The Kings New Clothes

[epicmek]

The title was inspired by the Hans Christian Anderson fairytale or was it Grimms? The subject is my continued frustration and irritation with not being able to induce a 5m grid in TR2010's Surveyor. To illustrate my point I have taken a screenshot to aid my explanation. See below:

What I have done in the picture is to set my "brush" to the smallest size available. I have added "A,B,C,& D" to show the columns. The first row indicated by the Yellow Push Pins was created whilst the grid was in its default 10m size. Column "A" was where I placed the cursor on the 10m yellow grid line intersection and activated a "Height Tool" set at 10m. Column "B" was where I placed the cursor again at the intersection of the 10m grid and clicked once on a black texture. Column "C" I placed the cursor on the intersection of a yellow and grey grid lines and again LMC'd a black texture. Column "D" the texture click was made on the intersection of the grey 5m lines and you can see no texture was laid.

In the second row I repeated the exercise again after changing the grid to 5m by right clicking the "Add baseboard" icon and selecting 5m grid and ticking it as OK. The point at which I activated the various LMCs are illustrated by the Red Push Pins.

For the life of me I can't see any difference! This has been nagging at me since TR2009 but tonight I have spent a couple of hours messing around with settings different actions to see if I could elicit a different result. There is nothing on the subject in the manual and I've searched on the forum with no definitive answer to the few threads on the subject.

Am I going mad? Is it a case of me doing something wrong or is it that the 5m grid is indeed an example of the "Kings New Clothes" syndrome?

Somebody please put me out of my misery.

Regards

Martin :'(

 

[JCitron]

Martin,

You'll notice with the 5m grid that when making topology changes that the ground rises up slower, and it takes more clicks to get the end results. This smaller grid, being half the size takes twice the work. This is very helpful when working with cuttings and slopes because there is a finer control over the cursor, which usually acts like a fat crayon that we used to get in kindergarten.

What I found with the 5m grid is a texture change in areas where they were landscaped with the 10m grid first. Because of the grid differences, the textures mapped differently, and as a result the original 10m grid-mapped textures lost their mapping coordinants and ended up very blocky. If the map was painted fresh with the 5m grid, everything worked fine.

I did notice too that it took more work for some textures, not all, to paint the surface. It was though their default filling area was much smaller than the grid, or they were small to begin with and became smaller.


John

 

[epicmek]

Thanks fir the Input♦

John

What you describe is not my experience. The picture, because of the aspect, doesn't show that all the tests are identical but assure you they are. I used the "Set Height" topology tool because the application is identical and so are the results. I've just checked it again using different sensitivity settings and it make no difference in the speed at which the peak appears at full height.

I'm still not convinced that the 5m grid exists.

Thanks anyway.

Regards

P.S Excuse the title typo . . . . fat fingers.

Martin

 

[JCitron]

Try making a peak without the set height tool. You'll see the results. It may not be visible to you on the bare grid because that is difficult to tell the difference.

John

 

[narrowgauge]

epicmek

The 5m grid does work as it should. It is possible to click on and deform any grid intersection. Did you click 'Yes' on the final confirmation popup, if not, your second test was on a 10 m grid.

Try again.

Peter

 

[itareus]

.....In the second row I repeated the exercise again after changing the grid to 5m by right clicking the "Add baseboard" icon and selecting 5m grid and ticking it as OK.....

After doing this did you then click on the baseboard to complete the conversion?

 

[epicmek]

Update

Hi All

Thanks for the suggestions.

Itereus gets the prize.

No I hadn't left clicked on the baseboard.

Reason: Nowhere else do you get a confirmation splash in trainz. . . . why would I expect to see one when carrying out this function. I swear I have never seen this splash screen confirmation before. Nowhere in the manual does it say you need to left click the background after ticking the "Ground Extend Options" or at least I haven't found it.

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I have always clicked on the screen below:

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then carried on with whatever I was doing.

The net result is that I have never had a 5m grid ever. I hope this thread will help alleviate the pain any other user is suffering from not knowing about the left click on the background after selecting and ticking the "Ground Extend Options" after selecting 5m.

I'm so pleased that I can now use the 5m grid I've almost forgotten what a bad inconsistent bit of programming this represents.

If anybody out there thinks there may be a benefit in my posting a step by step pictorial tutorial on changing the grid size let me know because I have all the screen shots and now I have the method

Thanks again . . . especially Itereus and I hope your wings get better . . . . wax = bad idea :hehe:

Thanks again.

Martin

 

[itareus]

Thanks again . . . especially Itereus and I hope your wings get better . . . . wax = bad idea :hehe:

Martin,

Youre welcome - I was fooled by this festure when it was first introduced, I think a tutorial would be a good idea but the thorny question is where to put it. Threads on the forum soon get lost and the Wiki is not used a great deal as far as I can tell. Perhaps both?

Be cautious of over use of the 5m grid, it's 4 times the polys of the 10m grid and may affect framerates.

BTW the winged guy was Icarus ... my name is a bit more mundane ItAreUs (think "Toys R Us") I had to think up a unique company name in 2 minutes flat (some years ago) and it was the best I could do!

Cheers

Chris

 

[JCitron]

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