Why is a trackside camera not a trckside asset ?

[cascaderailroad]

Why is a trackside camera, not a trackside asset ?

In the 14 years of Trainz many things never get improvement and probably never will

The so called trackisde camera (Static & Rotating) is a scenery item (yet it can not be rotated with config file tags rotstep -1,1, ... nor can it be height adjusted using config file tags height range- -50,50)

It is truly not a scenery asset as it can not be easily moved about like a building ... nor is it a trackside asset, as it does not lock onto a track

They are so extremely hard to place, that they should be abolished, and a new panning camera should be designed

And what is so interesting about a rotating camera that it is designed to look at the very bottom of a loco fuel tank, a place so very low, midpoint between the 2 bogies ... The entire design of the trackside camera is completely asinine !

Why can't an automatic rotating/static camera be designed, that is height adjustable, that can be re-aimed upwards, easily zoomed in and out, or one that is truely a trackside lock on asset, designed like a rotating trackside signal ?

Some things will never change in Trainz !

Even if someone created an invisible loco, that had an automatic rotating, panning, cab view ... that would be an easy to place trackside camera

All we have now is TRS2006, with shadows

 

[clam1952]

As you don't have TANE you will not be aware that it is a lot easier to place cameras at ground level even if there is a bank or slope close by.

 

[cascaderailroad]

But they still focus looking downward, like dweebs, focusing on the midpoint between the two bogies, looking at the very very very bottom of the loco fuel tank, focusing on the railhead ?

Fabulous improvement there ... bravo !

Where is the tilt adjustment upward ? No they always look down ... that is so utterly stupid !

 

[martinvk]

Since dynamic cameras have to look at any possible train vehicle, having them aim at the center of the traincar is the best location. Naturally if they are placed too close to the track, the traincar will be too big to show completely. Back up a bit and when it just fills the screen, it will be OK. If you really want to control the aiming point, use a static camera. They can be made to look anywhere, up down, left right and any location in between.

How could they be trackside objects? They have to be able to be placed anywhere in the map and not always attached to a track.

 

[cascaderailroad]

I want to stand @ 5 foot from the track, like a conductor would see the couplers up close, looking upward at the top half of the train, from down low, looking up ... I have tried static cameras in TRS2006 and still the camera is non adjustable, so that the camera will look never up at the top of the loco, looking up from the ground ... unless T:ANE is a drastic improvement, viewing from up close, being able to look upward, instead of looking down at the railhead ... I don't want to have to compensate by zooming out, looking very distant the train ... I want a real up close conductors view

He used to stand up and watch me shave ... Now he just droops, and stares at the ground :'(

 

[martinvk]

.. I have tried static cameras in TRS2006 and still the camera is non adjustable,(

don't know what static cameras you were using but when I place them, they can be aimed in any direction.

 

[cascaderailroad]

These trackside cameras will always look downward, looking at the railhead ... never will you see the couplers, nor the sides of the railcars ... they will never look upward ... and can not be positioned so they aim up at the sky, or sides of railcars

I do not want to compensate by looking down from the top of a 20 foot high bridge, or from a heliocopter high in the air ... I want a ground conductors view ... the only way to achieve this is to place an invisible loco (or a similar asset) on a piece of invisatrack ... then manually pan, rotate, zoom in freeintcam by using the mouse

 

[davidbird]

As I see it, the tracking cameras must be automated to track something, this something is the origin point (as defined by the original asset creator in GMax/Blender/whatever) and so will be at zero height. What else could be used?
The static cameras can be pointed in any direction, but this must be set up when they are placed in the route.

If you wish to have a (UK terminology) a shunter's-eye view when coupling up, why not simply switch your view to free-range camera? This means your view can be anywhere, pointed in any direction, zoomed in and out at will...

 

[cascaderailroad]

So you are telling me that these trackside cameras can be switched on, to "free-range-camera" in T:ANE, and can be aimed upwards ?

Please show me a screenshot, or a video of this

 

[martinvk]

These trackside cameras will always look downward, looking at the railhead ... never will you see the couplers, nor the sides of the railcars ... they will never look upward ... and can not be positioned so they aim up at the sky, or sides of railcars

IIRC, the red ones are static cameras and those CAN be pointed in any direction.

 

[davidbird]

So you are telling me that these trackside cameras can be switched on, to "free-range-camera" in T:ANE, and can be aimed upwards ?

No, just switch to free range view (press 4 on keyboard), then right-click the point you want the view focussed on. This is totally independent of any camera objects you may have placed on the route. The camera is then focussed the same way as it is in Surveyor. You can point the view in any direction, zoom in and out, rotate the view around a point. What you cannot do with free-range-camera is point it upwards, unless it's focus point is located on a higher piece of ground (such as an embankment) than your view-point itself.

Edit: Many apologies if I have misled you with the above. It's Free Range View not free range camera. It just give you a viewpoint that can be moved anywhere. It's what I use when coupling-up.

 

[cascaderailroad]

Numeral 4 is Free Roam (which everybody knows, and uses) ... but the idea behind Rotating / Static trackside cameras is that they automatically turn on when a loco is a certain distance way, and rotates like a conductor watching a switching move, which is great ... but the fact that they continually look down all the time, is a huge flaw in the design ! Why can't they be set so that they look up to a higher position location on the loco ? Whatever reason why this is not possible to point trackside cameras upward, makes as much sense: as a submarine with screen doors, or an airplane horn

There are several assets (which are essentially a loco) such as: "Railfan Platform" by DES, which if they had a automatic rotating camera, or one slowly panning back and forth 180 degrees, these would be great

 

[martinvk]

I stand corrected. While the static camera does swing left and right in any direction, it does this by pivoting around the current compass point. By the same token, when it is raised it also continuously looks at the compass resulting in a downward angle of view. When the camera is on the ground it looks horizontally.

The tracking camera always looks at the insertion point of the traincar within range. If the camera is in a valley and the train is on a bridge above, it will look up but other than that, since the camera is usually level with or above the train , it generally has a downward view. If you want an upward view, put the camera in a ditch or have the track on an embankment.

It has been quite some time since I placed any cameras, back in the days when I created the camera guides, that I had totally forgotten this part of their behavior.

 

[SailorDan]

Why can't an automatic rotating/static camera be designed, that is height adjustable, that can be re-aimed upwards, easily zoomed in and out, or one that is truely a trackside lock on asset, designed like a rotating trackside signal ?

Make your own - it's not difficult. Or use what's already there: <KUID:4468:9997> Signal Box A loco acting as a Signal Box which allows trackside views.

 

[cascaderailroad]

Nice ... But I have tried all these ... but they do not automatically pan or rotate ... and they require you to click on the asset, and manually pan with the mouse using the numeral 1 (which is trainzoptions file: -freeintcam) ... or manually in numeral 4 Freeroam, ... and all of these are not auto panning cameras ... which the trackside camera are auto rotating / panning ... and these do not aim upwards

 

[martinvk]

... which the trackside camera are auto rotating / panning ... and these do not aim upwards

you keep calling them trackside cameras, which they are not. They are Tracking and Static cameras. The fact that they can be placed beside a track is just one of the many places they could be placed. As long as they are within range of a track and a train, they will be activated, otherwise they remain dormant.

 

[cascaderailroad]

I realize what they do, and when they activate ... The point I am trying to makes is they have serious shortcomings, as they can not aim upwards ... so basically the "Tracking and Static Cameras" are old as the hills TRS2004 crap ... never improved on by Auran nor N3V !

I really love looking down at the railhead, following the midpoint between the 2 loco bogies, looking at the very very bottom of the fuel tank ... what an absolutly fantastic exciting FOV !

 

[clam1952]

I'm pretty sure that the camera doesn't point at the bottom of the bogies now in TANE when close but stays level'ish least it seems that way to me, it's definitely not the same as TS12 though.

 

[SailorDan]

... which the trackside camera are auto rotating / panning ... and these do not aim upwards

I don't know any trackside cameras which are auto rotating / panning. You should show the KUID of those cameras, as I am sure they could be duplicated. The only auto panning camera I have seen is the integrated tracking camera, but that's not trackside. Perhaps the ones you refer to are configured as locos that are scripted to switch the camera view according to some rule, but I can't think why they couldn't be configured to look upwards.

 

[cascaderailroad]

These are built in assets for TRS2006 <kuid:-1:6130>

They lay flat, and can not look upwards ... I do not want an elevated view looking downward, nor do I want a distant zoomed out view ... nor do I want a view looking downward as the crow sees ... and I do not want a view looking down on the railhead