Interesting reading. Layers really are the key.

I imagine a paintkit to be the following:-

Imagine lets say 10 layers of glass all lined up on top of each other but separated by say a few inches each. The bottom piece of glass is the bare fuselage. The second is the fuselage painted, lets say white for this example. The third is all the lettering, both livery and aircraft name, exits, emergency stuff, you know. The fourth is the windows. The fifth is all the panel lines rivets and doors and so on. The sixth is the weathering, dirt, general aircraft 'muck'. And so forth...

So i want to paint the colour of the fuselage...i pull out piece of glass 2, paint it and put it back. i want to alter the weathering, using contrast, or even multiplying the layers by copying the original and adding more layers of the same effects, which darkens it and defines it more. so i pull out that piece of glass and change it or copy it then put it back.

Once im finished, i can merge all these pieces into one to see the final result. As long as ive saved all my work i can go back and edit some more if im not happy.

Alphas are another matter entirely and i found them most difficult....trail and error trail and error. Try and try again!

Simple really!!! But without layers i don't believe anything realistic is possible without hours of work. Layers makes it easy.

I started by altering reg numbers of the default aircraft then changing the hue of a colour on some textures of a posky 767. I soon realised by the advice of a few on here ( Gary Russell, he was an enormous help to me!) that a multilayered  paintkit and working with layers was the way to go.

Once the bug bites it bites hard. the pursuit of perfection (in my eyes!) took me on quite a journey and quite a few sleepness nites in my quest to produce some what i thought were good repaints....... 

They are all still on avsim and some have some impressive download figures (in my eyes anyway!) and i did get emails from god knows where for requests..

Id like to think i succeded on some levels and still had a hell of a lot to learn on others, but i learnt things and produced things i never imagined possible!!!

Firing up your repaints in flight simulator and seeing them before your own eyes is a good moment, uploading them and seeing several hundred downloads of it is a great moment, to see screenshots appear from others with your repaints is fantastic!!!!!

Actualy making the aircraft must be even better but alas i just dont have the time to even learn let alone do.

However, Never give up in the pursuit of perfection.

garryrussell wrote on Aug 14^th, 2011 at 12:32am:

Oh, never nknew that! to be honest, I've actually never even bothered to try a paintkit or layers.

garryrussell wrote on Aug 14^th, 2011 at 10:00pm:

Correction, just stating what I find easy.

There. I made a few edits.

Sorry to here that........but why not have another go

Just start with changing the registration or titles.....then perhaps chage the colour of the striping.

Build up in stages

A lot of folk get put off because they try too hard and jump too far in.

Give it a go, step by step.....you know where to come if you get stuck

Garry

You need to create a new layer and make a selection of just the area you want

Make the new layer a 'Multiply' layer and fill the selection with colour.

By being a separate layer you can adjust it without altering the base layer in any way.

It's usually the maps split into layers which makes it easier ang quicker to do a good job.