[Mission_bug]

With the prolific upload of start up maps from Kirby I decided that I might have a go at his South Vietnam map, here is progress so far.

I began by trying to add a few textures from Google to cover large areas of the map.
Here we see my ForestOne texture which I placed in the Midland 3 slot and found it covered
most of the land mass apart from the coast.



In this second image you see the second texture which is in the Midland 2 slot, I called
it VietnamFieldColours and used it on all the lower land mass.



In the third image I used a texture I named VietnamBrownArea, the idea was to try to get
a subtle transition from the dark forest to the sand of the coast, not sure I've quite got there
yet. The airfield is in the area of modern day Phu Bai, not sure if it existed in the Second World war
or in the early post war years but I'm working on the assumption that if it is there now it probably was
back then in some form.
The texture used here is in the Airfield 0 slot and is just called VietnamAirfieldPlainBrown. The runway is
from the map builder.



The following are images of the area around the airfield I've built to represent Da Nang,
again not sure when the airfield came into being but these were built to experiment
with setting up taxi ways and such.








This image shows the parked aircraft so I managed to get the taxi bit right!



The map is fairly basic at the moment but gives me the chance to experiment with
the building process.

There are a few things I need to know before it moves any further, could any of you
please provide answers to the following questions.

1: The textures are from Google but not to any particular scale, does that matter? I sort
of just took a shot that looked about right, to me at least.

2: The airfields and place names have been placed roughly where they appear
when I view maps in Google, is there a way to get these exactly in the correct location
or is it merely guess work on the part of the map builder? In this instance the features
of the coast helped with placement, but this will be difficult as you move inland.



3: There are textures available for airfields but these have two images on them, Imphal springs
to mind but there are others, what is the purpose of that and how is it done?

4: My airfield is just a normal image done in PhotoShop but I've had to use plates from the map
builder to make a smooth area usable for the aircraft to take off and land,
the surface is bumpy and un-usable without those, I have read about invisible plates in other
threads how are they created?

Wishing you all the very best, Pete

[VC-81_BOLTER]

You do realize what a can of worms you are opening? F4 Phantoms, A6 Intruders, A4 Skyhawks, F-105 Thunderchiefs we can really get going on this. Unless of course you mean the French period, which means F8F-2 Bearcats and such... In any event this sounds like a major project! On the scale of the Canvas Knights WWI project. Maybe some others will jump in?

[norm]

coughimposibletohavesupersonicpliainsingamecough

[Batbomb]

Vietnam yeah... B-52...

[Bombsaway]

I wont worry about nam era jets but the your map looks fantastic! Nam was there durring WWII so why not have this map.
If you release it, I'll download it for sure.
Thanks for your hard work.

[CzechTexan]

There are a few things I need to know before it moves any further, could any of you
please provide answers to the following questions.

1: The textures are from Google but not to any particular scale, does that matter? I sort
of just took a shot that looked about right, to me at least.

2: The airfields and place names have been placed roughly where they appear
when I view maps in Google, is there a way to get these exactly in the correct location
or is it merely guess work on the part of the map builder? In this instance the features
of the coast helped with placement, but this will be difficult as you move inland.

3: There are textures available for airfields but these have two images on them, Imphal springs
to mind but there are others, what is the purpose of that and how is it done?

4: My airfield is just a normal image done in PhotoShop but I've had to use plates from the map
builder to make a smooth area usable for the aircraft to take off and land,
the surface is bumpy and un-usable without those, I have read about invisible plates in other
threads how are they created?

Wishing you all the very best, Pete

Nice looking textures. I'll try to give some answers to your questions.
1. ?
2. Wish I knew how to do that too!

3. Pick an airfield texture you like from the "load" of any other map and copy that text into this map's load file in one of the 4 lines for "airfield". When in Unlocked FMB you can go in to "tiles" and look for airfield 0-3 and just pick one and place it on the map. These are just textures so you will have to place runway plates over it.

4. Invisible plates are also known as blank plates in Unlocked FMB. Best way for me to lay them on map is to make one or a few rows of visible plates the way you want them on the airfield.
Then I delete one row and lay down the "blank" plates next to the visible ones to get a rough idea of where to lay and how big they are. Add more rows to cover a large area like the airfield in your first pic. Be sure to delete the visible plates.

Good luck!

[US_GRANT]

You know what would be cool is if, since you got the taxiing part done already, would be to have acft taxiing into or, at the very least, in front of revetments rather than hither and yon. I know When we used to deploy, we never parked our planes all over creation, but rather parked them near or in revetments so they could be placed in "protective" spots to prevent collateral damage from flying debris from bombs.

[viking4570]

There are a few things I need to know before it moves any further, could any of you
please provide answers to the following questions.

1: The textures are from Google but not to any particular scale, does that matter? I sort
of just took a shot that looked about right, to me at least.

2: The airfields and place names have been placed roughly where they appear
when I view maps in Google, is there a way to get these exactly in the correct location
or is it merely guess work on the part of the map builder? In this instance the features
of the coast helped with placement, but this will be difficult as you move inland.



3: There are textures available for airfields but these have two images on them, Imphal springs
to mind but there are others, what is the purpose of that and how is it done?

4: My airfield is just a normal image done in PhotoShop but I've had to use plates from the map
builder to make a smooth area usable for the aircraft to take off and land,
the surface is bumpy and un-usable without those, I have read about invisible plates in other
threads how are they created?

Wishing you all the very best, Pete

re 1: An unreduced texture, that is one without ,2 ,4 ,6 beside it's name in the load.ini, covers an area 1600x1600m. So, whenever I make a texture from google earth, I make sure that the zoom of the raw screenshot is such that it can be cropped to 1024x1024 and be natively 1600x1600m. That said, if it just looks right, it should be fine, cause in the end that's all that matters.

2. When making the ed maps I always take a real map and size it to fit and superimpose it as a layer over the ed map, then mark the ed map layer with the locations. I do the same for roads etc.

3. Not sure as I've never worked with that one so not sure what you mean by two images.

4. I place all runways taxi, parking areas etc using a visible plate. Then unpack the actors.static and open the outBuildings in notepad and search and replace for the blank ones. So for example, search for PacSand and replace with Blank. Repack the actors.static and you're done.

cheers, -viking

[Mission_bug]

Hello everyone, the map is primarily intended for the French colonial era up to and including the Second World War,
however, it could be used to portray events up until the French withdrawl from Vietnam.

The intention was not to do US operations during the Sixties, no jets, that said if someone builds a Skyraider
for Il-2, who knows?

Thanks for the answers CzecTexan I'll give the blank plates you mention a go.

The airfield texture you see was used as you say, this is my image which then had airfield
plates added.



As you see it is composed slightly diferent to this image of Imphal you see here which has
been cut in half and the parts re-arranged, hence the question about the images.




US_Grant, the idea is to eventually have revetments as you say, I will add these at a later stage once
the airfield is finalised, much to research and learn yet.

Thanks for the info Viking 4570 I'll have a go with some of your suggestions.

Wishing you all the very best, Pete

[Rall]

I wont worry about nam era jets but the your map looks fantastic! Nam was there durring WWII so why not have this map.
If you release it, I'll download it for sure.
Thanks for your hard work.

I agree about the Jets but, he could put in the A-1 Skyraider.

[EasyRider]

Here is the method I use for working with the BlankFieldPlate while in the Unlocked FMB

(The link is inoperative)

Easy

[RealDarko]

The USN attacked french Indochina during last part of the war. Ki-43 are based there, so yes we can have WW2 action there. Also the french period should be fun, unconventional warfare with interesting planes, soon we will have the Bearcat and the Texan, If someone create a french skin for the Junkers we will have the Toucan.
Looking forward to this map!!

P.S. PM If you need help

[MrOblongo]

French Period would be great!

Spitfires, Bearcats, Toucans (Ju52), Criquets (Storchs), Ki43 (Frenchs) and so...very weird combination of aircrafts. Bad thing is that would be mostly air-to-ground scenarios.

[fabianfred]

To get the airstrips as accurate as possible.... as far as location and heading is concerned... I did this for my Thailand map.

First I made a detailed ed_map_01 ......by using Google maps ...terrain view.... using PrintScreen to take many close-up views of the whole map area.... more than 30 for the Thai map... then joining them together and erasing the map surrounds in Photoshop

This gives accurate views of the hill in the terrain, so that you can zoom in and see the shapes of the hills in the terrain map replicated exactly in shape upon the ground. Easy to find the exact location of an airstrip in google Earth then. In GE the position of old airstrips is usually visible from the air..... even if they have been long disused.... and you can see the angle they were laid at too.

If you have my Thailand map...then you also have the invisible Kronstadt Plate i made for it.... #17a..... by making the Kronstadt Plates visible....(Canons Channel map Objects causes them ALL to be made invisible)...... use the kronstadt Plate #17 to lay out the airstrip....... then select each Plate and change it to the #17a one by using your Page up or Page Down key

[fish]

Why is it the first post was oh no jets, and the next was no supersonic? Why couldn't the first thing out of their minds of been oh the French colonization?