On flightsim.to there are plenty of liveries for the default Asobo planes as well for third party planes. Some have no indication of the resolution, some are marked “4k” and others “8K”. Some are marked “no mirroring”, others not.
I have a robust graphics card and am using a 1440p monitor at that native resolution.
Does it make any difference if I choose 4K or 8K liveries?
And, what does “no mirroring” mean? Is it not reflective? I don’t really notice any reflections on any planes, but I’d have to look more closely.
No, it won’t make much difference if you have a good card.
Smaller for smaller cards.
The mirroring is in regards to whether the textures are mirror image of each other.
When the sim came out, some aircraft could only have liveries made whose sides were mirror images, there was no other way at the time.
One side would be correct like DELTA for example, while the other side would read ATLED.
It is very seldom seen now
OK, thanks, @TheSevenflyer . So I guess, liveries marked “no mirroring” are preferable (more realistic).
Just so I understand, does the 4K or 8K mean that a display with less than 4K resolution will not be able to show all of the detail of the livery or that it will appear less crisp visually?
And is there any performance hit using a 4K or 8K livery vs. one not marked as such?
That’s correct, no mirroring.
Your thoughts on the 4K vrs 8K are also true.
More detail/crisp with the higher.
Obviously there must be some hit, with a good card you won’t notice much, if any.
I only have a GTX1070 and I don’t notice any hit
8K liveries are made by painters who haven’t yet adapted to the new ‘decal’ system. With this system you can have very high resolution decals where needed, and keep the resolution of the rest of the textures a lot lower, and it will look even better than the 8K ones (good example of this is the Aerosoft CRJ).
8K liveries add up fast, and especially if you have a GPU with limited VRAM, will cause unneeded load on the VRAM.
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Thanks for the clarification, much appreciated!!
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Thanks @N316TS and @TheSevenflyer and @MortThe2nd .
Is there any way to tell from the listings of liveries whether they are using the new decal system or not?
No. That’s not how it works.
It means the texture (=image) file used for the livery is 4k (4096 x 4096 pixels) or 8k (8129 x 8129 pixels) in size and has nothing to do with screen resolution. Also on a 1080p monitor you will see difference between a 4k texture and 8k texture if you’re coming close enough to the planes. Smaller details (such as rivets) will be much sharper on 8k vs 4k.
That being said, 8k liveries are a bit outdated, since there is indeed a better decal system in place.
They usually mention it, like 4k/8k.
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while the resolution is explained in previous answers, the non-mirroring is not exactly
there is another thing to consider when using these - they actually Add a new mesh component to the model and a new texture, so while this presents no problem normally IF Asobo/ms update the base model of that aircraft these non mirroring liveries would need to be updated. otherwise you would be replacing that newer model file with a modded older one
no big deal really but something you should keep in mind (they should still work fine but would not have w/e update was made)
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They usually mention it, like 4k/8k.
@Pieter1982NL - Thanks, but I don’t see any liveries on flightsim.to mentioning that they use the decal system, so I really don’t know how to verify which ones do. I only see mention of 4K, 8K, no mirroring or nothing at all about resolution.
Moved to #third-party-addon-discussion:tools-utilities as third party liveries are referenced by Topic Author.
@CasualClick I don’t think this topic should be moved to a third party addon / tools and utilities discussion section. It is more a general question about all liveries. I think users of the Asobo planes could also benefit from this thread, which would get more exposure in the general discussion section.
Understood, but most of the liveries available other than stock are from Third Parties, including the enhanced ones you’re referring to, hence it’s been moved. There are existing conversations about Livery building and an active Wishlist item such as the one below.
https://forums.flightsimulator.com/t/official-information-on-how-to-create-liveries-including-user-friendly-way-of-adding-them-to-the-simulator/306664