Wednesday, June 07, 2006

Quick 86 Class update

While the Tangara is my favourite EMU, the 86 Class is my favourite locomotive, and I just cant keep away from it - no matter how I try to finish the Tangara... besides I need a break every now and again from one model, so I work on the other for a while.

Ive gone back to the outside, and left the fridge and interior back wall for later. Ive detailed around the doors and added a few hand rails, which still need to be tweaked a little - especially the one at the front, which needs a few polys removed - I figure I can get rid of about 80 polys without making it look any different, but its a painstaking process of eliminating verticies one by one. Does anyone know an easy way of removing redundant verts without deforming the mesh - kind of like a reverse "Mesh Smooth" ? I certainly havnt found it in Gmax yet.

Ive finally decided that the 86 will be payware, which means I have to finish off the web site that I have been playing around with so far - at least theres no rush, it will be a while before the 86 is finished. I havnt decided on the price yet, but it will be no more than five bucks. Just so as you know.

File Version: 72

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Payware!

All I can say is, 'nuff said. As you and many other artists have already said, payware is not so much a way of making money off the item, it's a way for US, as end users, to repay the author who put so much darned elbow grease into the final product, that perhaps his elbow is greasless.

You've got at least one customer in me, no matter which way you slice it. All I gotta do is find a method of payment that suits, and bobs your uncle.

Fantastic work as always, I'm STILL baffled at how the Tangara is Freeware (tis just so fantastic), and I'm looking forward to more updates from your neck of the woods :).

Cheers,
Raichase

Wylie said...

Thanks for the encouragement! I usually acknowledge comments in the blog, but wanted to address the Tangara question directly.

Theres a lot of reasons why the Tangara will be freeware, but not the 86 Class. The Tangara was the first model I started to build (ever) and I said fairly early on in the forums that it would be freeware... Thats before I knew what I was getting myself into, but its not the main reason - it just helps keep me honest :)

I guess the main reason is that I want to build freeware. I want to give something back to the community that has been helping me, but the reality is that there are costs involved, as I have explained before.

The Tangara is taking most of my time, but the research has (so far) cost very little. I can simply grab my camera and walk down to Central, and away I go. Theres only been a couple of diagrams that I have had to pay a small fee for.

The 86 Class on the other hand is not so easy to just go and photograph, so much of my research has cost me actual money, plus factor in the time and family things.

Im trying to achieve a balance between giving everything away for free, and being compensated or appreciated in some small token way for my efforts, so its likely that in future, some things will be free, and some things wont be.

It wont depend on what it actually costs me to research and build a model, but rather on how I feel about it at the time. Naturally all the little stuff will be free, but I'll decide on the trains and larger projects as I get to them.

I hope you're not as baffled now, but thats about as straight an answer as I can give.

Anonymous said...

I appreciate the explanation, and appreciate how you keep your word too (such a rare thing these days :), about keeping the Tangara free.

I'm already looking forward to some good payware from Cardiff Workshops (the Railmotors are something else!), and considering the quality from your end of the shed, I'm more than happy to sign up for your payware as well.

Well done as always (especially re: the lastest posts on the Tangara), I'll be watching :).

Thanks again,
Raichase