and I can't do it with what I have.

 

I could not raise any interest in converting any of the other free models from CadNav, so I gave up on that project, here is a couple of examples of what they have and it would be great to see some of this stuff in the game, bad sadly not enough interest in models of this quality.

 

 

 

 

[Eight Ball]

Damn, they look great. Have you tried getting in touch with Hawkeye60? He converted quite a few already, maybe he could add those to his list?

[crazyeddie]

Hawkeye and I had this conversation a long time ago, he did the Bahrain Freighter for me at that time (from the same CadNav source) and we had a lot of trouble getting the ship finished in the way I wanted it. Like all modders he wanted to work on his own projects, so we only ever managed what you see today.

 

My eye for detail is a bit too demanding for some and these conversions take a lot of time and skill to do to a high standard, so not everyone wants to get involved, sadly.

 

I have raised this idea several times in recent years, but nobody is interested.

[Hawkeye60]

OK Ed, I am willing to give it another go!

 

 

My skills have improved a great deal since we first collaborated.

 

 

So I put this together in about a hour.

It is very much a WIP.

 

 

Just a first render and test in sim.

 

 

Want to work together again?

 

 

I have a cool Texaco oil tanker ship...........

 

 

[Eight Ball]

:captain::clap_2:

[joey45]

How did you get it to work.?

 

on ma mobile

[crazyeddie]

Joey

 

You have to place the Bahrain folder with the skins in it into your Saved Gamed Liveries folder, it wont work if you stick it in the Model Folders in Saved Games Mods.

 

I have no idea why it wont work in the actual model folder, another weird DCS inconsistency.

[joey45]

I can't get it to work with my model.

 

on ma mobile

[crazyeddie]

Joey - Try this:

 

Bahrain Freighter into your Saved Games/Mods/tech folder

Bahrain into your Saved Games/DCS.Liveries folder

 

The skins are just four WIP that I am playing with inc a military one as default.

Edited November 18, 2018 by crazyeddie

[joey45]

The freighter works but when I try to do it with my fishing boat it don't.

I'll have another go at it after I do more work on Hermes.

[PhantomC3PO]

Has anyone had any success with this? I've only just found this thread and wondering if anyone has managed to get the liveries working for the Kuznetsov?