I have just downloaded a recent addition to the download station
This is a GWR wagon - Fred Bendel. On looking in the description on DLS it says that one can select different numbers in surveyor.
I have downloaded the item to my PC. Gone to surveyor and there is no logical/obvious way of doing this.
Please can someone point me in the right direction.
Is there a [simple] tutorial anywhere about changing running numbers - as it is irritating to have a row of similar wagons all the same number - it used to irritate me on my OO layout as well!
Thanks in anticipation
I really ought to correct the description, you can't in fact just change the numbers on this particular one.
We had the same concern as you about having wagons with the same number. The first attempts used running numbers but these have a drawback each extra texture file adds on roughly the equivalent load of two hundred polys or 1,200 polys plus the 24 polys for the number themselves.
Part of my background is in hardware so I really didn't like the idea of adding 1,224 polys to a model that was only 3 or 400 polys to start with just to get a number change. Also each number was on a different plane so the spacing between the numbers was fixed, the numbers just didn't look right.
We switched to Chameleon and that meant we could get different numbers with only one extra texture the fonts looked better and we sort of settled on 15 and went from there. Chameleon works fairly well but occasionally the script gets confused. Scripts are more stable in TRS2009, TC3, TC1/2, TRS2006, TRS2004 in descending order.
I had a discussion with Paul hobbs in the forum and following that discussion I thought why not use just one texture that way there is no extra texture file since I'd moved onto TC3. I used the script off Paul's TC3 built in wagon which just happens to change the entire skin. I think the TC3 version wagons and vans are the most stable by the way. Click on the ? and scroll down to the bottom and you can change the skin which changes the number. The skins are all slightly different lightnesses or hues so put six in a row and they look slightly different.
The wagons and vans using this method actually select a skin at random so if you put a line of wagons down it is unlikely that you'll see two with the same number next to each other.
Then we come to the GWR Fred Bendle Wagon, I work with others including Chris Whiting and Bob Sanders. Bob Sanders who looks after the web site has TC3 but prefers TRS2004 since he is comfortable with it. He suggested making a GWR twenty ton mineral wagon which he could reskin. This is slightly larger than the seven planks etc so needs a different bogey. I reused a TRS2004 bogey rather than a TC3 one with operating brakes etc.
I had some MDO and MEO textures available so I just put them on the side of the 20 ton mesh and uploaded them. I changed the config.txt file so that although it still used Chameleon it now changed the entire skin not just the number. Bob's reskin looks very nice but I don't think it has made it's way to the DLS yet.
Chris had previously sent me some photographs to use as textures. Fred Bendle got put to one side as I didn't at the time have a suitable mesh. However I've been playing with the vans once more and I now have a range of lengths, again based on a suggestion from Bob Sanders. To get the highest quality textures I need to go back to the very large texture files that Chris had sent me then edit these before resizing them once. I stumbled across the Fred Bendle texture whilst looking for van tetxures so dropped it on.
So finally in answer to your question, first most of the time you won't see two wagons with the same numbers next to each other. If you do in surveyor you can go into ? and adjust the number. On the very old items change the running number but this method has a high overhead, on the older TRS2004 items change the number in Chameleon, on the TC3 items change the skin including the number, and on the newer TRS2004 items change the skin including the number in Chameleon.
Cheerio John
You maybe could have PMed me first instead of reporting right away...