steamboateng
New member
Building the NE Mass Route -page 6
Painting large areas
Most routes will have large areas which need to be painted with a common ground cover. The thoughtful designers of TS12 have provided a method to do this in the Tools roll out while in Surveyor. After creating a patch of blended ground cover (say 50 meters by 50 meters) the paste function (TS12 manual; pg. 179-180) can be manipulated to create ever larger patches to paste. Once a large area is covered, random selections can be taken to paste where ever. Rotating the direction dial will prevent that tiled look a single texture so often produces.
Paste acres of grass:http://i1251.photobucket.com/albums/hh557/steamboateng/Pasteacreesofgrass.jpg
Trees
Just about any layout will need lots and lots of trees for digital squirrels to play in, digital birds to sing in and, of course ,digital children to climb and fall from (bruising digital limbs,which require digital band-aids, etc, etc).
Trees, like sponges, suck up precious memory. And I don't need every darn one of them breeze dancing in unison to their earthy music. Just a few, here and there, is enough to cast their graceful illusion.Geography plays a role here too; coconut palms have no more place on Boston Common than sugar maples in the Florida Everglades!
I use forest splines sparingly and generally only at a distance to give the illusion of tree cover.
Trees01:http://i1251.photobucket.com/albums/hh557/steamboateng/Trees01.jpg
Trees02:http://i1251.photobucket.com/albums/hh557/steamboateng/Trees02.jpg
I'm using only 3 or 4 different single tree assets and only 2 different tree spline assets in the screen shots above. I will attempt to keep tree varieties down to 10 or 12 throughout the route and certainly no more than a half-dozen different tree splines.
I have test run several trains through the completed base boards to date. So far no jerky screens or hangs. That i7 processor is proving its mettle.
Sound
Sound is used to generate a sense of place. I'm a tranquil kind of guy, so I use squawking seagulls and gentle surf along the shore, chirping birds inland, along with a moo-moo here and a cluck-cluck there............Well, you get the idea.
If I wanted the sounds of electric drills, circular saws, hammers and the like, I can travel just a few feet to my shop and make a racket.......if nothing else! No thanks. Back yard do-it-yourselfer's are verboten in my world. If needed, I can add an industry sound here or there, but surely only enough to speak its presence, not dominate the scene. However, I must admit I love the sounds of throaty diesels and huffing steam that ply the rails snaking through my quiescent NewEngland countryside. I have incurred the chief mate's wrath on several occasions in the past, while operating 2 am milk runs across my 24 inch monitor!
I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of you following along in my ramblings. Please come back, as more N E Route pages are planned.
mbk
3/16/12
Painting large areas
Most routes will have large areas which need to be painted with a common ground cover. The thoughtful designers of TS12 have provided a method to do this in the Tools roll out while in Surveyor. After creating a patch of blended ground cover (say 50 meters by 50 meters) the paste function (TS12 manual; pg. 179-180) can be manipulated to create ever larger patches to paste. Once a large area is covered, random selections can be taken to paste where ever. Rotating the direction dial will prevent that tiled look a single texture so often produces.
Paste acres of grass:http://i1251.photobucket.com/albums/hh557/steamboateng/Pasteacreesofgrass.jpg
Trees
Just about any layout will need lots and lots of trees for digital squirrels to play in, digital birds to sing in and, of course ,digital children to climb and fall from (bruising digital limbs,which require digital band-aids, etc, etc).
Trees, like sponges, suck up precious memory. And I don't need every darn one of them breeze dancing in unison to their earthy music. Just a few, here and there, is enough to cast their graceful illusion.Geography plays a role here too; coconut palms have no more place on Boston Common than sugar maples in the Florida Everglades!
I use forest splines sparingly and generally only at a distance to give the illusion of tree cover.
Trees01:http://i1251.photobucket.com/albums/hh557/steamboateng/Trees01.jpg
Trees02:http://i1251.photobucket.com/albums/hh557/steamboateng/Trees02.jpg
I'm using only 3 or 4 different single tree assets and only 2 different tree spline assets in the screen shots above. I will attempt to keep tree varieties down to 10 or 12 throughout the route and certainly no more than a half-dozen different tree splines.
I have test run several trains through the completed base boards to date. So far no jerky screens or hangs. That i7 processor is proving its mettle.
Sound
Sound is used to generate a sense of place. I'm a tranquil kind of guy, so I use squawking seagulls and gentle surf along the shore, chirping birds inland, along with a moo-moo here and a cluck-cluck there............Well, you get the idea.
If I wanted the sounds of electric drills, circular saws, hammers and the like, I can travel just a few feet to my shop and make a racket.......if nothing else! No thanks. Back yard do-it-yourselfer's are verboten in my world. If needed, I can add an industry sound here or there, but surely only enough to speak its presence, not dominate the scene. However, I must admit I love the sounds of throaty diesels and huffing steam that ply the rails snaking through my quiescent NewEngland countryside. I have incurred the chief mate's wrath on several occasions in the past, while operating 2 am milk runs across my 24 inch monitor!
I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of you following along in my ramblings. Please come back, as more N E Route pages are planned.
mbk
3/16/12