My first attempt at creating telegraph poles was a failure. While I followed the "How to Make a Gantry" pdf, everything exported correctly with no errors, yet I'm not getting any wires on the pole. I got a feeling it's something wrong with wire. While the wire shows up in the editor, I can't place the wire as a normal loft. Not sure what I did wrong. Can anybody see anything wrong with this loft setup? Any help would be appreciated. Added question. What is a gantry tool?
After studying the pictures I posted above, I found that I had the wrong shader in Blender for the wire. I fixed that to the right shader but it made no difference...still no wires. A few more questions... 1. Does a loft need to be modeled facing the Y axis or the -Y axis? 2. For a wire connecting nodes, does the LOD numbers in the node name need to be added to the blueprint?
More testing was done. I found that my wire when made as a regular loft works. So I ruled out the position of the wire in Blender. It's obvious to me that some details are being left out of this gantry building process. I've gone over the process many times and I can't see what I'm doing wrong.
Phone the neighbors and wake the kids! I got the telegraph pole to work! I start from a clean slate with new models and new blueprints. I took a few hours but it worked the first time I imported the pole. To be completely honest, I have no idea what I did different to get this to work. The only thing that I changed was the node names...changing node name ins7 to ins07. Trains Simulator Classic is a fickle old gal, isn't she? Now I need to see if I can lower the polys a bit.
Most stuff in TS is case sensitive, so it wouldn't surprise me that 07 works instead of 7. LOD numbers are not needed in blueprints, just the node name. Model in Y+ direction. I would look into baking a 2d texture of the insulator, and use planes for the second LOD. You can even do this for the pole itself.
Thanks for the info. It comes down to wanting something a little more detailed then what is out there. Poly count vs. realism. At this time I'm going for realism. However, all blender models, blueprints are save in the source files so I can always go back and adjust if needed later. For now, I want to finish the variety of telegraph poles, then I'll move onto telephone poles, then powerline and then I'll finish up with some realistic street lighting. When all the models are done, I'll send out these packs to be tested. The 2D LOD texture Idea is good, however these insulators and wires are set a 130m, so they are in the scene for only a short time. More testing will be needed.
