I have been working on this for a while and am far enough into it to be pretty sure this one will get released. When? When it's done.....
The plan is to do about 120 miles, from west of Belen NM to somewhere east of the Union Pacific junction at Vaughn NM. Sixty miles of track are down, from the Western Portals through to east of the summit at Mountainair NM, and almost all of that 60 miles is textured and detailed.
The modelling philosophy will be my usual near-enough approach. The base is DEM via HOG, the track is in the right place, but everything else (including track layout at major stations) is simplified in the interests of decent frame-rates. Even so this one will need a fairly brisk machine. It is designed for low camera views (cab view and fixed tracking cams) but looks best with the draw distance tweaked out to two or three kilometers with just a hint of 'fog' which makes a pretty convincing distant heat haze.
Enough prattling - on with some screenies....
This shot captures the spirit of the place - miles and miles of not a lot. Makes it fast to texture
The Rock Island did run through New Mexico, so these units are not entirely out of place. This skin (available from USLW) is one of the best of the best...
The plan is to do about 120 miles, from west of Belen NM to somewhere east of the Union Pacific junction at Vaughn NM. Sixty miles of track are down, from the Western Portals through to east of the summit at Mountainair NM, and almost all of that 60 miles is textured and detailed.
The modelling philosophy will be my usual near-enough approach. The base is DEM via HOG, the track is in the right place, but everything else (including track layout at major stations) is simplified in the interests of decent frame-rates. Even so this one will need a fairly brisk machine. It is designed for low camera views (cab view and fixed tracking cams) but looks best with the draw distance tweaked out to two or three kilometers with just a hint of 'fog' which makes a pretty convincing distant heat haze.
Enough prattling - on with some screenies....

This shot captures the spirit of the place - miles and miles of not a lot. Makes it fast to texture


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