Yes, I know Ive been away for far too long. It happens. The truth is that Im not really good with textures. The texture mapping is tedious and often needs to be done several times until you get a map layout which you're happy with - moving things around means moving where the images will be, so you have to change the image template as well as the UVW unwrapping. Im also not very artistic, so even with a good map, the final textures probably wont be as good as many out there (though they will be better than some Ive seen) but Im not comfortable giving my source models to someone else to texture for me.After a while I get bored and frustrated with it, and leave it for a while, and thats when other things come along which take my time, and sometimes I dont get back to this as soon as I would like - there is also the dread of knowing that when I do start on it again, I will be faced with whatever problem caused me to put it aside in the first place.
Having said that, I do think about it a lot, and I do try to get some work done occasionally. Ive always said Im doing this for me, primarily, so unfortunately its going to have to be at my pace. You may not realise it, but I too am dying to see these models in Trainz! I have big plans for them, script-wise and that will take time itself, so the sooner the models are ready, the better.
Over the last few days, Ive been playing with the 86 Class. At first (as always happens) it took me a few hours to get familiar with the process, and with the model again. I tweaked some of the conversion I did previously (I had recently converted the 86 Class from Gmax to Max, to take advantage of the new TRS2009 features). After that, I started finishing up the external parts - pantographs and bogies. I still have about half of the bogie to texture map, and I also want to add a little more mesh to give it some more detail.
I converted my Heavy Duty Cross-Arm panto to Max and textured it. That was fairly easy since the texturing is very simple on such a small model, then I took a copy of the Tangara's light weight High Speed panto, and started converting it to the Heavy Duty version used on the 86 Class. The base is done - it hasnt changed much - and I just finished the contact assembly (photo). All thats left for it is the arm, and adjusting the piston and animation (also easy), and then a simple texture and test fitting it to the loco.
Ive set out to create a standard for Pantographs. There has always been confusion about this, and its not easy to determine exactly how high the wire should be. Briefly, the Panto base sits at 4M above the rail, the wire is 1.6M higher (at 5.6M) and the base mounts on a 2m x 2m area on the roof of the train. Using standard measurements like this seems to work well, and allows any of my pantographs to be interchanged with the others, and they all fit as they should on the train. This will make it easy to create both a cross arm, and a high speed version of the 86 Class (for example) since at times, both types have been used.
File Version: 03
Poly Count: 816
Note: The poly count shown here is for the Gmax model in progress. The count will generally be higher than that of the finished in-game model since it includes duplication, tools, jigs, and other pieces which may not be part of the final model. It may also include parts which are generally counted separately, such as pantographs, interiors, or bogies. LOD modelling will be used to further reduce in-game polygons.
