quote:

Originally posted by jarink:
This may just inspire me to finish off what I had queued up for the 15th and 21st Fighter Groups as well...

quote:

Originally posted by Bo_Nidle:
this was my first "published" effort:



And it took quite a while to get to that stage.

I never went into the air thinking I would lose.
- Cmdr R Cunningham, USN

quote:

Originally posted by Jesters-Ink:
Hey Joe, (sounds like a good title for a song) (I know, the old ones are the oldest), anyhoo on with my point . . .

The problem you have got here with IL2 and skins is the time line.
1946 or what ever you want to call it, is out of date. Considering the sim has been around for the best part of a decade, what was fantastic 8 years ago is really starting to show its age today. The models are quite chunky and the skin maps are not the best to work with.
Time and time again it has proved difficult to get the detail into the skin of your favourite aircraft. Take for instance the Spitfires Vb through to the IX not including the VIII, the skin maps are a bloody nightmare. Then you have the P-47 with its exceptionally annoying mirrored fuselage sides. It gets even worse with some of the early Yak, Mig and LaGG models. We have done our best in the past to get round these annoying maps and used some very clever ways too. In the beginning it is a challenge, but eventually it gets so annoying it isn’t worth putting the time in any more. The sim is also limited, it does not even have reflective textures or bump mapping, not that these would necessarily have helped with the above mentioned problems. The shame of it is we saw some progress at one point with slightly higher poly count models, but they seemed to back track from those almost as quickly as they were introduced.

This is what happened from my perspective . . .

I used to fly online every day without fail with one squad or another.
We devised new missions and ways to get ourselves killed on a weekly basis.
Skinning your favourite aircraft so that you could fly in your own unique skin (be it historic or not) was all part of the fun. It gave you a sense of pride so to speak.
But there comes a time however when you start to think, this is more of the same, then you start to question why the hell you are spending your life skinning and flying all the time.
So you make a decision to cut down on your flying and skinning time, then it gets to the point where you are not flying at all so where is the need to skin?
Sure enough you grow tiered of the whole affair and start playing Medieval Total War, cuz sure enough sticking heads on pikes never really gets old.

I still have an install of 1946 on my PC however and every so often I climb into the pit and throw it around the sky for a bit. Soon, the boredom sets in and I’m back to profile art or sticking heads on pikes again.

The age of the sim has also split the community as most of the “old guys” have moved onto other things. Those who are still around probably don’t feel like going through the tedious teaching process again, having done it over and over the past 8 years, so the new guys don’t get the help and advice they need to improve their work.
From this I see the gap is increasing from the old heads to the new and I don’t see this changing.

This is just my opinion from my perspective and no children or animals were hurt during the creation of this post.

Abraxa

My skins

quote:

Originally posted by Bo_Nidle:
I haven't been around in a while but I'm somewhat unpleasantly surprised to find that this thread has something of a "honking impatiently at the learner driver" feel about it.

I don't claim to be the best skinner in the world, far from it, but some of my efforts proved popular in some quarters and I didn't get to that level by having my initial efforts pilloried by the more experienced skinners.

Far from it in fact. I received advice and encouragement on this board to any queries I may have had, no matter how "noobish" (God I hate that expression!).

If my efforts had been derided the way that I have seen on here I would have quit early on.

As a reminder, this was my first "published" effort:

http://i19.photobucket.com/alb.../BoNidle/1stskin.jpg

And it took quite a while to get to that stage.

So how about newcomers get some slack and given helpful, constructive criticism.

---

Fire
IL2 tracks
Man CAN Fly!
New CWoS

quote:

Originally posted by Feathered_IV:

Anyone who is familiar with the Il-2 cockpit will agree that it needs a facelift. A worthy subject though. After all, if it wasn't for the Cementer we wouldn't have this sim at all.

Early days yet, but the details are coming along nicely.

quote:

Originally posted by DKoor:
It takes enormous amount of time and patience to make half decent job let alone something that really looks good.

The Wu is here to bring you Shaolin's finest...

quote:

Originally posted by R_Target:

THEN you get the world tour, the money, the groupies, and a video game based on your life.

Regards

Chris



www.europeanaf.org
www.flying-legends.net
www.mission4today.com
http://www.screenshotprints.com
www.screenshotworld.com

quote:

Originally posted by KRISTORF:

quote:

Originally posted by R_Target:

THEN you get the world tour, the money, the groupies, and a video game based on your life.

Bugger, missed that bit, must post my phone number.........

The Wu is here to bring you Shaolin's finest...

quote:

Originally posted by R_Target:

quote:

Originally posted by DKoor:
It takes enormous amount of time and patience to make half decent job let alone something that really looks good.

It seems that sometimes people get it backwards. FIRST you get the hard work and frustration. THEN you get the world tour, the money, the groupies, and a video game based on your life.

My Skins at M4T