Why is 0 0 0 black a bad color choice?

[Animal]

Okay, for the sake of spelling it out for new modders who have not yet a clue in the world what they are doing:

*puts on newb hat*
Why is 0 0 0 black a bad choice for a plane's color? Is it just ugly?

[Phoenix]

Its understandable.

A modder, going to try to paint for the first time or so, and wants a black plane. so he sets it to 0,0,0.

However 0,0,0 means that there is no colour at all, pitch black. It gives the appearance that there is a "hole" if you will. It will be darker than night!
Note Well: Real planes had the issue of being darker than night (not that dark though) so they were not painted one very very dark colour, but a lighter one.

If you look at most objects which are "black" you see they are not pitch black, and reflect some light, allowing you to see texture and shadows.

So I would recommend a low value of each colour, perhaps 20,20,20.

Actually this goes for ANY colour. don’t have a "pure" colour, have low values of other colours as well. this will make it look more real.

I hope this helps.

[Animal]

*newb hat*
Is there a proper place to use 0 0 0 black?

[Phoenix]

well,

on a plane? perhaps not. Not even the inside of an engine is that black.

[Animal]

what about using it to HIDE details?

[Taskforce 58]

Why is 0 0 0 black a bad choice for a plane's color?

Because 0 0 0 is as dark a color as you can get. YSflight renders shading of a polygon by making it darker, and if the polygon is already at 0 0 0 then it cannot be made any darker. That means a model with multiple polygons at 0 0 0 can have no shading rendered on it, and without proper shading it will just appears as a black hole instead of a 3D object with contours that you can observe.

I found that in real life glossy black surface tends to appear darker than a flat or satin black surface, so I usually use 8 8 8 for glossy black, 16 16 16 or even 24 24 24 for flat black. BTW rubber tires are not black, not even in real life. They are more like a very dark grey. I usually use 32 32 32 or even 40 40 40 for them.

I use 0 0 0 to simulate an opening where the inside is not modeled, such as the tail pipe or landing gear bays on a GAC level model, or the muzzle of a gun barrel.

[Shutter]

Haha, you know, I've had to say the 0 0 0 thing a few times myself, and I'm glad this was made. Stickied.

A note: tf58 knows EXACTLY what he's talking about. Keep it in mind.