David111767
30in and Rack Railway Guy
Those Euro engines are pretty self enclosing (I.e. Piping and whatnot), there's not a whole lot of detail you could add to the outside to make it near 50K. But that's just how I would do it.
-David
GMax and 3DSMax (And any other modeling program) screenies/renders
- Thread starter Mr.Kamikaze
- Start date
Those Euro engines are pretty self enclosing (I.e. Piping and whatnot), there's not a whole lot of detail you could add to the outside to make it near 50K. But that's just how I would do it.
-David
simulatortrain
jointed freaking rails
A JR passenger car?
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jacksonbarno
Alco Spoken Here
YES! That looks really good, I can't wait! I love troop trains!
Indeed! It's a grand passenger car too. Now, with any luck this first will have a second to follow it before too terribly long.A JR passenger car?
Easy: MP15DC has the radiator grills on the front of the locomotive, while the MP15AC has the radiators on the side of the front of the locomotive, looking similar to the location of the radiator grills on Southern Pacific's tunnel motors.
NSWGR_46Class
Just call my Captain Rude
LOD would not help anybody with a low end computers its got to with detail verses viewing distance
ryanstrains
Moderator
Putting 4 50k engines on and them staying at 50k would create more of a load than having the engine reduce to like 5-10k far away.
A JR passenger car?
or more of a caboose passenger car! lol
NSWGR_46Class
Just call my Captain Rude
Thats exactly my point yes
OK, I`ll keep a backup of the model (as always) in case I need an LOD.
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Erm, it would. It wouldn't load things a distance away and that helps low end computers because they don't have to load things a distance away. I thought you were a content creator?
Almost there.
NSWGR_46Class
Just call my Captain Rude
When your placing an item on a map your not doing it from a distance away are you so how does help low end computers then ?
ryanstrains
Moderator
Exactly, LOD does that.
simulatortrain
jointed freaking rails
Because you would assume the other things you're using also have LOD and are not at that one specific point close to the camera...
LOD Can help low end computers,
for example if I use a 4 LOD system I use these values
and only have a 2k LOD difference on the locomotive for the first and seond LOD, others would have 4 to 5 k removed for mid, low, if I use a 3 LOD system I do this
and the difference with the 4 LOD system and 3 LOD system is the 4 has a close transition and only removed nuts/bolt/rivet details, while the other LOD's remove 55-65% of the polys per mesh, for the last LOD I try and get that down to 2-1k polys.
You can still do the same for 2 LOD system.
and have the main mesh with the furthest mesh set to 1-2k polys which helps low end computers when they reduce draw distance, means about 900m away they are loading a 2k mesh and not a 40k mesh.
Cheers.
for example if I use a 4 LOD system I use these values
Code:
mesh("0.15")
{
name="body_low.im";
}
mesh("0.45")
{
name="body_mid.im";
}
mesh("0.85")
{
name="body_high.im";
}
mesh("1.00")
{
name="body_highest.im";
}and only have a 2k LOD difference on the locomotive for the first and seond LOD, others would have 4 to 5 k removed for mid, low, if I use a 3 LOD system I do this
Code:
mesh("0.15")
{
name="body_low.im";
}
mesh("0.65")
{
name="body_mid.im";
}
mesh("1.00")
{
name="body_highest.im";
}You can still do the same for 2 LOD system.
Code:
mesh("0.15")
{
name="body_low.im";
}
mesh("1.00")
{
name="body_highest.im";
}Cheers.
ZecMurphy
Community Assistant
Good Morning All
LOD provides performance benefits for all users, but especially those with low end computers. LOD does this in two ways. First, when you move away, the detail/poly count is reduced. Unless you are going to sit there close up to that one object every time you load Trainz, LOD will provide a benefit. About the only thing you could get away with, without lod, would be a single locomotive in your consist but only if you intend to have the camera locked as close as possible to the locomotive all the time for all users. Since this isn't possible (you can't stop a user zooming out a little bit - and even zooming out to see the loco and 2-3 short wagons is enough to drop to a lower LOD on most high detail locos!), you should have LOD
Second is that LOD (particularly the 'mesh-table' LOD system introduced in TS2009) is tied to the detail sliders. Lower the sliders, and the LOD transitions happen earlier. Increase the sliders, and they happen later. The main one of interest when changing the detail settings is generally the first transition, as increasing detail will move this further away, allowing high detail for longer. Some games may actually turn off the highest LOD at minimum detail settings, but this is generally only the case with 'closed' games (e.g. First Person Shooters, and similar), where all content is designed for the game. Without LOD, the detail sliders can't work (or can't work properly), and the game can never run well on lower spec computers...
A well built LOD should be seamless at the highest detail settings. If you can achieve it without effecting performance, it can also be seamless (or close too, as in transitions are subtle) at mid detail settings. Having it perfectly seamless with all detail set to minimum will generally hurt performance. The 'lm.txt' files are fairly set, but can still be adjusted a little by Trainz based on detail sliders.
Remember, LOD is about reducing detail, not removing it. For example, handrails should have the number of sides removed throughout the LOD, instead of just removing them when they are still visible. Once they're no longer visible on the screen, remove them (they will eventually get small enough on the screen to blend in on most vehicles).
A bonus, as a creator, is that LOD does allow you to put more polys into your models (and then reduce this properly through the LOD). This can take the form of putting more faces onto the wheels, making them smoother. Or into the handrails, boiler, or allowing you to include the inside motion gear (if visible). Another is to include a representation of the cab on the exterior loco as well.
For a small tank locomotive (complete 'exterior' model), 20,000-30,000 polys is a good ballpark figure if you have LOD
That said, you should always aim to keep it as low as possible. But, that 'low' isn't quite as low as it was 5 or 10 years ago
Regards
LOD provides performance benefits for all users, but especially those with low end computers. LOD does this in two ways. First, when you move away, the detail/poly count is reduced. Unless you are going to sit there close up to that one object every time you load Trainz, LOD will provide a benefit. About the only thing you could get away with, without lod, would be a single locomotive in your consist but only if you intend to have the camera locked as close as possible to the locomotive all the time for all users. Since this isn't possible (you can't stop a user zooming out a little bit - and even zooming out to see the loco and 2-3 short wagons is enough to drop to a lower LOD on most high detail locos!), you should have LOD
Second is that LOD (particularly the 'mesh-table' LOD system introduced in TS2009) is tied to the detail sliders. Lower the sliders, and the LOD transitions happen earlier. Increase the sliders, and they happen later. The main one of interest when changing the detail settings is generally the first transition, as increasing detail will move this further away, allowing high detail for longer. Some games may actually turn off the highest LOD at minimum detail settings, but this is generally only the case with 'closed' games (e.g. First Person Shooters, and similar), where all content is designed for the game. Without LOD, the detail sliders can't work (or can't work properly), and the game can never run well on lower spec computers...
A well built LOD should be seamless at the highest detail settings. If you can achieve it without effecting performance, it can also be seamless (or close too, as in transitions are subtle) at mid detail settings. Having it perfectly seamless with all detail set to minimum will generally hurt performance. The 'lm.txt' files are fairly set, but can still be adjusted a little by Trainz based on detail sliders.
Remember, LOD is about reducing detail, not removing it. For example, handrails should have the number of sides removed throughout the LOD, instead of just removing them when they are still visible. Once they're no longer visible on the screen, remove them (they will eventually get small enough on the screen to blend in on most vehicles).
A bonus, as a creator, is that LOD does allow you to put more polys into your models (and then reduce this properly through the LOD). This can take the form of putting more faces onto the wheels, making them smoother. Or into the handrails, boiler, or allowing you to include the inside motion gear (if visible). Another is to include a representation of the cab on the exterior loco as well.
For a small tank locomotive (complete 'exterior' model), 20,000-30,000 polys is a good ballpark figure if you have LOD
That said, you should always aim to keep it as low as possible. But, that 'low' isn't quite as low as it was 5 or 10 years ago
Regards
