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Help with bridge textures

Started by noahclem, October 04, 2015, 04:41:11 AM

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noahclem

Recently I looked at the custom rail bridges to see how difficult it would be to make them RRW compatible. Since many lack superstructure it appears they could be made to work by manually editing the fsh files. My question then, is if there is an established way to convert a transit texture to the perspective they appear in bats. A 10% width compression, vertical shear of 110, and rotation of 30.3% seemed to approximate one of the two angles. Is there an easier way to do this? Don't think it matters but I'm working on the garabit viaduct.

Help would be much appreciated :D

vortext

#1
An easier way could be to apply the transit texture to a flat S3D, turn it into a prop and then add the prop to the T21s. I've done this to cover up of the vanilla street on JENX's bridge: 


spoiler alert  $%#Ninj2  :D

The pavement is just a flat prop, hoovering .1 meters above the BATted street. The one thing which could be a problem is the bridge LODs, i.e. the LOD barring the prop from being visible unless it's raised by a considerable amount and thus ends up looking awkward. Though on second thought, I reckon bridges need to have tight LODs anyway to allow for automata to pass through.

At any rate, I can send you template files to work with if you like.  :)
time flies like a bird
fruit flies like a banana

eggman121

The other option you have is too place S3d Models with attached textures too the bridges with Cogeo's Model Tweaker. Five zooms are rendered for the RTK 1 and the last two zoom are too far out for that method (Or any method in fact) too work.

Than you can swap out textures with the tweaker also by changing the IID.

That is what I have done with the RRW bridges I have made!

-eggman121

noahclem

Sweet bridge  &apls  I've been wanting something like that for a long time!

The method you suggest looks quite feasible for the Garabit bridge as the LODs appear very tightly wrapped (wireframe view clearly shows the side rails so I assume that means a T21ed S3D could be visible from pretty close to the bridge surface). I'm a beginner at S3D stuff in general but have been working on it regarding the overhangs you were helping me with, trying to make my own for "memo-style" sidewalks, and switching around some of the TuLEP ones to make additional options possible. Unfortunately, I have zero experience with T21s so I might need a significant amount of help with this :/  It'd be great to have the template files and if you could give me a few pointers about the rest of the process I'd be very appreciative :)  This seems like a process that could be extremely useful for a lot of projects--not least my tram and texture work! Before choco disappeared for last time he seemed relatively confident that he'd created a fully functional TIA bridge with the only issue being an error where congestion view shows it as red. I think Xannepan's avenue bridge ought to have a TIA variant....

Stephen, I was just posting and saw your message. Sounds also like something definitely worth looking into. I've never used model tweaker to attach textures but am otherwise familiar with the program and assume I could figure this method out.

vortext

psa: the modeltweaker method is handsdown the easiest way to go about.

time flies like a bird
fruit flies like a banana

noahclem

Took me a little bit but I figured out the modeltweaker route. Already have a couple others done too. Seems like the next NAM might have a few more RRW bridge options....

click

mrbisonm

OMG....That bridge.................wow.................absolutely want!!!


Just great, wonderful work.....the texture is.......can't find the right word for it..............


Fred


....Uploading the MFP 1.... (.........Finishing the MFP1)

Gugu3


noahclem

Thanks a lot Fred and Guglielmo! This shouldn't need any testing so hopefully I can still sneak this and a few other RRW bridges in to the next NAM release, if the installer guys are okay with getting it in there too. I can also just upload it to my google drive and share a link if you don't want to wait til then ;)  I actually plan to redo these as the current textures were Willy's for the smaller truss bridge that's RRW compatible now and it seems he narrowed the texture to fit into that smaller bridge which isn't really necessary for these and also should use a transition texture which I didn't use for my first version of this bridge. Anyway, that process should be very quick.

Interestingly, it seems like this should be possible with all the rail bridges, including those with superstructures. They should all have very tight LODs, which should be necessary for automata to show, which should also mean that these textures should appear. Unfortunately, some of the custom bridges are done differently in a way that the new rail texture would need to be rotated and/or moved upward, so not all will be as quick and easy as the first couple.

As for redoing the texture for appropriate spacing between tracks, I could adjust the current one or use one of the ones I've made, like this light rail one:
click


That's HD, although I don't think that's important since the bridges are SD.

And speaking of that bridge, does anyone know where in the simcity .dats the original can be found? I'd like to RRW-ify it as well.

Special thanks to Erik and Stephen for your help with these--including Erik's patience over Skype last night :D  Also many thanks to mgb204, who sent me another option for doing it more similar to what I was originally trying to do. It seems the S3Ds are the best way to go about these for now, but his method will be invaluable for FLUP ramps with the new textures. Thanks guys! :)

TheTeaCat

Noah,

Amazing bridges!!

You can find the bridge using the exemplar analyser!

Just thought I'd include a pic for you! make it easier for you to scroll down to the item location ;)

Derry
Kettle's on. Milk? Sugars?    ps I don't like Earl Grey  $%Grinno$%
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle - If you're not part of the solution , you're part of the problem!
"Never knock on Death's door: Ring the bell and run away! Death really hates that!"
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vortext

Hehe, patience is a virtue.  ;)

Nah, kidding, I'm glad to see you got the hang of it! The light rail bridge texture looks great!  :thumbsup:
time flies like a bird
fruit flies like a banana

cogeo

#11
Hello everyone. Just saw this.

Quote from: eggman121 on October 04, 2015, 11:00:04 AM
The other option you have is too place S3d Models with attached textures too the bridges with Cogeo's Model Tweaker. Five zooms are rendered for the RTK 1 and the last two zoom are too far out for that method (Or any method in fact) too work.

Than you can swap out textures with the tweaker also by changing the IID.
That is what I have done with the RRW bridges I have made!

Could you elaborate please? Looks like it is still a quite laborious process, unfortunately.

Model Tweaker was made having a somewhat different procedure in mind. Actually the cases it was designed to cover were:
- Join two 1-Z/R models together. Quite simple in logic, appends the 2nd model to the 1st one.
- Join two 20-Z/R models together. Similar in logic, only more steps, appends each Z/R-view of the 2nd model to the corresponding Z/R-view of the 1st one.
- Append a 1-Z/R model to a 20-Z/R one. This one is a little bit different, it rotates the 1-Z/R model by multiples of 90° as needed, before appending it to each Z/R-view of the 1st one.

The 3rd case is the one aimed at facilitating bridges modelling. The developer is supposed to have made some little preparatory work, ie create a datfile containing a simple planar 16x16m model (4 vertices, 2 triangles, preferably 0.2m above ground level), directly referencing the SC4 (or NAM) straight network texture. Such a model looks identical to the network, and the texture is clean and undistorted, as BAT exporting (with all its known problems, like blurring, pixelation, colour bleeding etc) is NOT involved in the process.

Of course, this works splendidly for zoom level 5, as the model uses the level-5 texture, and quite well for the rest ones (shows shrunk versions of the level-5 texture). A "perfect" practice would be to instead have each zoom level using the correct SC4/NAM texture for the zoom, not one scaled-down by the game (which looks somewhat different). The problem is that the Merge command as is doesn't do this in some automated manner. Neither the Terture Replace command helps, as the position of the "zoom level" digit in the 20-Z/R IIDs and those 5-Z/R ones used for networks differs (the latter use the last digit as "zoom").

Therefore (before considering making such changes to the Tweaker), I think it could be a lot easier if the developer instead took some little time to construct a 20-Z/R model using the correct texture in each zoom level. It's quite easy, and once done it can be used and reused, or the texture IDs changed easily, if a bridge for another network is about to be made. The East, North and West models can be obtained by rotating the South one clockwise by 90°, 180° and 270° respectively (the rotations can be done by the Tweaker itself, temporarily setting the base model's IID from 0x#####000 to 0x#####001 in order to fool the Tweaker so that it does not recognise the model as a 20-Z/R one, but instead as 20 1-Z/R ones). Its some 15-20 mins work, and once done adding the network texture to the model will become a 1-step procedure.

Regards

noahclem

Thanks for your help TTC!

@Vortext - Thanks again :)

Thanks also for your input cogeo! Do I understand correctly that what you're suggesting is something that should already have been done by the original creator of the bridge? Should I be using part of that process with bridges that haven't been created in the way that you suggest?

I'm not a big fan of the light rail HD texture I displayed in the last post as the wood grain isn't subtle enough (I think my other rail sleepers are based on the same wood texture but have been much more manipulated/mutilated to the point that they have very little in common with the originals). Since I was in need of a new transition texture from ballasted RRW to non-ballasted RRW that didn't change width I made my own, and while I was at it I figured I might as well make my own bridge texture attempting to imitate Willy's as closely as possible. Here's what I ended up with:





There's an error in the faded edges but such things aren't noticeable in game.

kelis

Noah you're growing and growing as a modder this last year ! Fantastic work with those bridges and textures.
.                                                                                                                      

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Gugu3


cogeo

Quote from: noahclem on October 06, 2015, 11:11:48 AM
Thanks also for your input cogeo! Do I understand correctly that what you're suggesting is something that should already have been done by the original creator of the bridge? Should I be using part of that process with bridges that haven't been created in the way that you suggest?

There are basically two ways to model the bridge pieces. First, the original one (also used by Maxis) where the network texture is included in the model. BAT exporting causes awful effects though, and the resulting texture differs from the normal network texture and is badly distorted. Even the Maxis bridges look ugly. The second way was devised by some members here and consists in NOT putting the network texture in the bridge model, just the road- (or rail-) bed, and export these models; then a simple planar 16x16m model (4 vertices, 2 triangles) directly referencing the network texture, is appended to the (exported) bridge models (previously manually, using the reader, now with the Tweaker). As BAT exporting is not involved in this part of the process, the network texture on the bridge looks identical to the network model.

And of course the same procedure can even be used to improve the appearance of older bridge models (with the network texture included in the model), without having to modify and re-export the models. As the roadbed's upper face (and texture) is at height level 0 (this IS a requirement, as there are automata paths running at this level, and automata MUST be visible), you can simply append the planar model 0.2m above ground (or it's 0.4m, duh can't remember - pls check some bridge models), and this covers the old texture as it is above it, without affecting the automata (0.2 or 0.4m is negligible).

My suggestion was only about overcoming the problem (?) of using the same (zoom level 5) texture in all zoom levels of the bridge models (which is what the Tweaker does), and doing so in a productive manner (requiring less work in total from the developer). So I suggested making a 20-Z/R model, using the correct (network) texture for each zoom level, and append this one to the bridge models, not the 1-Z/R one.

Quote from: noahclem on October 06, 2015, 11:11:48 AM
I'm not a big fan of the light rail HD texture I displayed in the last post as the wood grain isn't subtle enough (I think my other rail sleepers are based on the same wood texture but have been much more manipulated/mutilated to the point that they have very little in common with the originals). Since I was in need of a new transition texture from ballasted RRW to non-ballasted RRW that didn't change width I made my own, and while I was at it I figured I might as well make my own bridge texture attempting to imitate Willy's as closely as possible. Here's what I ended up with:

Why use a HD texture? Was the normal (network) light rail texture made HD too? The point is to make the network and bridge textures looking the same (or similar, if the bridge texture has no ballast - but the rails and the sleepers must be looking the same). There is no point in using a HD texture on the bridge, and SD on the rest of the network. Besides, the resolution of network (and lot, and ground) textures is actually satisfactory and some attempts of making HD textures resulted in only marginally improved appearance, so whether all this is worth the effort is rather debatable.

As for the texture itself, sorry but I think there is room for improvement here. It doesn't really look good, looks like having... ballast as well, a much much darker one, which is also ended abruptly. The sleepers are longer and much darker too. You rather need a more elaborate alpha here, 100% opaque on the rails and sleepers, and less on the rest (gradually becoming less opaque as you move away from the rails, and possibly containing some "spots", resulting in an effect like having rust particles ejected and sprayed around the rails as the trains pass, which is actually how rails look in reality after some time of operation). This means that the "railbed", ie the bridge's own material (concrete, metal or what) will be partly visible between the sleepers or farther off the rails, which may or may not be looking good, depending on how the bridge's railbed (model & materials) was made; this may even necessitate making a custom texture for the bridge.


Tropod

Quote from: TheTeaCat on October 05, 2015, 08:29:46 AM
Noah,

Amazing bridges!!

You can find the bridge using the exemplar analyser!
http://i201.photobucket.com/albums/aa148/theteacat/capture_001_05102015_162533.jpg
Just thought I'd include a pic for you! make it easier for you to scroll down to the item location ;)

Derry

If you double-click on them in the main list it will automatically open the item in Exemplar analyser.

SC4Reader tool is similar in this regard, with the added bonus of better Tree filtering & object viewing (ie click on Exemplar property & it will load relevant object) which may be helpful in building these items;


noahclem

Thanks tropod!  I'll give it a try with your reader this evening :)

Thank you for clarifying the model tweaker process with these bridges  :thumbsup:

I'm familiar with the old experiments with HD textures but disagree with the old conclusion. For rail/tram networks in particular the difference is surprisingly dramatic, the performance and disk space costs are fairly minor, and HD is now the de facto standard for terrain textures, flora, network decorations (catenaries, lights, signs, etc), and of course automata. I've been working on replacing all the light rail and tram textures with realigned, HD, custom -sidewalked textures for many months which you could look at in the Noro trams and textures thread or prior to that the main Noro thread.

Due to the amount of effort involved and the high quality of the current SD RRW textures I don't have any immediate plans for giving the rail network similar treatment. However I don't rule it out in the future and enjoy using some for my personal use. As mentioned earlier, the bridge textures here aren't my own design but are intended to match Willy's bridge textures as closely as possible, both in coloration and content, hence the wide ties and dark coloration that I assumed was supposed to look rusty and grungy. I'm not sure why he made them that way but typically his textures are quite realistic and based on what he sees driving trains. Since his bridge textures included a transition from +/- 2.5m (rrw width) to +/- 2m (original width), which wasn't necessary for the bridges I retextured, I needed new textures and felt like making them based on the existing HD components I'm used to working with. The textures, obviously, are not baked in and will work with whatever the user has installed--or at least it will once I get around to making SD, RRW-width versions of the bridge textures.