Sessions by FLIGHTGFX?

[flightgfx]

Hello everyone,


Some might know already, some might learn about it for the first time but I am superbad at coding
My entire life I have been fighting against lines of codes like nobody in the Marvel universe has ever seen or done.
I tried on multiple occasions to get more deeply interested in it, but it never fully worked out for me to the extend we can call it even a semi-victory.

What I am pretty good at, is the graphical side of things.
After multiple years of corporate design experience (mostly interfaces for mobile apps) and honestly, being tinkering with graphical development (2D flat design, skeuomorphic design, 3D, motion) my entire life. I feel pretty confident that I know a thing or two about it. Not everything, but enough to make it shine.
Many people helped me out with questions that I personally had in the past.
Most of the things that I do know are skills I gradually developed myself over the years with the help of online content and some good old "fingerspitzengefühl".
I have learned A LOT about many things on the Internet and YouTube and I think the time has come for me to share some of my knowledge to others.

Now design is like with anything. The subject is so wide that you can be a designer and know nothing.
My parent still think I can go be a system engineer at NASA because I know how to setup name servers of a domain name
Well it does not work like that.
For instance, you can be great at designing mobile applications but know zero about 3D or motion.
The thing that I always loved most (and it gradually faded out of mobile apps for the most part) is skeuomorphic design.
Meaning that your design is trying to replicate a real world object in a 2D environment aka a flat display.

Comes in aviation, that other passion that we all share here.
So I am mainly focussed currently on bringing better graphics to the flightsim community without using any complex 3D rendering software.
The reason is mainly avoid render times, complexity, steep learning curves and for the purpose not really cost efficient.
The results would be so great that nobody would buy a real airplane anymore
The downside is we would all be dead before 1 panel gets finished because it takes longer to model and light the entire scenes.
There would also be some technical code limitations so the 3D would not fully come to it's glory after exporting it.

Anyways, back to the main story.
I am looking for ways to share my design knowledge and was wondering if this is something people here on the forum interest.
So it would help you make your images of your personal instruments even better.
More consistent. More realistic and basically customizable in ways only a woman at an IKEA store would understand

But I need your help first. I have some questions up front so I can try to wrap my head around what is desired by the Air Manager community.

1. Is this something that interests you?

2. What software do you guys like to use?
I predominantly use "Affinity Designer 2" currently (I am not affiliated with them) for these designs because:
- it is still reasonable in price for non commercial users (without discount 74.99 EUR one time currently. But they often have flash sales.)
- It does not have expensive subscription models but is a one time purchase (with free updates in the VX.00 cycle)
- It's available on multiple platforms (you have to choose your platform when buying though unless you buy their all inclusive license which is way to expensive for non commercial users)
- It is vector based meaning it easily scales your work without losing quality (before export to a bitmap structure like .png or .jpg at least)
- It is very intuitive and has capabilities that go way beyond "Skinman"

And no, we will not be using "Skinman" due to the limitations of the software.
I know it's free but I want to teach you the best that I can do. Not the best "Skinman" can do.
Besides if I understand well, "Skinman" is specifically developed to create interfaces for plugins for DAW software packages (for creating digital music).

Although the techniques that I use can be applied to most design tools. But obviously things are named different in different tools.
Or things (masking and clip masks just to give an example) will work slightly different due to a different philosophy the software is build on.

3. How would you like to get this content delivered?
- In small chunks and tips?
- In an in depth complete course divided into sections
- On what platform? Do you want this to be openly available on YouTube so you can share and care?
- Do you want weekly smaller updates? Or just 1 complete course that you can grind through till it's done?

4. What are topics of interest? I mean, what is it specifically that you want to get better at?
Is it getting better at the use of effects, understanding of layering, ...

5. What are objects of interest? Like is there anything specific you would like to see come to live?
- An FMS
- A glider cockpit
- Something for helicopters
- Do you want me to show you how you make your own instrument visually even more interesting? Perhaps by downloading something random and push it to my personal limits and show you how I do it.
- Whatever it is, this is a great moment to comment, ask, reply or even ignore hahaha.

Many thanks for the help and hopefully we can all push each other's limits.
If you want to see a few snippets of my current work, feel free to check https://www.flightgfx.com

[JackZ]

Hi
I have been using Skinman for quite a while now and I think I know more than a couple of tricks to achieve pretty good results as well IMHO, for those who know my work. I am like you, attached to subtle hints like shadows to enhance the feel of depth in 2D images

But it’s always interesting to learn new tricks and I reckon that sometimes Skinman can be limited.
It has however some features which are really practical in our type of projects, especially the way to create tick marks for analog gauges.
So I would be interested in how you do that with Affinity Designer.

[flightgfx]

Hi Jack,


It is true what you say about the tick marks. There is not a single commercial design tool where you can create the gradations or radials or however you want to call it, like with Skinman. In any other tool it is "hecho a mano". Manual labor. No shortcuts in other tools.
Nobody with a single sense of sanity will deny that.

And the reason is logical if you see what Skinmin is originally created for. Designing faceplates for VST plugins replicating old school synthisisers.
Now I am not here to tell anyone anything. I am just here to show how I do things and try to make people better in what they are doing design related. I also understand this might not be for everyone.

You could still use Skinman to create the tickmarks and import them into any other vector based design tool. But I don't think Skinman can export in any vector format. Correct me if I am wrong. The fact that Skinman has no active development, already keeps me away from the software. I am not here to advocate for anything because a tool is usually just a tool. The principles of skeuomarphic design are applicable in any tool. You can just not use Skinman in a commercial production environment. You would never be able to work together with anyone else in a design team. But again. Anyone can use whatever he wants and I am not here to tell anyone anything.

The tickmarks is also something that can be done in code actually. They have zero effects on them anyway. It's usually the effects that create the layered depth.

[flightgfx]

Hi Jack I have noticed there is also this tool

https://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?/f ... ent-390616

Probably also a very nice way to do the tickmarks while designing the rest of the gauge in a vector base program.
I still need to check it out myself though.

[frumpy]

Thanks for putting effort into this and for your openess. I dont like skinman too much, as it requires additional software like Photoshop to make things look better. And is "Fingerspitzengefühl" a belgium word?

> 1. Is this something that interests you?
YES!

> 2. What software do you guys like to use?
Affinity Designer 2 for 37 Euros on sale sounds like a good deal.

> 3. How would you like to get this content delivered?
Youtube tutorials, not too fast. I like Ralphs tutorials with Skinman, see and do and listen to funky music *g*. How you organize that would be up to you. I am interested in:
1. Intro to Affinity Designer with the basic understanding of how things work. I would use iOS, but Windows would be okay too.
1.1. Intro to drawing and scaling a form; how to line up things geometrically
1.2 Transparency
1.3 Pointers, digital readouts
1.4 Materials / rougher surfaces
1.5 possibilities of conversion to night lighting
1.6 using own fonts
1.7 creating scales and operating ranges, like green band for airspeed
1.8. Lighting: is it possible to create graphics with analogue lighting?
1.9 Shadows: is it possible to have a moving shadow e.g. under a pointer?
1.10 is it possible to import other graphics/photos and use them as a blueprint in the background or use them directly?
1.11 Effects
1.12 layers
1.13 tbc...

2. Example of creating a panel background with dashboard

3. Complete example of the creation of the graphics of a simple analog gauge, like airspeed

4. Creation of the graphics of a gauge with glass, like ADI or FMS; does not need to be complete

2, 3 and 4 would all use the tricks mentioned in 1.

> Do you want me to show you how you make your own instrument visually even more interesting? Perhaps by downloading something random and push it to my personal limits and show you how I do it.

Sure, push it to the max!



@JackZ: Did you ever publish that B58 Panel? It's very pretty, I'd like to use it for my sim.

[flightgfx]

Fingerspitzengefühl" a belgium word?

In Belgium we normally only use:

- beer
- chocolat
- fries
- and bicky burgers

So sometimes if you want to look smart you need to borrow some with your neighbourgs

Your message almost beat mine in lenght haha. Thanks!
I will take a more close look at it after I have seen some actual daylight, but this is definitely some stuff we can go by.

In regards of the price for Affinity. Yes! Their current offer is pretty flashy. I have the multi platform license.
Now I do have to tell you that I was using Affinity on Mac M2 Sonoma and I had a lot of issues. Actually I had a lot of issues with anything on Sonoma. I just rolled back to Ventura but didn't test it there yet. A lot of people are complaining with Sonoma since day one. So I just want that being said.
There are still some issues with that entire M chip story I think.

On the other hand. It is less of a problem when in training and not in actual production. But I don't want to lie to you. A lot of creative apps seem to have issues under Sonoma.
Premiere pro seems to be a paved road to hell if I read online.

There is also a free trial I believe for Mac. 30 days full version if I remember. So please give that a run first.
I had a lot of problems with e.g irrisponsiveness of software.
Often I could not even drag a guide from the rulers to my canvas. Very annoying if you need them 100 times a day.

But thanks for your help!

[JackZ]

@JackZ: Did you ever publish that B58 Panel? It's very pretty, I'd like to use it for my sim.

Thank you. Actually no. Some of the individual instruments were published on the store a long time ago until the submission process changed a year or two ago. I tried to submit an instrument one day and it got rejected again and again because of reasons I am still scratching my head for. And I found out that some of my designs were, strangely enough, « borrowed » for payware.
I eventually gave up on submitting any gauge, and this one is no exception. But I can send you a Siff file if you want, it’s gonna be simpler for me. Allow me a couple of days as I’m away from my computer, send me an MP

[Ralph]

What payware do you mean @JackZ?

[flightgfx]

I think we can consider this project as "not gonna happen" due to not enough interest.
It's not worth the countless hours of work to produce if there is little to no interest.

The following is gonna sounds stupid in that regard but still,...
Thanks for the input that was given though

[frumpy]

Well, perhaps in winter? I am having my head at too many places, and now in summer I'd rather go hiking or biking or hanging out with friends and beer or combine all of the above
I mean just look at the airliner panels by BW901, brilliant work with countless hours in it and still very little feedback.
I feel AM will be around for the next years and beyond, and quality of gauges and panels will increase over time. So perhaps you feel this may be a winter project, if not - I am sure you'll find something else thats worth the effort.