Texture Formats used by CFS3

It is recommended that you read the “Texture Formats used by FS2002” document for a full overview of
textures generally and the function of Alpha channels.

CFS3 was a new departure in the series of Microsoft Flight Simulators.

A new display engine was created for it instead of the previous method of taking and enhancing the current
“Flight Simulator” version. This has many results including the total loss of any cross-compatibility (or
backward-compatibility) with any other version of Flight Simulator or Combat Flight Simulator. It has however
given the developers the chance to rewrite everything from the ground up in a fashion optimised for combat
flight. As to whether they succeeded or not…….

One feature of this total rebuild is that they have gone over fully to DDS (DirectX DirectDrawSurface) textures.
These are standard across a wide variety of games because they are the native internal format of DirectX and
can be handled much more efficiently by the display code.

DDS comes in many variations. The most common is DXT1 but it also supports virtually all the 16 and 32 bit
formats as used in FS2002/4. See the FS2002 Texture document for a full description of the various internal
formats.

Unlike other versions of Flight Simulator CFS3 also supports the DDS DXT5 (interpolated alpha) format. This
appears often in textures that require a more varied alpha (cloud textures are a prime example).

It also seems that CFS3 expects textures to be square. I haven`t really tested it but all the default textures are
square.

CFS3 differs from FS2002 in the way it applies Reflections and specularity. Whereas FS2002 used the Alpha
channel of the main texture to define transparency or reflection CFS3 uses separate “map” textures to perform
the functions.

In CFS3 aircraft the main texture is the one whose name ends _t.dds and is accompanied by one or more other
textures that define various maps to overlay.

Taking the B26 as an example you will see the following textures :-

B26c_t.dds DXT1 The main texture

B26c_t_damage.dds DXT1 A map of Damage “holes” to apply to the main
texture when the aircraft has been damaged on a
particular part
B26c_s.dds DXT1 A map of specularity (or shine) to apply to the main
texture in conjunction with the current lighting in
CFS3
B26c_r.dds DXT1 A map of reflection to apply to the main texture
B26c_ct_bw_xxxx.dds DXT1 A number of textures that are used to apply the
coloured bands (eg B26c_ct_bw_wingtop.dds,
B26c_ct_bw_tail.dds etc). These are usually just
black and white “cutout” maps that mask off the
areas to apply colour changes to when the user selects
a different “Paint”

As well as these pure texture files aircraft will also have a MOS file. This is a Mosaic file that provides all the
information for mapping the coloured stripes, wingtips, flashes and Noseart. It also provides information about
where to map “bullethole” decals when the plane has been hit in various places.
The filename usually matches the filename for the main aircraft texture For the B26 this file is “B26c_t.mos”
Important note about CFS3 texture handling

Unlike other Flight Simulator versions CFS3 has no specific location for textures. They may be placed
anywhere in any of the CFS3 folders and they will still be found and used.

This “feature” has given rise to much confusion.

People have repainted existing aircraft by moving the current main texture to a storage folder and replacing it in
the Aircraft`s folder with a repainted version. If the storage folder is anywhere inside the main CFS3 folder then
they find that the aircraft still appears showing the “old” paint.

People have tried to make different versions of the same aircraft by creating a copy of the whole folder for that
aircraft and then editing the textures. Again they are finding that their “new” aircraft appearing with the same
texture as the old one.