Atomic Systems

I had intended releasing the Darjeeling class A a couple of weeks ago, but realised that I hadn't got a cab view for it. I didn't feel inclined to produce a unique one for what is a minority taste engine, so I came up with the idea of a "generic medium sized narrow gauge tank engine cab view (British)". The size range is something like "Jerry M", through "Linda" to "Joan". The hard work is the controls themselves, but by using different "Backgrounds", the basic cab can be made quite widely applicable. Here are the proposed variants

Click the image to zoom in


The screenshots are in 3D canvas where the model is being made. Most of the animation is done, the textures need some more work, and then comes the boring bit of creating all the ace files for the moving bits.

If this goes well, I may do a small generic cab (Quarry Hunslet sort of size) and a big one - Leek and Manifold, Dholpur &c

Very nice, Keep up the good work.

kevin

Timely idea, thanks.

Cheers Bazza

In the meantime, I think that the Highland Railway tank cab, ID11197, is a nice simple cab suitable for an NG loco

Tony

Very nice Andrew- I'm sure they will be very useful.

Superb!

jefran wrote:
The screenshots are in 3D canvas where the model is being made. Most of the animation is done, the textures need some more work, and then comes the boring bit of creating all the ace files for the moving bits.

Wonderful Model!

Thats exactly the point that I got to with my Sian cabview but got busy with a new job and left it alone! If you are successful making the .ace files would you let us know how its done? I had terrible trouble getting them all the same size.

Also, have you thought about moving the camera up and to the right a little for a more realistic driving position? If you moved the camera up and right then focussed it down and towards the 'smokebox' you would still get all the controls in.

Click the image to zoom in


Is that better? This is just a basic front texture, but it gives an idea of what it would look like.

The process of animating the controls and producing ace files is not difficult, just tedious. This is cab no 5, the first was on the Bagnall Armistice, and I would like to think that this is rather better than what I was doing 9 months ago. Basically, I start from an animated model of the cab, and first of all take a screen-shot to become the front texture, with all the moving bits hidden (not forgetting the pressure gauge needle). Then, restore the moving parts and WITHOUT CHANGING THE VIEW IN ANYWAY, take one screen shot of each animation (of the whole cab) frame. The next step is to crop them all to the same size (as the screen-shot will probably include the 3D modelling application). Next, resize them all to a common size which is a multiple of 640 x 480 - in my case this means trimming away some of the top, or bottom, (or both) as the screen-shot is too high in proportion. MSTS will use front textures 1024 x 768, and though I always use this resolution, I strongly suspect that if you went for 640x480, you wouldn't loose anything. All the shots with the moving parts will need resizing to 640 x 480, and it is very helpful to have a copy of the main view to this size. Now comes the really tedious bit, for each control, you need to identify a rectangular area which will cover all the movement of that control (and not interfere with any other) and copy that identical area out of each screen-shot. They need to go into a new file sized to accomodate all of the pieces for that control - so that if your regulator animation has 8 positions with each piece being 80 x 60 pixels, a BMP 160 x 240 would suit. I always produce a translucency layer, in case the control doesn't go in exactly the same place as on the "background" - it also means that you can use the control in another cab. The position for each control in the CVF file is determined by the x and y coordinates of one of the corners of the animation pieces you took off the screen-shots ( I can't remember which).

I have done two 15" gauge cabs - one for a Romney Pacific, and the other for the Kirklees engines, but neither would really be right for the Twining twins.

The above cab would quite easily pass for Northern Rock- so will be very useful on the NLMR.

Thanks Jefran, I knew the basic proceedure but havent had time (or patience) to sit and work through it! This what my cab looked like:



I have screenshots from the 3d program with the controls moving through their respective ranges of movement. But didnt get any further than trying to make a few BMPs. Might get it out again over the summer though. Actually I had decided it had a few too many bells and whistles for a first attempt and thought I would try to make a simpler generic quarry hunslet style NG cab with a few variations...great minds think alike eh? Yours is far better than I could have come up with.

I've just seen that this is now available for download at UK TrainSim - reference 16429

jefran wrote:I've just seen that this is now available for download at UK TrainSim - reference 16429

Generic Narrow Gauge Cabs (UK Medium) [11419000 bytes] - cabinstall.exe File ID: 16429 Date: 14 Apr 2007 - 1130 Downloads

Tim

Thanks Tim - I was trying to work out how it was done - but you've saved me the trouble

Has anyone actually tried it yet? I'd like to be sure that it seems satisfactory before I upload the DHR class A which uses it.

I've set up the Penrhyn Hunslet-style cab for Linda and Blanche and it worked fine I'm looking forward to trying the other two, but what with one thing and another I haven't had time these last few days...