A discusson on Trainz FOV and Trackside camera's

[cascaderailroad]

Trainz FOV is very tunnel visioned, and is nothing like the real human eye which see's @180 degrees FOV

Trackside camera's look down at the railhead, midpoint at the bottom of a loco's fuel tank ... When ever did you look down at the rail head, and flange, when rail fanning ? You don't ... You look up at the top of the train ... Why is Trainz so unrealistic ... Why can't you adjust trackside camera's to not look down ?

Trainz is for dummies !

We need a better FOV in Trainz ... Get with the program N3V !

Sometimes I think that trackside camera's should be abandoned all together ... and that a drivable pedestrian, or a drivable RV (with an internal, automatic panning camera view) would be more prototypical for railfanning Trainz

Where as Trainz is controlling you, it should be the other way around ... When you are looking through a trackside camera it is dependent on the train ... but it should not be this way at all ... a trackside camera should be a clickable asset, that you click on ... and it pans any passing train ... where as a trackside camera is really the train, looking at itself, and it moves along down the line ... instead of being independent of the train, which it is not.

I have tried them all ... Sitting in a loco cab (in freeintcam) and manually panning a passing train.

We still need a independent trackside camera vehicle, that automatically pans and films any moving object moving past it ... the closest thing is "Drivable Signal Box" (which is a real dumb idear) !

Trackside cameras are in internal part of the game ... and are not really an asset ... They can not be custom controiled, and any custom modifications of trackside cameras are impossible (such as up/down, right/left, yaw and pitch customizations are not even possible.

Some one please get with me on making the idea of an automatic panning adjustable trackside camera a real thing ... I feel this is a worthwhile asset that needs to be created ... as Trainz is really so lame, with these antiquated trackside camera's !

 

[nicky9499]

The problem with your first statement is human eyes have a round (therefore wide) field of vision. Displays however, are flat and therefore you will NEVER be able to fit a human eye FOV on a screen without severe fisheye distortion. There is an (expensive) way around this though; get yourself some TrackIR or Oculus Rift hardware.

I agree cameras could be improved though. N3V would do good to take a look at the way Sims3, Euro Truck and even Railworks implement their free cameras.

 

[jamiechi2]

I like the multiple options that RollerCoaster Tycoon 3 has for moving the free cameras. Something like that, especially in Surveyer would be great.

 

[captainkman]

I don't like the way Euro Truck Simulator and Failworks have their free cameras. I do not like it one bit. I would be devastated if Trainz implemented that type of free-roam camera.

I can provide more in-depth reasoning by request, too.

Kieran.

 

[cascaderailroad]

Maybe if someone made an automatic panning camera asset, we could abandon the built in Trainz trackside camera's (that always looks down at the ground).

 

[gremlin1812]

Trainz trackside camera's (that always looks down at the ground).

G'day, I'm sure it would not be too hard to alter the code to make the aiming point about half to three quarters of the way up the loco height and it probably could be included in the next TS12 SP or HF. I would not hold tour breath waiting for it as seeing as it is something not thought up by N3V as is their form it is unlikely to happen even though it is probably a simple fix.

 

[cascaderailroad]

As the trackside camera's are not "an asset" as they are hidden away in a JA file ... they are not customizable by the end user.

I feel N3V will never implement a new style trackside camera, in our lifetimes.

That is why we need a talented creator to build this panning camera asset (just as allmost assets in Trainz were never actually created by Auran nor N3V).

 

[cascaderailroad]

It seems the best I can do with rotating trackside camera's is:
Go straight over the area to be filmed, zoom in all the way, looking straight down ...
Press the PG down KB button a burst of 4 short clicks ... This will zoom out 4 clicks ...
Using the KB arrow keys slam the camera down to the lowest setting on the ground ...
Move the camera just so that it eclipses the tack closest to the camera (you might need to raise the camera up and down to get this location fine tuned).
Anyway ... the camera end location should be all the way down, so as to get a pedestrian railfans FOV ...

Your FOV should now be low enough to not look like it is being filmed from a 90 foot building top, and your FOV will be @ 100' or more distant the closest train track, and you will be able to view @ 2 traincars.

I hate the whirlybird, follow along, tracking camera, as it is so unrealistic, as most railfans can not afford a huey helicopter to pace alongside, and view their Trainz :hehe: Like viewing from the Badyear blimp.

 

[cascaderailroad]

What is needed is a total revamp of Trackside Cameras, they are so hard to place ... and always look down at the railhead, at the lower middle of the diesel loco fuel tank, midpoint between the 2 bogies.

I wish it would look up instead.

If someone with creation skills would create a building, that you could click on ... like a signal tower, that was a rotating trackside camera, one could sit in the tower and watch railcars roll by in a hump yard ... even better a trackside railfan person, or a drivable MOW vehicle, with a rotating trackside camera built in.

Even a "Walker Lead Pedestrian" with a cab view ... could be driven on a small circle, or semi-circle of track ... to get that rotating trackside camera effect.

There is a "Drivable Signal Box" somewhere

And at AC MonkeywrenchModels there are 3 drivable railfan/signalman/lantern's

 

[JCitron]

Why do the camera have to attached to anything in the first place? I find that needing to be a driver in a locomotive just to go off and do railfanning on my route to be an annoying aspect of Trainz.

The built-in camera options too are too fixed and difficult to place properly as well and the placement of them reminds me of drawing with fat crayons in many places. You can kinda sorta get stuff in the right place but you're still outside the lines.

What we need is a truly independent camera asset, as has been suggested, that we can play anywhere and doesn't have to be a locomotive cab to be viewed from. Simply clicking on a camera list which should list named cameras and then choosing a particular camera should work.

Aiming the camera should be done just like any of the other 3d modeling programs. World Builder from Digital Element, for example has simple camera placing. The camera is placed, height adjusted, then the FOV and target are adjusted. With that done clicking on the camera gives the view from the lens, and further adjustments can be made through the camera its self.

John