Palette Files

A .pal file is a 768-byte file (256*3) arranged as RGB triplets, one byte per color and 8 bits per color. When palette files are loaded, the 24-bit color values are loaded into the VGA card's color palette and the colors represented by the 8-bit values of 0–255 are defined. The color palette is 24-bit RGB color, and the resulting numbers that Flight Simulator works with (0–255) are indexed color.

The following table shows the general categories of the palette.

Color number	Function	Function 2
000–031	32-color gray shade run
032–112	Standard color runs (8 common colors)
113–115	3 water colors
116–121	Bright colors
122–127	Bright white run (landing lights)
128–159	32 panel colors
160–175	16 sky color gradient	32 panel orange color run
176–191	16 ground color gradient
192–255	64 texture colors

The Flight Simulator color palette is not loaded all at once from a single .pal file. Different parts of the palette are loaded at different times as follows:

At startup, the low 116 color are loaded from FS5.pal.
When a BGL PALETTE command is executed, the top 64 texture colors are loaded from the .pal file specified in the PALETTE command.
The bright colors, 16 sky colors, and 16 ground colors are generated internally by Flight Simulator.
At night, Flight Simulator replaces the 16 sky colors and 16 ground colors with a 32-color orange run used for control panel color remapping and world map view.
The 32 panel colors are loaded when the aircraft's control panel is loaded.

In Flight Simulator, palette (.pal) files are located in the Textures directory. Depending on the system, specific portions of a .pal file are loaded at a given time. Generally, the "bottom" 115 colors are loaded at system startup from Texture\FS98.pal. The BGL system's PALETTE command loads the "high" 64 texture colors from the specified .pal file (for example, Texture\Meigs.pal) when the BGL databases are executed.

The following list breaks down the components of the palette files.

FS98.pal—a 256*3 byte, 256-color palette file that includes:
- Low 116 colors, general Flight Simulator palette. 116 bottom colors used at system startup. These colors are loaded when the 2-D graphics driver is loaded. For the VGB driver, init_palette in Vgbcol.asm loads these colors.
- High 64 colors, used as hazing colors (to haze the lower 116 colors). Loaded as a BGL PALETTE instruction when no other high 64-color palette is available.
Meigs.pal—a 256*3 byte, 256-color palette file. This file is the Meigs texture palette; the 64 top colors are used. Contains colors for the Meigs/Chicago area database and its textures. The file is loaded by a BGL PALETTE command included in the Chicago database.
FS4.pal—A 256*3 byte, 256-color palette file. 14 colors from Flight Simulator, version 4.0, stored in 241–254. The file Vgbcol.asm remaps the colors using oldcol2mask and old_bright translation tables as shown in the following table.
Note: The file FS4.pal was only used in earlier versions of Flight Simulator that still had LOGOL scenery capabilities. This palette is used when LOGOL is being displayed to map the old LOGOL 16 colors.

Old	New	Color
0	0	Black
1	241	Dgreen
2	242	Dblue
3	243	Aqua
4	244	Orange
5	245	Gray
6	246	Mblue
7	247	Lblue
8	248	Olive/brn
9	249	Yellow
10	250	Gray
11	251	Lgreen
12	252	Red
13	253	Tan
14	254	Panel
15	127	White

The top 64-colors are loaded by a BGL PALETTE command in ELEMENTS_FRAME in the file Enviro.asm if LOGOL scenery (scenery_type !=2) is detected. The following table outlines the 256-color palette allocation in Flight Simulator.

Index (dec.)	Index (hex)	Name	Load source	Day/night effect	RGB values
0	00	Black	System		0, 0, 0
1	01	White 0	System	DDN	8, 8, 8
2	02	White 1	System	DDN	16, 16, 16
3	03	White 2	System	DDN	24, 24, 24
4	04	White 3	System	DDN	32, 32, 32
5	05	White 4	System	DDN	40, 40, 40
6	06	White 5	System	DDN	48, 48, 48
7	07	White 6	System	DDN	56, 56, 56
8	08	White 7	System	DDN	65, 65, 65
9	09	White 8	System	DDN	73, 73, 73
10	0A	White 9	System	DDN	81, 81, 81
11	0B	White 10	System	DDN	89, 89, 89
12	0C	White 11	System	DDN	97, 97, 97
13	0D	White 12	System	DDN	10, 10, 10 5, 5, 5
14	0E	White 13	System	DDN	11, 11, 11 3, 3, 3
15	0F	White 14	System	DDN	12, 12, 12 1, 1, 1
16	10	White 15	System	DDN	13, 13, 13 0, 0, 0
17	11	White 16	System	DDN	13, 13, 13 8, 8, 8
18	12	White 17	System	DDN	14, 14, 14 6, 6, 6
19	13	White 18	System	DDN	15, 15, 15 4, 4, 4
20	14	White 19	System	DDN	16, 16, 16 2, 2, 2
21	15	White 20	System	DDN	17, 17, 17 0, 0, 0
22	16	White 21	System	DDN	17, 17, 17 8, 8, 8
23	17	White 22	System	DDN	18, 18, 18 6, 6, 6
24	18	White 23	System	DDN	19, 19, 19 5, 5, 5
25	19	White 24	System	DDN	20, 20, 20 3, 3, 3
26	1A	White 25	System	DDN	21, 21, 21 1, 1, 1
27	1B	White 26	System	DDN	21, 21, 21 9, 9, 9
28	1C	White 27	System	DDN	22, 22, 22 7, 7, 7
29	1D	White 28	System	DDN	23, 23, 23 5, 5, 5
30	1E	White 29	System	DDN	24, 24, 24 7, 7, 7
31	1F	White 30	System	DDN	25, 25, 25 5, 5, 5
32	20	Red 0	System	DDN	21, 5, 5
33	21	Red 1	System	DDN	42, 10, 10
34	22	Red 2	System	DDN	63, 15, 15
35	23	Red 3	System	DDN	84, 20, 20
36	24	Red 4	System	DDN	10, 25, 25 5
37	25	Red 5	System	DDN	12, 30, 30 6
38	26	Red 6	System	DDN	14, 35, 35 7
39	27	Red 7	System	DDN	16, 40, 40 8
40	28	Red 8	System	DDN	18, 45, 45 9
41	29	Red 9	System	DDN	21, 50, 50 0
42	2A	Red 10	System	DDN	23, 55, 55 1
43	2B	Red 11	System	DDN	25, 60, 60 2
44	2C	Green 0	System	DDN	5, 21, 5
45	2D	Green 1	System	DDN	10, 42, 10
46	2E	Green 2	System	DDN	15, 63, 15
47	2F	Green 3	System	DDN	20, 84, 20
48	30	Green 4	System	DDN	25, 10, 25 5
49	31	Green 5	System	DDN	30, 12, 30 6
50	32	Green 6	System	DDN	35, 14, 35 7
51	33	Green 7	System	DDN	40, 16, 40 8
52	34	Green 8	System	DDN	45, 18, 45 9
53	35	Green 9	System	DDN	50, 21, 50 0
54	36	Green 10	System	DDN	55, 23, 55 1
55	37	Green 11	System	DDN	60, 25, 60 2
56	38	Blue 0	System	DDN	0, 7, 23
57	39	Blue 1	System	DDN	0, 15, 40
58	3A	Blue 2	System	DDN	0, 23, 58
59	3B	Blue 3	System	DDN	0, 40, 84
60	3C	Blue 4	System	DDN	0, 64, 104
61	3D	Blue 5	System	DDN	0, 71, 122
62	3E	Blue 6	System	DDN	0, 87, 143
63	3F	Blue 7	System	DDN	0, 99, 156
64	40	Blue 8	System	DDN	0, 112, 179
65	41	Blue 9	System	DDN	0, 128, 199
66	42	Blue 10	System	DDN	0, 143, 215
67	43	Blue 11	System	DDN	0, 153, 230
68	44	Orange 0	System	DDN	28, 14, 0
69	45	Orange 1	System	DDN	56, 28, 0
70	46	Orange 2	System	DDN	84, 42, 0
71	47	Orange 3	System	DDN	11, 56, 0 2
72	48	Orange 4	System	DDN	14, 70, 0 0
73	49	Orange 5	System	DDN	16, 84, 0 8
74	4A	Orange 6	System	DDN	19, 98, 0 6
75	4B	Orange 7	System	DDN	22, 11, 0 4, 2
76	4C	Orange 8	System	DDN	25, 12, 0 2, 6
77	4D	Yellow 0	System	DDN	28, 28, 0
78	4E	Yellow 1	System	DDN	56, 56, 0
79	4F	Yellow 2	System	DDN	84, 84, 0
80	50	Yellow 3	System	DDN	11, 11, 0 2, 2
81	51	Yellow 4	System	DDN	14, 14, 0 0, 0
82	52	Yellow 5	System	DDN	16, 16, 0 8, 8
83	53	Yellow 6	System	DDN	19, 19, 0 6, 6
84	54	Yellow 7	System	DDN	22, 22, 0 4, 4
85	55	Yellow 8	System	DDN	25, 25, 0 2, 2
86	56	Tan 0	System	DDN	25, 21, 16
87	57	Tan 1	System	DDN	50, 42, 32
88	58	Tan 2	System	DDN	75, 63, 48
89	59	Tan 3	System	DDN	10, 84, 64 0
90	5A	Tan 4	System	DDN	12, 10, 80 5, 5
91	5B	Tan 5	System	DDN	15, 12, 96 0, 6
92	5C	Tan 6	System	DDN	17, 14, 11 5, 7, 2
93	5D	Tan 7	System	DDN	20, 16, 12 0, 8, 8
94	5E	Tan 8	System	DDN	22, 18, 14 5, 9, 4
95	5F	Brick 0	System	DDN	28, 11, 7
96	60	Brick 1	System	DDN	56, 22, 14
97	61	Brick 2	System	DDN	84, 33, 21
98	62	Brick 3	System	DDN	11, 44, 28 2
99	63	Brick 4	System	DDN	14, 55, 35 0
100	64	Brick 5	System	DDN	16, 66, 42 8
101	65	Brick 6	System	DDN	19, 77, 49 6
102	66	Brick 7	System	DDN	22, 88, 56 4
103	67	Brick 8	System	DDN	25, 99, 63 2
104	68	Olive 0	System	DDN	17, 22, 9
105	69	Olive 1	System	DDN	34, 44, 18
106	6A	Olive 2	System	DDN	51, 66, 27
107	6B	Olive 3	System	DDN	68, 88, 36
108	6C	Olive 4	System	DDN	85, 11, 45 0
109	6D	Olive 5	System	DDN	10, 13, 54 2, 2
110	6E	Olive 6	System	DDN	11, 15, 63 9, 4
111	6F	Olive 7	System	DDN	13, 17, 72 6, 6
112	70	Olive 8	System	DDN	15, 19, 81 3, 8
113	71	Water 0	System	DDN	0, 58, 104
114	72	Water 1	System	DDN	0, 87, 112
115	73	Water 2	System	DDN	43, 112, 128
116	74	Bright red	Code	-	25, 0, 0 5
117	75	Bright green	Code	-	64, 25, 64 5
118	76	Bright blue	Code	-	0, 0, 19 2
119	77	Bright aqua	Code	-	10, 10, 25 5, 5, 5
120	78	Bright orange	Code	-	25, 12, 0 5, 8
121	79	Bright yellow	Code	-	25, 25, 0 5, 5
122	7A	Bright white 0	Code	-	81, 81, 81
123	7B	Bright white 1	Code	-	12, 12, 12 1, 1, 1
124	7C	Bright white 2	Code	-	146, 146, 146
125	7D	Bright white 3	Code	-	17, 17, 17 0, 0, 0
126	7E	Bright white 4	Code	-	19, 19, 19 5, 5, 5
127	7F	Bright white 5	Code	-	22, 22, 22 7, 7, 7
128–159	80–9F	Panel 0–31 /panel orange 0–31	Panel /code	Panel lighting
160–175	A0–AF	Sky colors 0–F hazing from greens to grays		DDN
176–191	B0-BF	Ground colors 0–F, hazing from blues to whites		DDN
192–255	C0–FF	Texture colors 0–63		DDN

Important: There are some important things to note about the colors described in the preceding table:

The RGB values are normalized; that is, the values reflect the initial values used, without taking day/night effects into account.
Color is affected by time-of-day; the colors get darker at night and brighter during the day.
At night and when panel lights are on; colors 128–159 are changed to a monochromatic orange scale. Then, the panel colors are remapped to this scale through the panel_remap_table used by the 2-D panel drawing primitives.
The time-of-day system controls sky and ground colors differently than the other colors; sky colors do more than simply lighten/darken in response to the hour of the day—they change through a blue-red spectrum to simulate dusk/dawn horizon atmospheric effects.
Bright colors don't dim at night; they remain bright. These colors are used for instrument panel lights and ground lights that are bright at night.
Note: You can also set "frozen" bright colors by specifying the last "N" colors in the texture color palette (upper 64 colors). You can used the FIXED_COLORS or NIGHT_COLOR_RANGE command to set up a fixed palette that won't change, regardless of time of day. For more information, see the Palette Control topic.