Default rolling stock

[longiron]

I say that knowing full-well how much easier TSM is to use than all others...I truely LIKE TSM...Abacus, not so much.

TSM is owned by someone else, Abacus only distributes it for a cut. That's why it's worth the outreach effort.

[kingconrail76]

TSM is owned by someone else, Abacus only distributes it for a cut.

According to my License Agreement, Abacus owns the "Rights" to TSM.
Quote of the License Agreement:

" Train Sim Modeler License Agreement
Your purchase of a Registration Key is a license to use this
software subject to the following restrictions:
1. You agree not to distribute a registered copy of Train
Sim Modeler to any other person or entity.
2. You may make as an unlimited number of 3D scenery objects
and/or trains.
3. You may distribute the 3D scenery objects and trains made
with Train Sim Modeler subject to all of the following:
a. You own the copyright to the original visual model or
you have permission from the copyright holder to
distribute the computer files containing the representations
of these objects and/or trains.
b. You are not selling, bartering or trading the computer files
representing these objects and/or trains.

Thanks from Abacus "

[kingconrail76]

TSM is owned by someone else, Abacus only distributes it for a cut. That's why it's worth the outreach effort.

You edited your comment since I posted, or I would have addressed that comment;

This thinking baffles me: You say Abacus is just the distributor, BUT it is worth the effort to ask a "distributor" to "create" a new 3D Modeling software, based on Software owned by someone else, who abandoned that Software on March 13, 2002.



.

[wacampbell]

I've said it from day one...until there are "Editors and Tools", ORTS is nothing more than MSTS eye-candy.

Agreed. The editor and tools are planned and progressing at hobby pace.

Efforts to provide these "plug-ins" for Blender (or even better, 3D Crafter) should have been made a very long time ago...but the ORTS team said it was not important.

... more like not the highest priority at the time. We had and still have a lot of foundational work to do. ( BTW, Blender plugins are done, just not released for reasons below )

How can we (the Content Creators) build "ORTS Default" equipment, if we don't have the Tools to do so? How can we implement "effects" or "Physics" when we don't know what they are?

Agreed, you can't. And its because these details haven't solidified enough to release. We have advanced physics and advanced graphics, but there still work to be done on just how we will implement them, what the file formats and data configuration will look like.

...it's all been an aks-baskwerds adventure if you ask me.

Thats seems pretty harsh. We are a group having fun, and sharing what we are doing for those who are interested.

[kox]

We are talking about ambient occulsion and other shader (lighting effects) that can make models appear more 3D and realistic. All work best with Shader Model 3.0

See these threads for the other ideas

Real time ambient occlusion? Why? it's more efficient if the modellers bake those to textures. It's better quality (raytracing) and the modelers need to make it just one time, and don't need any resources during the gameplay, while real time AO does.

BTW those experiment sound nice, just we cant't see the images since that forum needs registration to view

[wacampbell]

Real time ambient occlusion? Why?

No, Chris is refering to 'baked AO'. Even baked AO can benefit from shader support since the UV mapping of the AO layer is often different than the UV mapping of the color layer. Consider a brick building textured with a repeating brick pattern. Although the color layer repeats, the AO layer probably does not. So it would be normal for it to have a separate UV map to enable it to stretch across the full width of the wall or perhaps the entire structure. This separate UV mapping requires shader support, and that is what Chris referred to.

[lindsayts]

I've said it from day one...until there are "Editors and Tools", ORTS is nothing more than MSTS eye-candy.

One must remember a train sim is different things to different people, while it is clear some think OR is still just MSTS "eye candy" to some of us its a major improvement. One aspect out of a number being the steam locomotive "phsyics" is a MAJOR improvement over MSTS, the water consumption in OR V0.7 is still a bit high but other wise the steam locos perform reasonably realistc. Another major improvement (to this writer anyway) is the ability to display a decent cabview with a far higher resolution so one can get a much more realistic driving enviroment.

MANY THANKS to longiron for the information, its greatly appreciated by at least this writer.

Lindsay

[kox]

That is very rare when a diffuse texture is repeating, i can't say any example where it is useful, and AO is needed. For example for a brick wall, the AO isn't needed because it's very... flat. And if you need to stretch the AO texture anyway what is the advantage, over repeating the colors in GIMP/PS, and combine it with AO? All textures have lossless or lossy compression, and the compressors can reduce the size of textures efficiently if there are repeating patterns in them.

I've done a little test with my loco's textures. I've exported the main texture (full body of loco excluding the bogies) to PNg with highest compression it have 4096*4096 resolution:

Color texture only: 19,7 Mbytes
Ambient occlusion texture only: 3,25 Mbytes
Color+Ambient occlusion combined: 22,2 Mbytes

[OTTODAD]

Another major improvement (to this writer anyway) is the ability to display a decent cabview with a far higher resolution so one can get a much more realistic driving environment.

You mean like this: https://www.otto-wipfel.co.uk/video/...9-cab-view.wmv

Alt-Enter to view Full-Screen.

That's the cab of my favorite US Dash-9 in Railworks-3, it's controls matching those of my Raildriver, radio chatter, moving map and a lot more.

The cab and headout cameras can be positioned to suit one's preferences !

O t t o

[seagoon]

....Is there a Train Simulator which can do better right now ?....

Depends upon your definition of "better" and what it encompasses.

BVE provides a "better" sound experience.
ZUSI provides a "better" rail-operations experience - and possibly "better" dynamics.
There was (maybe still is?) a South African beta sim of driving a Garratt which gave "better" realism when operating a steam loco.

BK

[seagoon]

.....Thats seems pretty harsh. We are a group having fun, and sharing what we are doing for those who are interested.

You've hit the proverbial nail directly on the head, Mr. Campbell.
That is exactly what a computer game is, and even more so when being created/developed in spare time and by volunteers.

Too many people take amusement way too seriously.

BK

[lindsayts]

You mean like this: www.otto-wipfel.co.uk/video/rw3-dash9-cab-view.wmv

Alt-Enter to view Full-Screen.

That's the cab of my favorite US Dash-9 in Railworks-3, it's controls matching those of my Raildriver, radio chatter, moving map and a lot more.

The cab and headout cameras can be positioned to suit one's preferences !

O t t o

Not really, the video shows a 3D cab and the compression of the video does not do the detail justice so its difficult to make a judgment.

Note the rest of the post below I have mentioned before (I think).

At this time I do not know if OR can do 3D cabs, what it can do though is to use much higher resolution images for the cabview background and the gauge needles (V0.7 does not have hi-res suppport for the general cab animations, hopefully this will be in the next version). It appears one can use as high a resolution as the program will except. In my experiments (I have at this stage done 5 hi-res cabviews, Note 1) have found there was little advantage in going above 2048x1280 for the cab background, at this resolution one can CLEARLY read the gauges and makes the cabview quite realistic. I found for the diesel loco cabview I did one could see the panel was flat and not on a slope which looked somewhat out of place.
One other aspect does improve the experience for me is one of my systems has 30 inch 2560x1600 monitor, at normal viewing distance this just about takes up my normal width for my vision so the cab looks much more normal size and complete.
Unfortunately I have no way to put up a full resolution (2560x1600) of the cabviews for general viewing, there is a number on a another web site but one MUST be a member to view them.

The standard MSTS cabs are a REAL let down after using these hence the activity below. The cabviews take quite a bit of effort to do as it is VERY difficult to get a real good cab photo particularly in most DE's and a lot of DMU's. A real good example here being the Bluebird, the cab in those being a real shoe box, it took nearly a 100 hours of work on the image to remove the perspective distortion.

Note 1: All australian rolling stock, 3 dieslel electrics being the Victorian Railways N class, 3rd series X class, New South Wales 48 class, South Australian Railways Bluebird DMU and Victrorian Railways H220 steamer. Currently under way is one for a VLine Sprinter DMU and also a sort of generic cabview for the newer style of DMU's using a streamlined front, this last being done in two versions one with a full width windscreen the other a split windscreen.

Lindsay

[haverfordwest]

Too many people take amusement way too seriously.

BK

Too many people take themselves too seriously, your greatness excluded of course.

[kox]

A real good example here being the Bluebird, the cab in those being a real shoe box, it took nearly a 100 hours of work on the image to remove the perspective distortion.

wow, with that amount of time, a practiced modeller makes a full 3d cab model with texturing

[kingconrail76]

One must remember a train sim is different things to different people, while it is clear some think OR is still just MSTS "eye candy" to some of us its a major improvement. One aspect out of a number being the steam locomotive "phsyics" is a MAJOR improvement over MSTS, the water consumption in OR V0.7 is still a bit high but other wise the steam locos perform reasonably realistc. Another major improvement (to this writer anyway) is the ability to display a decent cabview with a far higher resolution so one can get a much more realistic driving enviroment.

MANY THANKS to longiron for the information, its greatly appreciated by at least this writer.

Lindsay

No, what one must remember is the context and subject of THIS THREAD.... ORTS "Default" Rolling Stock.

You people are getting as bad as the RailSim/TS12 folks, constantly arguing how "my simulator is better than your simulator"...

Mr. Campbell; I'm sure you're a much smarter fellow than I am, but until I can see the fruits of your labors, I'm not buying them (figuratively).
-Without a way to create content, how are you testing these new Physics and Features that you are encoding into the ORTS software?
-It's an Open Source project (sorta-not), but you're "holding back" the tools to create content...?
Ps. Those are rhetorical questions, the ORTS team has already answered them clearly in the past.