[Csantucci]

 _o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha, on 23 March 2013 - 05:24 AM, said:

If your route uses the MSTS default track you are safe.

Sorry, I don't understand well your sentence. The Bernina railway is narrow gauge, so it does not use MSTS default track, with the exception of Tirano, where there are both the narrow gauge and the standard gauge station.

[_o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha]

 Csantucci, on 23 March 2013 - 05:31 AM, said:

Sorry, I don't understand well your sentence. The Bernina railway is narrow gauge, so it does not use MSTS default track, with the exception of Tirano, where there are both the narrow gauge and the standard gauge station.

Sorry, C, I thought that your route was built using the standard gauge tracks, and your 'narrowed' them.
I do have the Bernina installed on some other computer, will you share your .sft file as well for testing?

Nice route, BTW, but a little sparse in scenery since I have not yet copied all those default shape files and such.
I have the Bernina in a folder that uses OpenRails exclusively, so it has not even the standard MSTS files and folders.

SOB is another nice Swiss route, are there any more?

Will try to "superelevate" the Milwaukee Road RMD next as it also seems to use custom track textures.

[_o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha]

By looking carefully over the ScaleRail track and its textures I found that the track is a little asymmetrical, the ties are not 100% centered to the ballast.
This shows a little in those tie plates when you hover really low over the track and move from left to right.

In my intepretation of superelevated ScaleRail there seems to be more Moiré patterning than in the 'flat' ScaleRail.

How can I reduce this effect, caused I think by overlaying textures?

I have tried to avoid 'Z-buffer fighting' by having each layer 2 cm above the other. Perhaps some not-rounded value is better since I eyeballed this first attempt?

Also, I think there are no actual .s files used to render the dynamic superelevated track. Everything is constructed "on the fly" using those LODItems and their "polylines" and "vertices". This means one can recreate the proper ScaleRail ballast contour and rail shape. One just needs to find the right measurements and texture file coordinates.

[Csantucci]

To Edwin: I must admit that apart the Bernina, the SOB and Vone's old Albula route, I haven't tried other Swiss routes, so I don't know what the situation is. There is a payware Gotthard route, but I haven't bought it. It's true that parts of the Bernina route have few buildings, but I preferred not to insert buildings not corresponding to reality. And there are large parts of the route where you won't see buildings in real life!

Referring to using superelevation and a specific .stf file in the Bernina route, release 1505 led to a further improvement: by defining 1000 mm as gauge the non superelevated track is no more drawn in the same track sections where also the superevated track is drawn. However after having done some tests I think that by the moment I will use superelevation only in some runs because:
- due to the fact that in the .stf file only one type of track can be defined, I have the standard track not only where other types of track should be drawn, but even in tunnels
- moreover in tunnels and only in tunnels non-superelevated track and superelevated track are both drawn. But this could be the fallout of some trick I used to avoid white stripes on the ground at rail joints.

On point 1 I hope that JiJun will make the miracle...

PS: I saw only today that I was requested to share the track profile that I developed for the Bernina Freeware. Here it is:
 TrProfile.zip (975bytes)
Number of downloads: 431

[_o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha]

I have updated my posting #72 with a more definite and accurate ScaleRail profile for use on the Western Pacific Feather River Canyon route.

Apart from the slight Moiré patterning, there is hardly any visible difference.
But what about performance in FPS? Does this eye-candy detract from performance?

[JohnnyS]

Quote

DBTracks, narrow gauge and UKFinescale profiles would be nice too!

Hello!

DBTracks track profiles for dynatracks are publically available from the DBTtracks website, the file format is .dpp. Is this format compatible with OR?

Cheers,
John.

[_o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha]

 JohnnyS, on 25 March 2013 - 07:05 AM, said:

Hello!

DBTracks track profiles for dynatracks are publically available from the DBTtracks website, the file format is .dpp. Is this format compatible with OR?

Cheers,
John.

No, John, the .dpp files are profiles for converting dynamically generated MSTS track into DB Track. If you have a model railroad, the dynamically generated MSTS track is equivalent to using a piece of flextrack to create some trackwork that cannot be achieved by using the track sections from your train set (or the MSTS/DB Track track sections).
The .dpp file tells the Dynatrax program how to create a custom piece of DB Tracks from a custom piece of MSTS track that was dynamically generated by the route builder.

AFAIK nobody has yet tried to create a "Default Dynamic Track profile" .stf file to "superelevate" DB Track. It is more complicated than ScaleRail still, especially the concrete ties with their contoured "troughs" that hold the tie plates.

However, using my .stf template anybody can try. I might even try myself over the next couple of days to "superelevate" my Scharzwaldbahn.

[JohnnyS]

Hi _o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha,

I suspected as much. Thank you for the info.

Quote

I might even try myself over the next couple of days to "superelevate" my Scharzwaldbahn.

I look forward to seeing your attempts at creating a DBTracks profile if you choose to do so. Good luck.

Regards,
John.

[dennisat]

 Csantucci, on 24 March 2013 - 07:12 AM, said:

....- due to the fact that in the .stf file only one type of track can be defined....

I can see this would be a problem with some UK electrified routes that use the 3rd rail. I have a 3rd rail electrified route with large sections of diesel operated non-electrified lines. UK Finescale has both types of track but OR would need to be able to tell whether a dynamic track section was 3rd rail or not.

Dennis

[_o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha]

With the help of the Dynatrax profile of ScaleRail Marc Nelson sent to me I was finally able to match my WP Feather River Canyon track profile as closely as possible to the ScaleRail dimensions.

Here is the file:
 TrProfile (WP3rd_SRv3).zip (1006bytes)
Number of downloads: 551

A few things still need to be sorted: LOD's for greater viewing distances, since I experience fatal buffer overflow errors if too much superelevated track has to be rendered in one view of a very long train or of a large yard. LOD's with less detail will perhaps help. Also, the shadows still play their game on the rail sides when the headlight in on.

Given that the older Dynatrax (version < 0.52) .profile files are humanly readable, and that a UK FineScale profile as such exists, it wouldn't be too difficult to adapt my .stf file to UK FineScale. DB Tracks' material and geometry specifications are in a newer .dpp file for DynaTrax, and those .dpp are not readable by humans. No doubt DB Tracks' Norbert Rieger will supply you with accurate dimensions should you wish to create a pixel perfect superelevation profile for -one- kind of DB Tracks you use in your route.