Too much light.

Users of TRS2019 (and T:ANE) are now spoiled for choice in terms of available lighting settings options and the capacity to set atmospheric conditions for the full Diurnal Cycle of their sessions.
To get to grips with these powerful controls, N3V have recently updated their Lighting Tutorial for TRS2019.
You can run that onscreen - whilst simultaneously trialing the settings in TRS2019 - from this link: https://n3vgames.typeform.com/to/y4J2Rl

If you want to learn more about the new lighting model - and if you haven't completed this tutorial yet, then doing so is highly recommended!

Tutorial is not IE friendly, so page is messed up.
 
How are these settings saved.

Ken

They are only saved at route or even just session level, with no means of easily reading the values or exporting them - which is what some of us are asking for.

With regard to the monitor issue, I really do think pushing this as a hobbyhorse could result in less tech savvy users borking their hardware. Okay a monitor isn't the same as overclocking your GPU or CPU but many people use their PC at the plug and play level so turning down the initial brightness and contrast is probably the limit of their knowledge. Even I would leave settings such as temperature alone - if it ain't broke (for 99.9% of the games or apps which use it) don't try and fix for the oddball title (TRS2019) which doesn't... :) :)
 
They are only saved at route or even just session level, with no means of easily reading the values or exporting them - which is what some of us are asking for.

With regard to the monitor issue, I really do think pushing this as a hobbyhorse could result in less tech savvy users borking their hardware. Okay a monitor isn't the same as overclocking your GPU or CPU but many people use their PC at the plug and play level so turning down the initial brightness and contrast is probably the limit of their knowledge. Even I would leave settings such as temperature alone - if it ain't broke (for 99.9% of the games or apps which use it) don't try and fix for the oddball title (TRS2019) which doesn't... :) :)

The problem of saving them at route or session level means that you need to save your own version which I think is impractcal. I would like to see an extra panel on the environment settings which allows you to load up any presaved settings in a similar manner to saved filter settings. This would be even better if there was a means of importing or exporting a file so that other more experienced users could save their settings for others to use. If we have gone to the trouble of creating sophisticated lighting method we need to finish the job off and make it easy to use.

Ken
 
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Hi

I seem to have stirred things up a bit with my original post. If the majority of people want the light levels setting up for the monitor default it then begs the question of whose default value do N3V use? As it seems that default values can vary even for monitors of the same make and model then they are on a hiding to nothing with this. No matter what they do someone is likely to complain.

It seems to me that if this is the only thing winding people up about TRS2019 then N3V must have got it good enough to please the majority of users. I certainly feel that this is the best version yet as I've not bothered with other versions since I bought it. When I acquired both TS12 and Tane at first release I didn't bother with either of them for months after first trying them out.

Regards

Brian

No two monitors, even identical one are exactly the same especially using different Graphics cards and they do deteriorate with age. Having just replaced two monitors here I hadn't realised just how bad my existing ones had got. Over the years the original one have had their brightness and contrast cranked up to compensate and ended up with both on maximum which no longer cuts it. The new ones are perfect on default settings, may not be after a couple of years though.

The two new Identical monitors one with a 980TI one with a 1080TI actually appear to have slightly different gamma, probably due to the graphics cards

Point being is most will set their game settings to suit their monitors which may look great to them but the route when on a different monitor or GPU may look dark or over bright. You are not going to get a default that suits all systems.

If all systems were the same there would be no need for in game controls, Microsoft's software monitor adjustments or Nvidia's Control Panel or whatever AMD use.
 
JCitron - try setting the Sunlight pane's RGB dials to a uniform darker grey whilst turning the Ambient pane RGBs to a neutral near-white.
(Seems counterintuitive to have your sunlight (directional) settings lower than the Ambient light levels, but the result is much more realistic, detailed shadows - and not the harsh contrasts you've mentioned.
Suggest experiment a little with both for various daylight time slots and then top it all off with a gentle nudge to the new brightness slider...
With care - and following that basic premise above - it is possible to achieve full, rich, vibrant colours AND subtle, clearly delineated shadows and greyscale integrity across the entire gamut - especially if your monitor has already been properly calibrated to show its full range of colour tonal capabilities.

Thanks PC_Ace.

I did that last night and had some excellent results. Since I'm working on my route in Surveyor, I tend to set the lighting at noon to ensure I have nothing floating off the terrain. Once in my driving session, I'll reset my environmental controls to a more realistic lighting that's suitable for the route.
 
JAGG -
Tutorial is not IE friendly, so page is messed up.

Yes - unfortunately, the Google Forms host for the N3V Lighting Tutorial for TRS2019 has never been at all sympathetic to the Microsoft Internet Explorer browser.
For best results, use the latest variants of Chrome, Edge or Firefox browsers. I have tested this particular form with all of these modern, standards-based browsers to ensure that it works properly.
IE is now in its sunset years, lingering on mainly because of some ancient, legacy Internet banking applications.
 
KenGreen -
How are these settings saved.

Changes you make to the Environmental settings controls are applied after you shift focus from each control and are saved to the particular session associated with a Trainz route when you save the session.
This allows you to set up distinctly different atmospheric diurnal conditions for different sessions based on the same route.
One could be a sparkling, bright sunny day - another a wet and miserable night - another with near-blizzard, white-out conditions in the snow and sleet.

My favourite plaything at the moment is a session I set up to start at 6.00am on a somewhat misty morning in a picturesque steam-era engine yard with distant views over the lake towards the tree-covered hills far away from the camera.
As the sun rises, it casts impressive crepuscular rays over the landscape whilst generating lovely long shadows interplay with the trees and through loco steam and smoke whilst direct rays glint off shiny surfaces.
The new TurfFx blades of grass also take on a different look and feel during such early morning episodes.
I'm loving it!
 
KenGreen -

Changes you make to the Environmental settings controls are applied after you shift focus from each control and are saved to the particular session associated with a Trainz route when you save the session.
This allows you to set up distinctly different atmospheric diurnal conditions for different sessions based on the same route.
One could be a sparkling, bright sunny day - another a wet and miserable night - another with near-blizzard, white-out conditions in the snow and sleet.

My favourite plaything at the moment is a session I set up to start at 6.00am on a somewhat misty morning in a picturesque steam-era engine yard with distant views over the lake towards the tree-covered hills far away from the camera.
As the sun rises, it casts impressive crepuscular rays over the landscape whilst generating lovely long shadows interplay with the trees and through loco steam and smoke whilst direct rays glint off shiny surfaces.
The new TurfFx blades of grass also take on a different look and feel during such early morning episodes.
I'm loving it!

As I said in an earlier post saving to a session, unless your own, means that you need to create a new session. If you could save an environment setting to your own installation as you do when saving filters this would be more suitable as you could load these settings after loading the session which would replace the creator's sessions settings.

Ken
 
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Hi All
Environment settings are saved per route/session, so that creators can create different lighting conditions specific to their route and session. It is not appropriate to replace this with a system wide override, as this could substantially change the look that the creator of the route has aimed for.

When it comes to bringing a route from TANE or earlier into TRS19, you may need to reset the environment settings to the new defaults. Since it is possible for a route to use non default environment settings, we cannot guarantee how 3rd party routes will look in any version of Trainz (such as if a creator has setup the lighting to compensate for an overly dark or contrasty monitor). With the new PBR lighting in TRS19, the lighting defaults have changed, and as such previous routes may need to be adjusted.

This can be done on a session level, however there is no magic fix for this, since the environment settings can be practically anything for any route.
Regards
 
In the absence of a system for saving and loading environmental lighting settings (one is coming we are assured) I have been trialing a simple light level notation system for recording the various RGB settings for the ambient and sun colours during a 24hr cycle.

During the development of a session I place the RGB values and times for the various control points on the clock in the session description box of the session editor. This way, selecting a session in Surveyor immediately brings up the set starting time for that session and the ambient and sun colour values for each control point.

For example:

06:00 ABM 128 (RGB) SUN 160 (RGB)
07:00 AMB 192 (RGB) SUN 192 (RGB)
12:00 AMB 255 (RGB) SUN 224 (RGB)
18:00 AMB 128 (RGB) SUN 192 (RGB)
19:00 AMB 128 (RGB) SUN 128 (RGB)
20:00 AMB 096 (RGB) SUN 000 (RGB)
24:00 AMB 000 (RGB) SUN 000 (RGB)
05:00 AMB 096 (RGB) SUN 000 (RGB)

The first row is the time at which the session is set to start (in this case 06:00). AMB = Ambient colour, SUN = Sun colour. Since I have set all three RGB values to the same identical value I just place that value followed by (RGB). I have not yet tried using this system for different RGB values for a set time.

It could be expanded by adding additional columns for Brightness and Fog levels.

The values that I use are, for simplicity, set at 1/8th intervals of the full colour circles - so 3/8th = 096: 4/8th = 128: 5/8th = 160: 6/8th = 192: 7/8th = 224: etc.
 
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Hi All
Environment settings are saved per route/session, so that creators can create different lighting conditions specific to their route and session. It is not appropriate to replace this with a system wide override, as this could substantially change the look that the creator of the route has aimed for.

When it comes to bringing a route from TANE or earlier into TRS19, you may need to reset the environment settings to the new defaults. Since it is possible for a route to use non default environment settings, we cannot guarantee how 3rd party routes will look in any version of Trainz (such as if a creator has setup the lighting to compensate for an overly dark or contrasty monitor). With the new PBR lighting in TRS19, the lighting defaults have changed, and as such previous routes may need to be adjusted.

This can be done on a session level, however there is no magic fix for this, since the environment settings can be practically anything for any route.
Regards

What if the creator has not made the best of the lighting in the user's view and in the case of TANE routes this will almost certainly be necessary to change the settings. My suggestion was to make the best use of the various lighting settings in an easy way so that each user can apply their own ideas of the correct lighting. As the lighting is now very sophisticated we need an equally sophisticated method of use.

Ken
 
In the absence of a system for saving and loading environmental lighting settings (one is coming we are assured) I have been trialing a simple light level notation system for recording the various RGB settings for the ambient and sun colours during a 24hr cycle.

During the development of a session I place the RGB values and times for the various control points on the clock in the session description box of the session editor. This way, selecting a session in Surveyor immediately brings up the set starting time for that session and the ambient and sun colour values for each control point.

For example:

06:00 ABM 128 (RGB) SUN 160 (RGB)
07:00 AMB 192 (RGB) SUN 192 (RGB)
12:00 AMB 255 (RGB) SUN 224 (RGB)
18:00 AMB 128 (RGB) SUN 192 (RGB)
19:00 AMB 128 (RGB) SUN 128 (RGB)
20:00 AMB 096 (RGB) SUN 000 (RGB)
24:00 AMB 000 (RGB) SUN 000 (RGB)
05:00 AMB 096 (RGB) SUN 000 (RGB)

The first row is the time at which the session is set to start (in this case 06:00). AMB = Ambient colour, SUN = Sun colour. Since I have set all three RGB values to the same identical value I just place that value followed by (RGB). I have not yet tried using this system for different RGB values for a set time.

It could be expanded by adding additional columns for Brightness and Fog levels.

The values that I use are, for simplicity, set at 1/8th intervals of the full colour circles - so 3/8th = 096: 4/8th = 128: 5/8th = 160: 6/8th = 192: 7/8th = 224: etc.

Now wouldn't this be much easier if you could save a file with these settings and reload it each time or even save an exported file and send it to fellow users. Would this not put our sim far above the competition.

Ken
 
Since all the above is in the eyes of the beholder, allow that person to set their personal standards of route and lighting and be able to easily propagate that standard to other routes.

Well, that is nice but what do you do when a route looks bad with your "standard" environmental settings. Well, you fiddle the controls. Seems that is where we are now. As our photographers above well know not everyone likes their photos as much as they do. There is a reason we have full control of the colors, the brightness and the evenness of the application of each. Instead of looking for a standard that every route must match, just set the environment to your liking for each, and get back to playing the game. Tony waits with rewards for proficiency.
 
It is sort of a PITA but not a huge deal. I have been looking at a LOT of older routes and almost all of them have the haze filter applied. I found the easiest fix is togo into the environmental menu and just click the Reset Diurnal Color button. That cleans everything up. If you save the route it will hold that setting. Old routes that I have imported int TR19 and saved all have proper lighting when opened after the first save.
 
Sorry, I know this thread is a year old, but I only got 2019 a month ago and have been struggling with the lighting since then.

The settings suggested by pc_ace work well up to a point, but I was still getting a dull, lifeless look to the overall scene, so I imported a box with a photo test card on it.
The result made it much easier to see what was wrong. There is very little gradation in the tones, and almost a third of the scene has highlight clipping.
In the developer settings the exposure and its strength values seem to offer a good result (I set them at 10 and 0.6 respectively), so would it be possible to make theses settings saveable, like a user default?

PS my screen is calibrated with a color munky, but mucking about with the brightness and contrast settings made minimal changes to the appearance of trainz.

Chris.
 
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