Making high contrast nav ball!

[OxalysResourceConsortium]

I had a few minutes to look into this and slapped something together for you.

http://puu.sh/6VLuF.jpg

Version 1.2

Source

How to use it:

1. Unzip into KSP root dir
   
2. Run the game. Enter flight scene with something
   
3. The plugin will save the default NavBall texture to disk at (KSP_Root)/GameData/NavBallTextureExport/navball.png
   
4. Exit KSP. Modify the navball.png inside above directory as you wish
   
5. From now on, whenever you enter the flight scene, that texture will overwrite the default version
   
6. To reset to default, simply uninstall the plugin. To get a fresh copy of the default texture, delete or rename navball.png in the plugin's directory
   

Changelog

1.2 - Fixed an issue that caused only a single instance of the flight and iva NavBall to be changed

1.1.a - Fixed working directory issue when KSP is launched by an external program. Folder can now be renamed and/or moved anywhere, as long as it's under KSP's GameData dir

1.1 - Fixed issue preventing NavBall texture from being changed if the vessel doesn't have an iva view

1.0.a - Now includes iva

1.0 - Released

Found a possible bug, after following your instructions loosely and installing it on my heavily modded copy of ksp 0.23 for linux (I have a mission ongoing that has a mod that is imcompatible with 0.23.5) I went to the NavBallTextureExport folder and there was nothing there. So I tried again, this time with a virgin copy of ksp 0.23 and just your mod installed. Same problem. Went to the debug menu and this is the only piece of useful info I found:

[Exception]: MissingMethodException: Method not found: 'UnityEngine.Object.FindObjectOfType'.

[OxalysResourceConsortium]

5thHorseman said:

Black on both the top and bottom just looked... wrong. So I've settled for black and dark grey. I like it. I'm now working on the numbers and started with the hardest one, hoping it'll get easier from here on out. Here's what I have so far. Ignore anything cyan as those are just marker lines for my benefit while editing, to make it easier to do on the bottom when I get it right.

I'm not sure if it was you who posted it, but earlier when I was reading over this thread I found a black/grey monochrome texture like the one in your post posted up here, but now I can't find it and I've gone over every page of this thread at least 5 times looking for it. Anyone have any idea?

[Superfluous J]

I'm not sure if it was you who posted it, but earlier when I was reading over this thread I found a black/grey monochrome texture like the one in your post posted up here, but now I can't find it and I've gone over every page of this thread at least 5 times looking for it. Anyone have any idea?

I think it was me. In the following post I say "Here is my black and grey navball" and then have the black and dark cyan one. One of the problems with uploading stuff to my own site and overwriting things

Here is the best I have (not quite what is in that image), and I've updated that post. You have to rename it to just "navball.png" of course:

[OxalysResourceConsortium]

I think it was me. In the following post I say "Here is my black and grey navball" and then have the black and dark cyan one. One of the problems with uploading stuff to my own site and overwriting things

Here is the best I have (not quite what is in that image), and I've updated that post. You have to rename it to just "navball.png" of course:

http://pulpaudio.com/ksp/hcnb/navball_blackgrey.png

Do you have any of the previous versions? I'm looking for the one with the 10 degree intervals and was completely black, white and grey. I figure if it has no colors it won't interfere with the colors for any of the markers in the enhanced navball mod. I'm specifically thinking of the normal and anti-normal markers which are red.

Edited April 18, 2014 by OxalysResourceConsortium

[Superfluous J]

Do you have any of the previous versions? I'm looking for the one with the 10 degree intervals and was completely black, white and grey. I figure if it has no colors it won't interfere with the colors for any of the markers in the enhanced navball mod. I'm specifically thinking of the normal and anti-normal markers which are red.

Sadly I don't. I was just fiddling at the time and sadly didn't observe proper digital editing practices like having tons of layers and backups and whatnot.

[Tinyboss]

Thanks for making this tool, xEvilReeperx! Making navballs is fun. Is there any chance the tool could be modified so that we can reload the .png without exiting and reloading KSP?

Here's my minimalist navball:

I began by coloring the north heading red, since everyone does, but then I realized that east is more often useful, so I made that green. Then I got the idea to color south yellow and west blue, and do away with labels entirely.

Edited April 19, 2014 by Tinyboss

[OxalysResourceConsortium]

here's my entire log in case you need it.

[OxalysResourceConsortium]

downloaded version 1.1 and its working perfectly fine now.

[neamerjell]

My favorite custom navball:

I tried kbob's decluttered version and found that the yellow markers didn't contrast enough for me against the white background, so I made it medium grey.

Edited April 29, 2014 by neamerjell
Gave credit to kbob for my starting point

[Superfluous J]

...there's a trick from typesetting...

If someone could figure that out this would really be awesome. In the meantime, though, I've thrown in the towel on making custom colors and switched my navball over to using brown and blue similar to the stock navball.

[Red Iron Crown]

This thread really needs to go into Releases where it can get the attention it deserves.

[Navy4422]

This thread really needs to go into Releases where it can get the attention it deserves.

Agreed, OP, I would recommend starting a release thread or editing the original post after which you can contact me and I can move it.

[iFlyAllTheTime]

Omg, I had to post just to say you an awesome avatar pic Navy4422. That made my day!Hope this post doesn't break any forum rules and/or code of good conduct.Sorry if it does.

[Jorbrasken]

I think I'll give my opinion about each version.

-the ones with black and white: The black side is ok except for the dark blue node marker. The white side is not my thing because the yellow and light blue or light colors are difficult to distinguish in my case.

-Black and grey navballs: I think these are very good, but the dark blue node marker is the hardest thing to distinguish, both on the black side and the grey side.

-Entirely black with yellowish numbers on one side and blueish on the other side: This one is for now my favourite, except that I'd make the colors of the numbers and lines a bit more different in tone from one to another myself, but it's not bad. the problem once more is the dark blue node marker for maneuvers. The antimaneuver marker and the other markers as far as they are a light color, they are easy to see.

The best solution for me in my case is using dark backgrounds, light colors for lines and numbers and light colors too for markers, but the problem is the marker's can't be changed as far as I know.

So yes, right now I'm using the dark on both sides with yellowish and blueish numbers and lines, It's the one that fits me most. The ones with a grey part are not bad too, I'd also use them, but the one that gives me trouble is the ones with white background, just for light color markers.

I guess everyone has a diferent issue and colorblindness in it's own can manifest in different forms, that's why the best option would be to let us be able to pick the colors that we want for every element in the navball, backgrounds, lines, markers.And I'd even suggest letting us change the form of the different markers, so we could distinguis them even if they were of the same color.

[rynak]

I liked something from all the versions posted here, and disliked other things, so i ended up making my own frankenstein navball, taking ideas from all those posted already, and adding some own.

My navball is functionally divided into three zones: horizon, climb/descend area, polar area. Each of them is designed differently, because at least i tend to use those zones differently:

Horizon area: Free of any clutter. There aren't even pitch markers, because quite frankly, so close to the horizon, you functionally don't need them. Directions are readily available above and below, but the area where you're usually headed during level flight, is kept free, so that you can horizontally navigate without obscuring info.

Climb/descend area. Pitch markers from 30 to 60 degrees. Just three markers in 15 degree steps (30, 45, 60) - more precision would just look fancy, but functionally add useless clutter. Again, above and below, sky directions remain in sight.

Polar region: No one needs any precision at this angle, because: 1. There's no space. 2. There's no space. 3. You can't control very precisely at this angle anyways. Rather, all you care about is sky directions. What was east again? 90? 270? I need to know fastish! Nevermind that - just use big letters instead. The polar region thus is nothing more than 4 big letters, and a crosshair. One curiousity you can notice in the above pic though, is that not only is the north colored (red), but south as well (blue).

Pic for ingame usage:

http://i2.minus.com/i6Q5PMFxeG91P.png

Ultra Hi-Res source pic without antialiasing and smoothing - for editing only:

http://i5.minus.com/i28p95rrQ1Hiw.png

The whole thing was created in an exotic freeware app called "diagram designer" by meesoft. Probably no one knows or uses it, but in case anyone wants to edit it in diagram designer, instead of an image editor, drop me a line and i'll post the file.

EDIT: Reuploaded pics to 2img, because bayimg sucks.

EDIT2: Reuploaded pics to tinypic and min.us, because 2img sucks too.

Edited July 18, 2014 by rynak
fix broken post-Y2K internet

[blizzy78]

Ultra Hi-Res source pic without antialiasing and smoothing - for editing only:

http://image.bayimg.com/7cc0ce1814b480f1de02e927fcd92886412e7861.jpg

You should save that in PNG format. JPEG always has some compression and artifacts, reducing quality.

[rynak]

Umm.... goddamn image hoster - it converted that to JPG? I uploaded in PNG.... *checks* Bleh...

Give me a few minutes to look for an image hoster that doesn't suck.

DONE. See previous post - both the game and the hires pic are now in PNG - now hosted on 2img, who apparently don't mess with uploads.

Edited July 17, 2014 by rynak

[rynak]

Reuploaded pics again, because the previous image hosters apparently couldn't deal with the bandwidth, or they just plain sucked.

I'm considering some final tweaks, including contrast improvement below the horizon, and slightly increasing fontsize of the pitch readouts. However, i'm currently transitioning to 0.24, so it might take a few days for me to get to it.

[Captain_Brian]

Does this work with .24? Has it been recompiled?

Thanks!

I had a few minutes to look into this and slapped something together for you.

http://puu.sh/6VLuF.jpg

Version 1.2

Source

How to use it:

1. Unzip into KSP root dir
   
2. Run the game. Enter flight scene with something
   
3. The plugin will save the default NavBall texture to disk at (KSP_Root)/GameData/NavBallTextureExport/navball.png
   
4. Exit KSP. Modify the navball.png inside above directory as you wish
   
5. From now on, whenever you enter the flight scene, that texture will overwrite the default version
   
6. To reset to default, simply uninstall the plugin. To get a fresh copy of the default texture, delete or rename navball.png in the plugin's directory
   

Changelog

1.2 - Fixed an issue that caused only a single instance of the flight and iva NavBall to be changed

1.1.a - Fixed working directory issue when KSP is launched by an external program. Folder can now be renamed and/or moved anywhere, as long as it's under KSP's GameData dir

1.1 - Fixed issue preventing NavBall texture from being changed if the vessel doesn't have an iva view

1.0.a - Now includes iva

1.0 - Released

[xEvilReeperx]

Yep thanks for reminding me. Went ahead and updated it for 0.24.

[Red Iron Crown]

Yep thanks for reminding me. Went ahead and updated it for 0.24.

You should consider putting this in a new thread in the Release forum, where it can get the attention it deserves. My favorite navball mod, and I've recommended it to others who had trouble finding it.

[Superfluous J]

Yep thanks for reminding me. Went ahead and updated it for 0.24.

You should consider putting this in a new thread in the Release forum, where it can get the attention it deserves. My favorite navball mod, and I've recommended it to others who had trouble finding it.

Second. This shouldn't be a comment on a thread. It should be given the prominence it deserves. I'll re-reply to that thread with my images.

[Rabid Bat]

I agree this needs to go to the release forum, its a great mod, I found it a few months ago by accident.

[smunisto]

Yup, needs a thread. I needed to use google to find this thread after seeing custom navballs on some person's screenshots on another mod thread.

Also, all textures made by people here are great, but how can I get the "cross" effect as an overlay to my navball. I am talking about the 1px horizontal and vertical lines crossing each other at the direction marker.

[Alshain]

I would like to see this in a release thread too, and maybe reserve the second post for a compilation of user-made navball textures to make them easy to find.