Editing Extended Bitmaps

Extended Bitmaps and FS2000

Because of the undocumented extensions to the standard Windows Bitmap format used by the New FS2000 textures there are major problems when trying to edit the images.

Most Paint programs will happily load the 8 bit textures but will discard the Palette-Transparency settings and the Sub-images for the simple reason they don`t know they are there!

Many (but not all) Paint programs will load the 16 bit textures but, as well as throwing away the sub-images, they will expand the image up to 24 bit. This will stop them from appearing in FS2000 even as a normal bmp. I have yet to see a paint program that will let you save in 16 bit BMP format.

Although the "Aircraft Editor" that comes with FS2000 Professional will let you edit Aircraft textures successfully the only method currently available for general use on all Extended Bitmaps is to use the Bmp2000 program as a "go-between" with your chosen paint program.

This program allows you to load an Extended Bitmap in any of the variations and send the main image (or any of the sub-images) to a paint program. Once editing is finished and the edited bitmap saved out of the paint program Bmp2000 can be updated with the changed image, new sub-images created if required and a new Extended Bitmap saved out with all the "Extra" data restored.

Editing 8 bit Transparency

There are 2 ways to edit the transparency levels in the palette of an Extended Bitmap.

Neil Park`s "Bmp2CFS" program was the original program for transparency. Because it only works on the palette without disturbing the rest of the file it works perfectly without affecting any other "Extra" data. It also means it will work with "Normal" Bmps as well. I think it will only work with 256x256 bitmaps

Bmp2000 also offers full access to the palette transparency settings and saves out in Extended Bitmap format.

Asymmetric Bitmaps

Non-Square bitmaps can created in a Paint program and converted to 256 colour Extended Bitmaps with BmpExt. This can also edit the Palette transparency of converted (or already existing) Extended Bitmaps of any configuration.