Creating my own liveries, or, the hunting of the KTX2

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Hello there. Firstly my apologies if this is in the wrong category. I find the plethora of options a little overwhelming.

Which leads me to my question. As someone of distinctly average intelligence, I’m wondering if there are avenues for me to be able to create and edit my own aircraft liveries in MSFS2024 as I used to in 2020. I should say these would not be anything like good enough quality for distribution and would only be for my use for screenshots and such.

In 2020, I could find the PNG files and make changes to them and via a bit of trial and error I could rustle up something adequate. But in 2024, the PNG files seem to be encrypted in something called a KTX2 file, and I have no idea whether that’s something I can open myself, or whether the encryption key or whatever is only available to licensed third-party developers.

I’ve found a few references on other forums and such to using Nvidia software to read KTX2 files but I’ve not been able to make that work; but I know that some people somehow are doing this because there’re a load of third-party liveries on some add-on sites.

Does anyone have any definitive advice on a) whether this is something I should expect to be able to do and b) what the process might be if so? (Obviously whether the process is achievable by someone of my level of clever I appreciate you won’t be able to judge.)

I’d appreciate any tips. I miss being able to customise.

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Yes it can be done but it is a lot more difficult unfortunately. That is why you see substantially fewer 2024 repaints available than you do 2020 repaints. Its really frustrating and sad. I am in the same boat with you, wishing I could make edits like I used to. Unfortunately Asobo seems determined to prevent most of us from doing it, apparently not acknowledging that one of the reasons for FS success over the years was exactly this ability that so many took advantage of, and allowed their files to be used by others in the community. Sadly, they seem determined to destroy this part of the community by making it so difficult.

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Ah, that is a shame. And yeah, it does seem really shortsighted. Customisation, you would think, should be a core part of a project like this. People are going to connect more, engage more and invest more in something they can feel is at least partially ‘them’. And livery editing was one thing available to those of us who aren’t smart with coding and 3D modelling and such, but who could at least daub at GIMP or Paint-dot-Net a bit.

Well, thanks for replying, anyway. I guess I’ll keep an eye out and see if anything turns up in future that might make it a bit more accessible; otherwise I’ll just fly what I’ve got. :confused: