Default Track Replacements

[eric]

There's not, but you could probably make one based on the dynamic track profile.

My licensed copy of Dynatrax no longer functions, so it hasn't been very high on my list.

[paulytechnic]

Yeah, I've noticed that, and have tried a couple different things but haven't landed on a good fix. The shadows are legit, and I suspect that the reason they're not appearing on dynamic track is that it may have been designed in a way it doesn't cast a shadow.

The problem is exacerbated by the USTracks textures and how alpha's are defined. The edges are alpha'd as you'd expect, but the ballast around the ties is also alpha'd out, which means it has to be drawn as three separate objects (slope, top, slope).

As three separate objects, there's no edge to un-crease or apply smoothing to. It might be possible to make it more of an arched curve, but that's going to increase the poly count for each shape.

That makes sense, and I feel that increasing the poly count for each shape would not be enough of a benefit to justify the hit on resources. So, since smoothing the ballast for the replacement shapes isn't really feasible right now, a good alternative would be to modify the dynamic track profile so the harder shadows are consistent with the replacement global shapes. (Again, I don't think they look bad, but I'd much rather that everything looked consistent so you couldn't even tell which track is dynamic and which isn't).

As mentioned before, such modifications are a bit beyond my expertise. But with some experimentation and a lot of fumbling, I think I stumbled on a solution. It looks like the "Normal" values control the lighting of the surface. So I replaced these values for the ballast slopes with values "borrowed" from one of the replacement shapes.



Are these the "correct" values? I have no clue...I'm just fiddling in the dark here. But the results in Open Rails are good, and dynamic track now seems to have consistent shadows as all other track...



So here's yet another Track Profile update for the USTracks default replacements...

[ATTACH]n2307173[/ATTACH]

[RobGuru]

There's not, but you could probably make one based on the dynamic track profile.

My licensed copy of Dynatrax no longer functions, so it hasn't been very high on my list.

Where can you get Dynatrak from?

[qballbandit]

Hey Paul, great stuff - thanks! I also used the BlendTexDiff edit and really appreciated the results.

[gedeonndl]

Hello,
a fix for MTracks is planned? In order to properly associate them with ATrack?

Sincerely, Gedeon.

[eric]

I thought I'd uploaded that fix. File updated.

https://www.trainsim.com/forums/filelib-search-fileid?fid=88502

[gedeonndl]

Hi,
Thank you so much

[JRussell87]

G'day Eric.
I am so please with this new Default track mod you done on this. It is absolutely magnificent and great for this Sim in particular. it looks nice and smooth when I tested it on the Australian New South Wales Southern Highlands route. it really look magnificent. Even provided the screenshot of your modded track below this message.

Big thank you for doing this, Glad the track pieces look more realistic than the default flat ones from kuji.

Yours Sincerely,
Josho

[eric]

Glad to hear they're working out.