HUD Customizability

[Devilish Dave]

So I've gotten to the point in the game, where I like to personalize my ship's interior, I know this can be done partly by buying little bobbleheads, but I want to change the colours of the menus and various elements on the dashboard.

I am familiar with some sites that offer these sort of services, however all it does it basically change the hue of the colours and in turn it changes things that don't look good elsewhere. So, I'm wondering, what's the best HUD changing mod out there, which perhaps gives me far better control over the colors of specific elements? As far as I can recall, FDev don't have an issue with this, and have stated that themselves? I also wonder, if they know this is a wanted feature, why don't they implement it in the settings? :(

In addition, if such a mod/program exists, is there also one that would shift between two presets depending on the situation? For example, dim the lights when you engage in combat or deploy your hardpoints? Would be cool.

[Un1k0rn]

I suspect the reason that Frontier hasn't done anything themselves is because for one, the community already has.

Secondly, and as you mentioned yourself, changing the colour throws a lot of things off. That tells me that Frontier would have to separate a lot of HUD elements to fix this as it's obvious the whole thing is one massive lump tied to a single hex value currently, hence the weird elements like barely visible character portraits. Perhaps they simply don't consider the effort to rebuild the HUD to be worth it.

The way that players change the HUD colour currently is a mod. It's not actually intended but as it doesn't cause any harm to gameplay in any manner, Frontier saw no reason to prevent people from doing this.

[Devilish Dave]

Originally posted by Un1k0rn:

I suspect the reason that Frontier hasn't done anything themselves is because for one, the community already has.

Secondly, and as you mentioned yourself, changing the colour throws a lot of things off. That tells me that Frontier would have to separate a lot of HUD elements to fix this as it's obvious the whole thing is one massive lump tied to a single hex value currently, hence the weird elements like barely visible character portraits. Perhaps they simply don't consider the effort to rebuild the HUD to be worth it.

The way that players change the HUD colour currently is a mod. It's not actually intended but as it doesn't cause any harm to gameplay in any manner, Frontier saw no reason to prevent people from doing this.

I would have thought the same and I'm no artist so when it comes to colours I can only apply logic. But if the colours blend when using these 3rd party softwares, but not when it is set to default, then those two colours are different. So the code to make those colours differentiate exists, but these tools don't pick them out and pretty much just generalize.

The tools I found have 3 different set of colours to change, but there are more than 3 colours used on the dashboard. I don't think it would be difficult for Frontier to make those accessible, or?

Do you know what mod it is? Perhaps it does a better job than what I've seen these sites do.

[madman]

To change only colors for most elements in the game, you can install EDHM_UI.

https://github.com/BlueMystical/EDHM_UI/

It doesn't change interaction with the server so shouldn't be considered as cheating. Just change colors in a smart way by modifying shaders.

[Un1k0rn]

Originally posted by Devilish Dave:

Originally posted by Un1k0rn:

I suspect the reason that Frontier hasn't done anything themselves is because for one, the community already has.

Secondly, and as you mentioned yourself, changing the colour throws a lot of things off. That tells me that Frontier would have to separate a lot of HUD elements to fix this as it's obvious the whole thing is one massive lump tied to a single hex value currently, hence the weird elements like barely visible character portraits. Perhaps they simply don't consider the effort to rebuild the HUD to be worth it.

The way that players change the HUD colour currently is a mod. It's not actually intended but as it doesn't cause any harm to gameplay in any manner, Frontier saw no reason to prevent people from doing this.

I would have thought the same and I'm no artist so when it comes to colours I can only apply logic. But if the colours blend when using these 3rd party softwares, but not when it is set to default, then those two colours are different. So the code to make those colours differentiate exists, but these tools don't pick them out and pretty much just generalize.

The tools I found have 3 different set of colours to change, but there are more than 3 colours used on the dashboard. I don't think it would be difficult for Frontier to make those accessible, or?

Do you know what mod it is? Perhaps it does a better job than what I've seen these sites do. :lunar2019grinningpig:

I think I let painter mode take over TBH. I do understand colour theory but also as just that: A painter. I was wrong to mention hex codes, my bad and I apologise as these aren't used in Elite's settings for the HUD. (Been a long time and I just use the vanilla orange now)

Anyway, I found this. It's not a tool that will do the job for you per se but this should allow you to figure things out: http://arkku.com/elite/hud_editor/

You will have to enter the matrix manually when happy with your experimenting.

Additionally, there's this thread that lists various values found by other players: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/threads/no2o-the-definitive-list-of-1-7-2-2-compatible-hud-colour-color-configs-please-add-yours.259311/

[Un1k0rn]

Originally posted by madman:

To change only colors for most elements in the game, you can install EDHM_UI.

https://github.com/BlueMystical/EDHM_UI/

It doesn't change interaction with the server so shouldn't be considered as cheating. Just change colors in a smart way by modifying shaders.

It's not cheating at all, no. Strictly speaking there's not actually any need for a tool like that all, as it's nothing more than a fairly simple file edit. Simply put: The most basic form of game modding there is.

[Devilish Dave]

Originally posted by Un1k0rn:

Originally posted by madman:

To change only colors for most elements in the game, you can install EDHM_UI.

https://github.com/BlueMystical/EDHM_UI/

It doesn't change interaction with the server so shouldn't be considered as cheating. Just change colors in a smart way by modifying shaders.

It's not cheating at all, no. Strictly speaking there's not actually any need for a tool like that all, as it's nothing more than a fairly simple file edit. Simply put: The most basic form of game modding there is.

Yea, I found the file and messed around with it. Made some really weird looking HUDs, so I was wondering what exists, for the sake convenience and saving me time.

This is what I've tried first: http://arkku.com/elite/hud_editor/

And then I decided to look into the code to see if there's no way to have more options. I don't like how it generally changes everything. The compatible colour configs sounds interesting, I'll make sure to check it out. Thank you! :)

Originally posted by madman:

To change only colors for most elements in the game, you can install EDHM_UI.

https://github.com/BlueMystical/EDHM_UI/

It doesn't change interaction with the server so shouldn't be considered as cheating. Just change colors in a smart way by modifying shaders.

EDHM_UI looks nice and seems to offer far more options than these website ones. Thanks!

[Un1k0rn]

No problem. I regret my knowledge on this is fairly limited, and quite possibly outdated. But yeah glad you've got things sorted now.

Project Wingman cured me of orange fatigue. If you've played it you'll know what I mean.

[funkynutz]

Originally posted by Devilish Dave:

This is what I've tried first: http://arkku.com/elite/hud_editor/

That's the old way of doing it. It was better than nothing, but it's very limited compared to EDHM_UI.

[Devilish Dave]

Originally posted by Un1k0rn:

No problem. I regret my knowledge on this is fairly limited, and quite possibly outdated. But yeah glad you've got things sorted now.

Project Wingman cured me of orange fatigue. If you've played it you'll know what I mean.

Haha, there's absolutely nothing to regret, are you crazy?
I'm the one truly clueless.
But yea, since I found this website and YT video talking about it, but they were all 4-6 years old, I was wondering if there is something more up-to-date. I guess that package from GitHub is as modern as it gets, noticed they updated something this month too.

Originally posted by funkynutz:

Originally posted by Devilish Dave:

This is what I've tried first: http://arkku.com/elite/hud_editor/

That's the old way of doing it. It was better than nothing, but it's very limited compared to EDHM_UI.

Yea, I would just change it because it would blend in with my room and setup if it were blue or red. Which is when I got the idea, what if it would change from normal blue and then fade to red when in combat or when my hardpoints are deployed.

Very random wishes for the game, but hey, I've seen worse.