Skin 4k Fw 190 D9

[Blitzen]

Here's an interesting one someone might be willing to try to skin ; labeled as flown by a Major Beim Stab ,possibly from II./JG4?

 

Edited August 28, 2019 by Blitzen

[SR603-Flowbee]

While waiting for Paganizonda to convert his beautiful War Thunder skin I thought I would crack on and do one meantime as I couldn't wait to fly this D9. As usual I used ICDP's superb template and then worked from there. I have created a new 4k Alpha base layer to build on and I hope you will check this out as I think it will yield nice skins.

 

 

https://www.mediafire.com/file/d1zy7u4lnalmuin/Fw190D9_Public_blue_12_v14.dds/file

Edited September 15, 2019 by Flowbee_603

[Yankee_One]

Love it and a masterpiece again

 

Thank you very mucho??

[E69_julian57]

11 / JG 54 4 amarillo

Spoiler

 

https://mega.nz/#!Nqp0UC6K!Vkf3r4AOyvnBJPCpYAhUehHLjMxJbhjbHEkFn9WiAro

Edited September 7, 2019 by E69_julian57

[Danziger]

Is this the official D9 skins thread? I do not see one pinned anywhere.

Here are some personal skins I am messing around with. Nothing historical.

Spoiler

 

Edited September 11, 2019 by Danziger

[sevenless]

On 9/7/2019 at 11:54 PM, E69_julian57 said:

11 / JG 54 4 amarillo

 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

https://mega.nz/#!Nqp0UC6K!Vkf3r4AOyvnBJPCpYAhUehHLjMxJbhjbHEkFn9WiAro

 

Julian,

 

this was Dortenmanns last mount with JG 26. I would be more than happy if you could give it a try.

 

 

[[DBS]El_Marta]

The upper yellow 4 and blue twelve are amazing skins. But I think the weathering is a bit too much. They look as if they have been drawn out of the mud recently. Think about the actual age of the planes when they were deployed in combat. Weathering is a great skill, but do not let yourself be carried away by it. Less is more.

 

Overall the sharpness is too high. Rivets, scratches and patina sticks out too much.

 

I appreciate the skill and industry of depicting the material and texture of the surface. But these planes look like they are 75 years old.

Edited September 12, 2019 by [DBS]El_Marta

[E69_julian57]

You're right
I put a lot of dirt on them 

Edited September 13, 2019 by E69_julian57

[Yankee_One]

5 hours ago, E69_julian57 said:

You're right
I put a lot of dirt on them 

 

AND I LIKE IT!!!!

[SR603-Flowbee]

 

On 9/12/2019 at 10:20 PM, [DBS]El_Marta said:

The upper yellow 4 and blue twelve are amazing skins. But I think the weathering is a bit too much. They look as if they have been drawn out of the mud recently. Think about the actual age of the planes when they were deployed in combat. Weathering is a great skill, but do not let yourself be carried away by it. Less is more.

 

Overall the sharpness is too high. Rivets, scratches and patina sticks out too much.

 

I appreciate the skill and industry of depicting the material and texture of the surface. But these planes look like they are 75 years old.

 

I totally get what you are saying as my son has the same opinion. However he has little interest in WWII and thinks the planes should look like the cars he sees in the street or the waxed planes at an airshow. Shiny, bright and washed on a Sunday. That is just what he likes and he thinks that is what I should be doing.

 

I picked out some original b/w photos at random. The first was literally the first one I came across. If you zoom in and look closely the shiny rivets, metal edge, reflecting fuel spill and dirt streaks and build up can clearly be seen. I almost immediately found more showing mud splashes as high as the tail plane and luftwaffe crew washing layers of dirt off a fuselage. I can only speak for myself here but I am not going to be motivated to create a skin (some of which can take me up to 85 hours or more - three weeks in real life) that I believe to be unrepresentative.

 

Everyone has different tastes. When there is a sharing of appreciation that is great but unfortunately I will only do skins that look right to me as I want the pleasure of seeing them come to life in this superb sim. That is what motivates me to put in the hours of research and digital painting. Luckily for you there are plenty of toned down and clean skins already included as standard with the game for you to enjoy.

 

 

As for,  "rivets, scratches and patina sticks out to much",  here again are a couple of  photographs that would suggest otherwise. Note how the light catches and reflects from the scratches and paint wear. Look at the rivets around the gun ports. Note how even though the sunlight is causing reflections of light from exposed metal there is very little if any shine coming from the matt paintwork.This isn't an opinion but a matter of fact backed up by photographic evidence from the aircraft of the period. Everything else comes down to personal preference.

 

 

Edited September 15, 2019 by Flowbee_603

[E69_julian57]

I Am of that opinion, in fact I try the opposite.
  that look worn, with semi-gloss,
There are times when my hand goes out and they look like tanks.

Edited September 13, 2019 by E69_julian57

[Madcop]

32 minutes ago, E69_julian57 said:

I Am of that opinion, in fact I try the opposite.
  that look worn, with semi-gloss,
There are times when my hand goes out and they look like tanks.

 

Well, as long as these tanks can fly, I am happy with them ! ?

 

More seriously. Do you know that during the final year of the war, the life of an aircraft rarely lasted until the first engine overhaul ? 

 

So I think, as a modeller, that the secret of weathering lies in subtlety.

 

Who can do the most, can the least !

 

[SR603-Flowbee]

Well thanks to the developers and the countless hours spent on creating the superb and freely available templates we can all have what we like best with a minimum of effort. 

 

The reason I started doing skins in the first place was because I didn't like how clean the original Il2 -  Sturmovik skins were. So maybe, if you haven't already done so, it is an idea to download Gimp or buy Photoshop and have a go at creating your own vision of what a WWII fighter looked like. It is a rewarding and creative pursuit. 

[SR603-Flowbee]

Out of curiosity I went back to the 190D9 Blue 12 to see what was up and the fact is that it is about as good as I can currently do. Then I thought maybe we aren't looking at the same thing. Monitor settings make a huge difference and I play exclusively in 3D. So I lowered the contrast 20 and upped the brightness 10 on the finished dds file and then cut the output at the lower end of the Alpha by 13 to increase the shine to a satin look. Now the plane looked more like what you guys seem to like. ( I'm guessing here as it could go way deeper. ) Here is what it looks like now - this took about 30 seconds to do.

 

 

https://www.mediafire.com/file/y6bwv2g08evk0xf/Fw190D9_Public_blue_12_v14_locon_hia.dds/file

 

Try it and let me know if this is closer to what you are looking for. I don't mind putting in a few extra minutes as long as I still have what I wanted in the first place.

[Danziger]

I always wondered why some of the skins look so wet. I've seen some glossy paint on early Soviet planes and apparently the Germans were polishing planes for a while. However, almost every British, US, and late war German and Russian planes I see in photos are very matt. Like the P40, A20, and P39 US painted skins are way too glossy.

 

 

Also the whole name of the game was to not be seen. I think a nice shiny gloss finish glinting in the sunlight would be the opposite of desirable.

Edited September 13, 2019 by Danziger

[SR603-Flowbee]

25 minutes ago, Danziger said:

Also the whole name of the game was to not be seen. I think a nice shiny gloss finish glinting in the sunlight would be the opposite of desirable.

 

Totally  agree, the early German helmets and planes were polished or used gloss paints and then everything went to matt paint in '42 to reduce reflection. The helmet paint also had sand added to further reduce reflection. I have one on my shelf.

 

I think the idea that planes were shiny comes from seeing them in Museums or Airshows were they are washed and polished for protection. I doubt that any aircraft would be shiny and clean for even a short time in a war zone. A few weeks on the road in a car is testament to that. Furthermore the prop wash has so much dust and dirt blowing back that it is blinding. This creates a sandblasting effect on paint. Mix in exhaust emissions with unburnt fuel and oil spray and leaks and the results do not point to a waxy shine. 

[FoxbatRU]

IMHO. The first seems to me more natural. On a flat monitor with gamma 1.

 

Скрытый текст

     Fw190D9_Public blue 12 v14.dds                 Fw190D9_Public blue 12 v14 locon hia.dds

Edited September 14, 2019 by FoxbatRU

[SR603-Flowbee]

Good work!  I really like the colour scheme. 

Looking down below now... 

Edited September 14, 2019 by Flowbee_603

[E69_julian57]

Spoiler

Update for an error seen in next post

Edited November 8, 2019 by E69_julian57

[sevenless]

@Julian: Wonderfull job on yellow 1 of Dortenmann. Now we have all his D9 mounts in the game: red 1 with JG54, and black and yellow 1 with JG26.

[SR603-Flowbee]

   really liking the skin.

 

You might consider making a version using RLM 63 Light Grey instead of light blue. Depending on whether you kept your template it should just take a few minutes.

   I know it looks too dark on screen... but different in game.

I read that the Germans ran short of light blue at the end of the war and started using light grey which kind of ties in with your Art Profile picture. I was curious so knocked up a version of your superb skin to have a look and liked the result. Anyway your choice.

 

I found I had to use 2 layers of color rml63, the bottom set to 100% Normal, the top layer set to 50% Opacity and Multiply. This gave a good color result in game not too glaringly white.

 

Just a thought - Love the skin.

Edited September 17, 2019 by Flowbee_603

[E69_julian57]

Hello  Flowbee_603
I think the color rlm 63 is a color used for higher surfaces.
The color that replaced rlm 76 was a 76 with more gray and green according to the ICDP template.
When you compare colors from different sources, there are quite a few differences, I usually use those of the template by retouching them a bit.
Look at the difference of RLM 76b

http://www.ipmsstockholm.org/colorcharts/stuff_eng_colorcharts_germany.htm

I'll make the change to see how it looks.

[ICDP]

There's a really great section on RLM colours in Volume 2 of the Gerry Crandell Dora books.  In it he makes a very credible claim that the duckegg RLM 76 (he calls it RLM84 Blaugrün) was not actually down to the LW using whatever they could get, but an actual mandated colour.  It was a shift from air superiority colours to ground concealement greens for obvious reasons.

 

 

Edited September 15, 2019 by ICDP

[E69_julian57]

Thanks for the clarification ICDP

 

 

 

 

Edited November 8, 2019 by E69_julian57

[SR603-Flowbee]

That looks really good to me and very close to what I got maybe a shade different but I really like it. Thanks, I am going to try it out now. Awesome! 

 

Ok, really pleased with the outcome and very close to what I had in mind although I used RLM 63 and you used RLM 76b. I use the RLM color chart that ICDP included but tend to pick by colour rather than number as the shades differ quite widely anyway and the ground crews did a lot of mixing . End result is amazingly close. Here is a side by side screensave to show what I mean. Great skin and Thank You!

 

Oh, and just in case anyone is wondering the left one was my rough knockup and the right Julian's v2.

 

Edited September 15, 2019 by Flowbee_603

[XQ_Lothar29]

21 hours ago, E69_julian57 said:

Thanks for the clarification ICDP

 

 

https://mega.nz/#!M3BDxAQZ!hXLgeN4tsnw-iQsK7GPVvLvu6g7F0jJYmYO5HiXiOUk

 

Julian need help for this

 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/j1jyia80wlwyq6l/no recuerdo como quitar este cuadrado de la rueda.jpg?dl=0

[E69_julian57]

Hola III/JG52_Lothar29
Tengo que mirarlo, no recuerdo como lo hice
Es para una piel g-6.
Creo que quite ese cuadrado del canal alfa.

 

Aunque creo en la última plantilla se corrigió.
Lo miraré más tarde.

 

Hi lothar
I have to look at it, I don't remember how I did it
It is for a g-6 skin.
I think I removed that square from the alpha channel.
Although the last template was corrected.
I will look at it later

 

 

Edited September 16, 2019 by E69_julian57

[XQ_Lothar29]

22 minutes ago, E69_julian57 said:

Hola III/JG52_Lothar29
Tengo que mirarlo, no recuerdo como lo hice
Es para una piel g-6.
Creo que quite ese cuadrado del canal alfa.

 

Aunque creo en la última plantilla se corrigió.
Lo miraré más tarde.

 

Hi lothar
I have to look at it, I don't remember how I did it
It is for a g-6 skin.
I think I removed that square from the alpha channel.
Although the last template was corrected.
I will look at it later

 

 

the black square of the alpha channel, I've removed it and it doesn't work.

by the way, it's for the skin of the G6 effectively

 

el cuadrado negro lo he quitado yo del canal alpha y no ha funcionado.. no recuerdo como lo hacia antes..

Por cierto, es para el skin del G6 efectivamente

[E69_julian57]

Estás utilizando la última plantilla
Hice pieles del G6 y no me aparece ese error

 

You are using the last template
I made skins of the G6 and that error does not appear to me

[il2ulrichhose]

On 9/13/2019 at 6:35 PM, Flowbee_603 said:

Out of curiosity I went back to the 190D9 Blue 12 to see what was up and the fact is that it is about as good as I can currently do. Then I thought maybe we aren't looking at the same thing. Monitor settings make a huge difference and I play exclusively in 3D. So I lowered the contrast 20 and upped the brightness 10 on the finished dds file and then cut the output at the lower end of the Alpha by 13 to increase the shine to a satin look. Now the plane looked more like what you guys seem to like. ( I'm guessing here as it could go way deeper. ) Here is what it looks like now - this took about 30 seconds to do.

 

 

https://www.mediafire.com/file/y6bwv2g08evk0xf/Fw190D9_Public_blue_12_v14_locon_hia.dds/file

 

Try it and let me know if this is closer to what you are looking for. I don't mind putting in a few extra minutes as long as I still have what I wanted in the first place.

unbedingt so weitermachen mich hat dieser Skinn so fasziniert wie kein anderer.Und ich habe Alle die hier zu haben sind.Meine Hochachtung für diese Arbeit.

[SR603-Flowbee]

Much appreciated, as I said I do not mind creating a lighter version with more shine as an alternative to the more Matt with normal contrast. I will make the same adjustments to the next skin I am working on. It might be useful though if you flag up which ones you want.  

 

Ich kann deutsch gut lesen und verstehen aber ich kann leider nicht so gut schreiben. Kanst du mein english verstehen?

[E69_julian57]

Spoiler

https://mega.nz/#!9yxzAKyR!PDEY7ZR0FliC4_hHzZPAONHy8X5ARsswtDJJQyx3Ivc

[E69_julian57]

Version 2
Lower surfaces in rlm 84

Lighter than version 1

https://mega.nz/#!t75C1A7Y!WiRZHJFiGYd-HyN-Y6dPjWM3s-cpJWm6BScIrPgGduU

[Danziger]

On 9/1/2019 at 4:48 PM, Flowbee_603 said:

While waiting for Paganizonda to convert his beautiful War Thunder skin I thought I would crack on and do one meantime as I couldn't wait to fly this D9. As usual I used ICDP's superb template and then worked from there. I have created a new 4k Alpha base layer to build on and I hope you will check this out as I think it will yield nice skins.

 

 

https://www.mediafire.com/file/d1zy7u4lnalmuin/Fw190D9_Public_blue_12_v14.dds/file

If you don't mind me asking, when you make your alpha do you start with a dark matt base and use brighter shinier weathering spots or the opposite?

 

Also, where do you guys find resources for paint schemes and markings and such? Are there any detailed walk-around photos of internal parts and such? I had found a great source for the MiG but I'm new to the German planes.

Edited September 18, 2019 by Danziger

[SR603-Flowbee]

"when you make your alpha do you start with a dark matt base and use brighter shinier weathering spots or the opposite?"

 

I make a generic Alpha Base first. This is for matt paint so it is a dark grey and then I add small scratches on top in lighter grey. Getting this right takes time as the Levels need to be set right to get the right amount of matt paint with small scratches appearing when hit by light. Then I make the skin. Any paint flaking, more scratches, bare metal, grease stains and fuel spills are just pasted from the skin layers onto the Alpha. The same goes for dirt, I just paste the layer ontop and into the Alpha layer. It automatically gets converted from RGB to Grey scale during the paste which saves time. If I need more or less shine I just select that part of the skin then move to the Alpha layer and keeping the selection on start shading with light or dark grey. Through time you get a feel for grey level and the likely shine it will produce. Any errors you can just erase with dark grey and redo. Also if you select and copy lets say lots of paint flakes and they do not reflect properly just lighten or darken as required before repasting into the alpha layer. 

 

Getting a good base alpha is all important otherwise lightening and darkening becomes an endless balancing act.

 

Also use the Alpha output level setting to keep things from getting out of control. i.e pure black creates holes so raise (or rather clip) output at the bottom to between 4-10.  To much glow in the dark reflection then lower or clip output levels at the top end to 226 or lower.  10-216 output level is a good rule of thumb to avoid problems.

 

I hope this helps and remember that no part of a skin is copy protected so feel free to experiment with existing skin alphas to see how they work. 

 

---------------------------------------

 

Hauptman Herber Nolter Gruppen Commander of II/JG301 was shot down in his White-12 Fw190D-9 near Halberstadt on 31 December, 1944; he bailed safely but sustained serious injuries. He died of his injuries on 13 May, 1945. Received the RK for his success as a bomber pilot on over 300 missions.( I think he received it on the 9th of May, 1945 before his death). Assigned to JG-301 in December, 1944. No known aerial victories.

 

As far as I can gather there are no actual photographs of his plane. The photographs that do exist of a White-12 of JG300 and JG301 and attributed to him were taken after being captured by the Americans. At this time Herbert Nolter was critically ill in hospital and the aircraft from which he had bailed was in bits. If anyone can find an original photo of his plane or of Nolter himself I would really like to see them. 

 

This skin is therefore just as speculative as all the other models, skins and artist profiles of which many exist.

 

 

https://www.mediafire.com/file/l2l94vt6ud6wjco/Fw190D9_Public_white_12_II.JG301_v7.dds/file

Edited September 18, 2019 by Flowbee_603

[Danziger]

Coming along. Getting the alpha sorted out.

Spoiler

 

Edited September 19, 2019 by Danziger

[Danziger]

Do bombs, rockets and other weapons not have any alpha or normal map? I just noticed they do not really look like they have any reflection.

[E69_julian57]

Package Fw 190 D 9 09/19/2019
Alpha channel setting more matte.
23 skins already made
Overwrite Files

 

Download in the first post

[sevenless]

I guess we never will see this baby in the game, however it might be worth a try as a skin?

 

Ta-152 H1, Green 9 flown by Ofw. Willi Reschke Stab JG301 April 1945

 

https://chriswauchop.com/2014/01/20/zoukei-mura-132-focke-wulf-ta-152-h-1-2/

 

Edited September 20, 2019 by sevenless

[Voidhunger]

37 minutes ago, sevenless said:

I guess we never will see this baby in the game, however it might be worth a try as a skin?

 

Ta-152 H1, Green 9 flown by Ofw. Willi Reschke Stab JG301 April 1945

 

https://chriswauchop.com/2014/01/20/zoukei-mura-132-focke-wulf-ta-152-h-1-2/

 

 

finger crossed to see it one day!