OV-10A Bronco mod by Split Air team.....and MORE

[EnvyC]

Just tried the delete/reinstall method and it didn't work, game just crashed.

[Eight Ball]

On 11/3/2022 at 8:33 PM, Frag said:

There was many changes to the editor in 2.8, so yes I guess it impacted its loading time.

The biggest issue is that all the textures are .png not .dds...hundreds of them

This not only impacts the Bronco itself but also the loading of all the other textures. Looks like DCS is really clogging up trying to load all these png's

I've converted them all to dds and it cuts the overall loading time for the map by a lot.

(I restarted the game between the 2 takes, the mission is just a single Bronco over Batumi, nothing else)

 

Edited November 6, 2022 by Eight Ball

[Hiob]

1 hour ago, Eight Ball said:

The biggest issue is that all the textures are .png not .dds...hundreds of them

This not only impacts the Bronco itself but also the loading of all the other textures. Looks like DCS is really clogging up trying to load all these png's

I've converted them all to dds and it cuts the overall loading time for the map by a lot.

(I restarted the game between the 2 takes, the mission is just a single Bronco over Batumi, nothing else)

 

 

Hi @Eight Ball

 which application and parameters did you use for the conversion? 
 

Thank you!

[Eight Ball]

18 minutes ago, Hiob said:

which application and parameters did you use for the conversion? 
 

Thank you!

I converted the textures from the main texture folder and the liveries manually with paint.NET.

Then I realised there was another 250 of them in cockpit/textures and decided to try with a proper converter.

This is the one I've used: https://www.xnview.com/en/xnconvert/

You cant select a specific codec tho, I think it converts to DXT3.

 

Just make sure you keep the same filename (by default it will be {Filename}_result. Change it to just {Filename}

 

Edited November 6, 2022 by Eight Ball

[Rudel_chw]

1 hour ago, Eight Ball said:

I've converted them all to dds and it cuts the overall loading time for the map by a lot

Hello,

Can you please  share the converted files?
Thanks a lot,

 

Eduardo

[Hiob]

13 minutes ago, Eight Ball said:

I converted the textures from the main texture folder and the liveries manually with paint.NET.

Then I realised there was another 250 of them in cockpit/textures and decided to try with a proper converter.

This is the one I've used: https://www.xnview.com/en/xnconvert/

You cant select a specific codec tho, I think it converts to DXT3.

 

Just make sure you keep the same filename (by default it will be {Filename}_result. Change it to just {Filename}

 

 

Thanks! That'll help.

Do you think there are other mods/modules with this issue?

[Fab8ball]

1 hour ago, Rudel_chw said:

Hello,

Can you please  share the converted files?
Thanks a lot,

 

Eduardo

even better if you could share a link where to download the complete mod with the converted files. It would be great help for anyone using this great mod, thanks a lot in advance

[Rudel_chw]

1 hour ago, Fab8ball said:

even better if you could share a link where to download the complete mod with the converted files.

 

That wouldn't be right, as the developer's download link includes a facility for making donations.

[crazyeddie]

If you recollect some of the earlier posts you will see that I described this problem way back in Sep and offered the .dds 5 files up for both the main texture file and the cockpit.

My aim was to see if we could improve performance and It did indeed improve mine, significantly, but only one other person responded so I removed the link to free up space in my Dropbox.

I still have that zip files somewhere if I can find it again.   

 

Edited November 6, 2022 by crazyeddie

[Eight Ball]

Here are the converted textures

OV-10 Bronco dds Textures

 

Contains:

- converted textures for the external model, cockpit as well as liveries

- new entry.lua

Make a backup! You shouldn't notice any visual difference for the external textures and the liveries. You may notice a small difference regarding the cockpit textures, they seem just a tad less crisp to me but I'm not even sure. You may want to use only the external textures and keep the cockpit textures as png, you should still enjoy an improvement with loading times.

Feedback would be appreciated since the devs are considering converting all the textures for the next update

[Hiob]

12 minutes ago, Eight Ball said:

Here are the converted textures

OV-10 Bronco dds Textures

 

Contains:

- converted textures for the external model, cockpit as well as liveries

- new entry.lua

Make a backup! You shouldn't notice any visual difference for the external textures and the liveries. You may notice a small difference regarding the cockpit textures, they seem just a tad less crisp to me but I'm not even sure. You may want to use only the external textures and keep the cockpit textures as png, you should still enjoy an improvement with loading times.

Feedback would be appreciated since the devs are considering converting all the textures for the next update

Good Job! I‘ve seen your discussion with the devs. Thank you.

Will test asap!

[Rudel_chw]

1 hour ago, Eight Ball said:

Feedback would be appreciated since the devs are considering converting all the textures for the next update

 

Hello,

Just tested it, and it is a great improvement .. this is a short video loading one of my missions, using the original Bronco Mod:

 

 

and this is the same mission, using your converted textures:

 

 

On all the different load stage times, the time from START to ROLE selection lowered from 27 seconds to 22 seconds, and the time from FLY to having the cockpit fully loaded, went from 69 seconds down to 3 

Also, the fps in-cabin went up from 32-38 fps, to 40-47 fps ... so, all in all an excelent imrpovement

Best regards to both you, @crazyeddie and of course @dikennek

 

Eduardo

 

 

[Hiob]

I don’t have a video, but can report the same. Significant lower load times, good performance (by feel, I didn’t do an proper A/B-testing), and no apparent decrease in visual fidelity.

I will keep the dds-files.

[Joe1978]

^ Yes me too. Thanks!!!!!!

[Ithronwise]

@Eight Ball With the dds files by Eight Ball the loading time and the performance are much better (no stuttering and fps drops anymore when I look around in the cockpit). Unfortunately the readability of the cockpit instruments is much worser than with the original png files. It seems as if they wouldn't be "anti-aliased":

With original PNG files:

With Eight Balls DDS files:

Edited November 7, 2022 by Ithronwise

[Hiob]

49 minutes ago, Ithronwise said:

With the dds files by Eight Ball the loading time and the performance are much better (no stuttering and fps drops anymore when I look around in the cockpit). Unfortunately the readability of the cockpit instruments is much worser than with the original png files. It seems as if they wouldn't be "anti-aliased":

With original PNG files:

With Eight Balls DDS files:

 

You're right. My visuals matches your screenshots. I wasn't aware of the degradation since I didn't make a proper A/B-testing. Perhaps you should tag @Eight Ball, I'm sure it can be worked out. All (most?) of the other modules also uses .dds after all.

[Ithronwise]

7 minutes ago, Hiob said:

You're right. My visuals matches your screenshots. I wasn't aware of the degradation since I didn't make a proper A/B-testing. Perhaps you should tag @Eight Ball, I'm sure it can be worked out. All (most?) of the other modules also uses .dds after all.

Yeah, I think it has something to do with the compression level of the dds files.

Edited November 7, 2022 by Ithronwise

[Eight Ball]

@Ithronwise@Hiob

Thanks for the feedback guys, I was afraid it would be the case. Manual conversion it is then

 

[Rudel_chw]

1 hour ago, Eight Ball said:

@Ithronwise@Hiob

Thanks for the feedback guys, I was afraid it would be the case. Manual conversion it is then

 

But @crazyeddie seems to have done this work already, let's see if he can find the files

 

[Eight Ball]

55 minutes ago, Rudel_chw said:

But @crazyeddie seems to have done this work already, let's see if he can find the files

oh right! Althought I assumed he also did it with a converter. There are around 150 textures for the external model, another 150 in the liveries folders and +250 cockpit textures.

And thank you too for the feedback @Rudel_chw, sorry I forgot to mention you in my previous post

[VR Flight Guy in PJ Pants]

Hats off @Eight Ball! The cockpit texture loads almost immediately, actually well before the briefing screen shows up. And it looks sharper too!

[crazyeddie]

15 hours ago, Eight Ball said:

oh right! Althought I assumed he also did it with a converter. There are around 150 textures for the external model, another 150 in the liveries folders and +250 cockpit textures.

And thank you too for the feedback @Rudel_chw, sorry I forgot to mention you in my previous post

Here you go - all in dds 5 format converted with paintnet, I think everything you need is in here, its what I'm using currently so it should be okay:  

Have just  added the few in game liveries I did have in the same format.  I only have 4. 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/1rpx600g4bdthpl/CrazyEddies Bronco dds Textures.zip?dl=0

Link above updated to include liveries. 

 

Edited November 8, 2022 by crazyeddie

[Ironhand]

9 minutes ago, crazyeddie said:

Here you go - all in dds 5 format converted with paintnet, I think everything you need is in here, its what I'm using currently so it should be okay:  This does not include the liveries, sorry. I dont use the game liveries so have not converted them, but I can do it if anyone wants them.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/qcr3eylrodnkwye/CrazyEddies Bronco dds Textures.zip?dl=0

 

When I follow the link, it says that the item has been deleted.  ???

Edited November 8, 2022 by Ironhand

[Eight Ball]

1 hour ago, crazyeddie said:

Here you go - all in dds 5 format converted with paintnet, I think everything you need is in here, its what I'm using currently so it should be okay:  

Have just  added the few in game liveries I did have in the same format.  I only have 4. 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/1rpx600g4bdthpl/CrazyEddies Bronco dds Textures.zip?dl=0

Thanks a lot mate!

Edited November 8, 2022 by Eight Ball

[crazyeddie]

3 hours ago, Ironhand said:

When I follow the link, it says that the item has been deleted.  ???

 

Sorry, link updated.