Huge win for me in Blender

[CSXT Q-317]

I have been playing around in blender and scored what I consider a HUGE win. Just getting the darn practice model textured.

While not perfect, and a few adjustments need to be made. I am starting to gain some ground .

In this one, I fiddled with loop cuts and gave myself a small challenge in mapping with recessed windows and doors. It is far from perfect by any means but you win anyway you can.

Just figuring out the mapping at its very basic level took a day or two.

So I have learned thus far how to export the UV map itself. More practice is needed, but hopefully, by mid-winter I can start creating all the things I will need for the Ohio Division and The Branch.

I was one of those on the fence with Blender because it was intimidating to me. But if I can get this far, I think anyone can.



Screenshot 2024-08-21 231143.png

[CSXT Q-317]

Call me jealous.
I wish I could do this, but I honestly feel extremely overwhelmed with this program.

I am happy to see so many learn this program though with producing so much we have been missing!

Its been a bit confusing. Right now I am still trying to figure out the exporter. I ran a test and the shape is made I do the bit of editing and can not see in in Open Rails. That is what I am working out now.

[TrainSimJack]

Very Nice Job!

I was messing around with blender tonight, trying to follow a tutorial with no voiceover:


I couldn't get through the video, but I did see some solutions to extending a roofline, which I think you might like, so I'll share it here:
Make your first Low Poly House - Blender 4.2 tutorial (beginner version) (youtube.com

0:25 - this persons method of making a roof peak was different from mine, but I think theirs was more effective.
0:32 - they break the roof apart from the main model, allowing it to be scaled separately (I thought it was a clever idea)
0:45 - you can see a simple Scale operation (S) on the Y axis (press S, then Press Y and move the mouse)
0:51 - this shows the same problem I had when trying to extend the roofline down - it seemed impossible to get it to extend perfectly aligned.
0:55 - this person's solution was to "solidify" the roof, which then allowed "extruding" from one of the flat edges. I had to watch this section a bunch of times for the mechanics, even though the idea made immediate sense.

That's about as far as I got, and of course I didn't texture mine, nor did I get to windows!

I especially like your Roof texture!

Also as a side note, blendermarket's running a 25% off sale right now.

[CSXT Q-317]

I'll check that video out, thank you for the link btw.

. I decided to recess my windows and doors for practice. There is a lot of specific structures to a couple of route projects I have that simply have no match anywhere in the sim world.

To keep my wits about me with textures I created the UV map and utilized texture paint to essentially "label" the orientation as I am still not used to this UV Mapping because for some reason it still is confusing. So I run that texture paint and create a guide to save and edit externally. One cool thing I do like is I can take that mapping and edit while Blender is still up.

I have also been researching multiple UV Maps. I am not exactly sure if you can apply shadowing directly to the model via a layer or not.

I have still a long way to go myself. I ran a practice export of that basic shape and it did not export. It keeps telling me that the "Main" is not found in the scene collection. I have that to sort out yet.

I would like to get the hang of it better so that I can kick out a couple of projects to the community.

[superheatedsteam]

Well done with the win in Blender. The first one is the hardest.

The reference to MAIN is to do with the naming conventions for Collections in Blender. Collections are a way of sorting and organising your model as they become more complex but also used for the .S export.

This is covered in the instructions that come with the exporter but is also able to be viewed in the demo building UnionStop.blend.

In the screen shot below you will see a collection called MAIN and below that is another collection called MAIN_2000 which has the geometry called 'building' within it.

MAIN_2000 indicates that this building has a single LOD that will draw the geometry within that collection from 0 to 2000 metres from the camera. The .S exporter will only export objects that are within the MAIN collection. If you want LODs for you model you could put a high detail version of the model in the MAIN_0100 collection and a simpler version of the model in the MAIN_2000 collection so you have 2 LOD's that range from 0-100m and 101 to 2000m. Note those numbers I have used a just an example, as the model creator, you decide the number of LOD's and draw distances.

Create that structure of collections in your blend file, select the object or objects you want to export and press the 'M' key to 'Move' those objects and a pop up will appear. Click into the MAIN>MAIN_2000 collection and then export to .S from Blender.

blender_collections2.jpg

[wacampbell]

>> It keeps telling me that the "Main" is not found

Remember it should be MAIN in all uppercase letters. Same for all the MSTS/OR keywords.

[eric]

Looking good.

I'd say the first dozen objects are the hardest. You have to fully exercise all modeling demons and habits from previous tools.

What used to be one or two clicks in TSM or GSU can be several or many more repeated steps. Some of that can be fixed thru scripting. But learn the mechanics first, and deal with scripting later.

Sent from my SM-S911U using Tapatalk

[pwillard]

Looking good.

Remember to check to make sure that your MSTS Materials settings are looking the way they should... you sometimes need to make double-sure that the proper texture is assigned in that part of the materials tab.

===

Honestly, Scripting is getting easier now, since you can ask CHATGPT for things like "Chatgpt please make me a Blender Python Script that removes all existing materials" for example, and what you get back will likely work first try. Its best for repetitive tasks and such.


For example, while importing some models that originally existed in 3D CANVAS, it became necessary to fix some uvmap errors that were messing up the exporter.

So coding doesn't need to be very complex to be useful

import bpy


for mesh in bpy.data.meshes :           # for every mesh in the .blend file

    if len( mesh.uv_layers ) == 0:      #   if it doesn't have any uv maps

        mesh.uv_layers.new()            #     create one

    if not mesh.uv_layers.get('UVMap'): #   if it doesn't have one with the default name

        firstmap = mesh.uv_layers[0]    #     rename the first map

        firstmap.name = 'UVMap'         #     to the default name

​

[CSXT Q-317]

Thank you guys, the wealth of information that is shared here. I will definitely keep practicing and exercising new habits in.

But getting it that far I will say took a lot of trial and error.

The most important thing I set out to do is run through the process in smaller segments at a time. That way it was less overwhelming.

I will definitely keep that in mind about the MSTS materials stuff.

Additionally thanks everyone for the info on the MAIN issue.

[CSRX]

Call me jealous.
I wish I could do this, but I honestly feel extremely overwhelmed with this program.

I am happy to see so many learn this program though with producing so much we have been missing!

[eric]

I honestly feel extremely overwhelmed with this program

Indeed. There's too much functionality I won't ever use...

[CSXT Q-317]

Call me jealous.
I wish I could do this, but I honestly feel extremely overwhelmed with this program.

I am happy to see so many learn this program though with producing so much we have been missing!

Its been a bit confusing. Right now I am still trying to figure out the exporter. I ran a test and the shape is made I do the bit of editing and can not see in in Open Rails. That is what I am working out now.

[pwillard]

I *think* my document as well as the README in the exporter explain how it works... but see if you can explain the issue you are having.

https://github.com/pwillard/ebook-OR...C-Notebook.pdf PAGE 109

Also, I would recommend installing TSRE as it comes with a handy "shape viewer" option that is useful for testing your export.

[CSXT Q-317]

I *think* my document as well as the README in the exporter explain how it works... but see if you can explain the issue you are having.

https://github.com/pwillard/ebook-OR...C-Notebook.pdf PAGE 109

Also, I would recommend installing TSRE as it comes with a handy "shape viewer" option that is useful for testing your export.

I don't see it in Shapeviewer, I am obviously missing something, and it's probably simple. I'll go back through the ORTS CC book.

Essentially when I go to export it, I get the finished ok, I add it to the REF file, do the editing to the image and texture lines in the S file. But it fails to show in TSRE after placement.

But here is what I have at the end of the test export.
Screenshot 2024-08-23 163134.png

[eric]

Both the editor and Shapeviewer in TSRE v8.004 will give you some detailed errors or warnings in the logs if textures are missing.

For testing with TSRE SV, you can put the shape and textures together in a folder and it should render.

It will also attempt a relative path from ../folder to ../textures before failing.

[CSXT Q-317]

Both the editor and Shapeviewer in TSRE v8.004 will give you some detailed errors or warnings in the logs if textures are missing.

For testing with TSRE SV, you can put the shape and textures together in a folder and it should render.

It will also attempt a relative path from ../folder to ../textures before failing.

Goctha.

I don't see it rendered in shapeviewer or my test route itself. The shape itself isn't rendered.

Leads me to believe I may have to revisit the shape file itself.