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I am creating some simulation videos with the UP #4014 (Big Boy). It has a nice brass bell, but when it sounds... it doesn't move, because no bell animation was foreseen in MSTS. So I am thinking about adding such animation; the animation part could be called ORTSBELL. Is there interest in this? Is there someone which could add such animation to a loco shape, so that I could test this feature?
Bell animation
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#1
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Posted 19 May 2019 - 01:01 AM
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Posted 19 May 2019 - 04:32 AM
Hi Carlo,
I would be happy to download one of the locomotives from the resources and animate the bell, if you don't have a better offer.
Geoff
I would be happy to download one of the locomotives from the resources and animate the bell, if you don't have a better offer.
Geoff
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Posted 19 May 2019 - 06:15 AM
Hi Folks,
Yes - highly interested - just mentioned it in another post quite recently... I actually tried this before in the early days of MSTS - and it sort of worked - before I realized the animation would be linked to the speed of the locomotive - it was pretty funny seeing the bell slam back and forth when I tested it... I think you need the source code of a locomotive to animate a bell - so we can’t do it on the Big Boy - right ?
I could set it up during the week on my current project locomotive - I won’t have time today - then send it to you ?
How do we control the speed of the animation ?
Oh - missed Geoff’s post - that’s great too and should work as a valid test - perhaps he can do it sooner than my schedule allows as well...
The other things we still need to address with steam locomotives - if anyone looks at it or has any interest - is cylinder cock smoke effects synchronized to the movement of the piston/wheel rotation - cylinder cock smoke effect for articulated locomotives - and some type of retarding mechanism for when the drivers slip - there should be some resistance even when slipping to prevent infinite animation speed...
Regards,
Scott
Yes - highly interested - just mentioned it in another post quite recently... I actually tried this before in the early days of MSTS - and it sort of worked - before I realized the animation would be linked to the speed of the locomotive - it was pretty funny seeing the bell slam back and forth when I tested it... I think you need the source code of a locomotive to animate a bell - so we can’t do it on the Big Boy - right ?
I could set it up during the week on my current project locomotive - I won’t have time today - then send it to you ?
How do we control the speed of the animation ?
Oh - missed Geoff’s post - that’s great too and should work as a valid test - perhaps he can do it sooner than my schedule allows as well...
The other things we still need to address with steam locomotives - if anyone looks at it or has any interest - is cylinder cock smoke effects synchronized to the movement of the piston/wheel rotation - cylinder cock smoke effect for articulated locomotives - and some type of retarding mechanism for when the drivers slip - there should be some resistance even when slipping to prevent infinite animation speed...
Regards,
Scott
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Posted 19 May 2019 - 07:33 AM
Hi Scott,
I have sent Carlo a locomotive with an animated bell. It's a bit rough and ready, but it works in the sim in the same way you mentioned - with the bell swinging in time with the wheel rotation.
Cheers,
Geoff
I have sent Carlo a locomotive with an animated bell. It's a bit rough and ready, but it works in the sim in the same way you mentioned - with the bell swinging in time with the wheel rotation.
Cheers,
Geoff
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Posted 19 May 2019 - 08:21 AM
mrmosky, on 19 May 2019 - 07:33 AM, said:
Hi Scott,
I have sent Carlo a locomotive with an animated bell. It's a bit rough and ready, but it works in the sim in the same way you mentioned - with the bell swinging in time with the wheel rotation.
Cheers,
Geoff
I have sent Carlo a locomotive with an animated bell. It's a bit rough and ready, but it works in the sim in the same way you mentioned - with the bell swinging in time with the wheel rotation.
Cheers,
Geoff
Hi Geoff,
Perfect - thanks so much - as mentioned - highly desirable for me...
Thanks Carlo too - for your interest...
Regards,
Scott
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Posted 19 May 2019 - 08:42 AM
Hi Geoff,
I've received the message and downloaded the test loco, thank you!
As soon as I'll have a result, I'll let it know here.
I've received the message and downloaded the test loco, thank you!
As soon as I'll have a result, I'll let it know here.
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Posted 19 May 2019 - 09:04 AM
Is it possible to animate the bell separately so that it can be varied to match the ringing in the SMS file ?
Just Askin !
Just Askin !
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Posted 19 May 2019 - 12:15 PM
I did experiment with a form of bell animation using the MSTS BIN Mirror animation a long time ago. It kinda worked but required regualr pressing of a key combination command to keep the bell swinging. A dedicated swing animation would be fantastic!
An old video of my attempt at it in MSTS:
An old video of my attempt at it in MSTS:
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Posted 19 May 2019 - 12:17 PM
Hobo, on 19 May 2019 - 09:04 AM, said:
Is it possible to animate the bell separately so that it can be varied to match the ringing in the SMS file ?
Just Askin !
Just Askin !
Agreed. The animation does not need to be linked to the rotation of the wheels. We need an entry to adjust the speed of the animation.
Example:
ORTSBell ( 1.1 )
Where 1.1 is the speed of the animation in frames per second.
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Posted 20 May 2019 - 06:30 AM
I have a first version running. Here a small video
https://youtu.be/E-GQZl76Pn4
Bell matrices and animations in .s file must start with ORTSBELL .
The frame rate of the animations is 8 per second. In fact in Geoff's example (Geoff, thank you again for the perfect test case) there are 16+1 animation steps, which means that a full swing forward and backward lasts 2 seconds. The sound must be adjusted accordingly, which means that the sound file must contain two bell strokes, each one lasting a second, plus the eventual fadeoff at the end. I was lucky and could find BB_bell.wav and X_BB_bell.wav which have 4 bell strokes, each lasting 1 second (!). As the first bell stroke should start not immediately, but when the bell is about at the maximum of the swing, I cut out a part of the two files so that the first bell stroke starts at about 250 ms from the beginning of the file. The resulting file contains two strokes + a fadeoff and has a cue point at the beginning and one after two seconds.
I will now analyse if this feature may be easily applied also to AI trains and to remote trains (in Multiplayer), then I foresee to publish that first in the OR MG release and then, if accepted, in the official release.
https://youtu.be/E-GQZl76Pn4
Bell matrices and animations in .s file must start with ORTSBELL .
The frame rate of the animations is 8 per second. In fact in Geoff's example (Geoff, thank you again for the perfect test case) there are 16+1 animation steps, which means that a full swing forward and backward lasts 2 seconds. The sound must be adjusted accordingly, which means that the sound file must contain two bell strokes, each one lasting a second, plus the eventual fadeoff at the end. I was lucky and could find BB_bell.wav and X_BB_bell.wav which have 4 bell strokes, each lasting 1 second (!). As the first bell stroke should start not immediately, but when the bell is about at the maximum of the swing, I cut out a part of the two files so that the first bell stroke starts at about 250 ms from the beginning of the file. The resulting file contains two strokes + a fadeoff and has a cue point at the beginning and one after two seconds.
I will now analyse if this feature may be easily applied also to AI trains and to remote trains (in Multiplayer), then I foresee to publish that first in the OR MG release and then, if accepted, in the official release.