v0.33 (2021-01-17) - Fixed unusual AI crashing on Rally Stage 1. - AIW workaround for Rally Stages map to display point to point correctly for new UI. (by moving last waypoint index to the beginning) ------------------------------------- Also in the previous ver 0.32, I have encountered 3 times, when changing rally stage map in Server (with a few friends), after loading finished, everyone would get stuck with a Synchronizing notice, and no one can move until either restart session, or if someone left server and rejoin. I haven't yet identify which problem would cause this, maybe just a network issue, or may be related to AIW. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Edit: tested more today with friends, and seems all good now. Maybe just a network issue.
Finished merging 3773 surface pieces, and split into 323 sections now (may have to do further splitting later). Begin to subdividing road side meshes and closing all the gaps (almost doubled road surface mesh density).
@svictor purely curiosity on your big effort in subdividing the road and roadsides. In this magnitude of a track It is impossible to add detail to every turn manually? Will you add "noise" later on to deform it to make it more natural/variated? I cant see that you can bend/smooth the turns without doing it manually, a subdivided surface will still be square.
To explain more clear about the whole reconstruction plan: First, this track has several surface sections. They include: 1. Main road, which the center part of the road. 2. Road edge, which is the transition road between main road and grass, and in most sections, they consist of 3 layers (inner, middle, outer). 3. Grass, sand, gravel, and everything else. The main road, which I had already subdivided 1 month ago (8 squares, 0.8-1meter density), had already added random "noise" (1-2cm variation) and crossfall (2%). And it drives good. However, the road edge was not subdivided, due to the complexity of hundreds materials and messy mesh condition. It was extremely difficulty to do them at the time. This leaves a huge amount surface gap, which adds up with all the road gaps that existed in original conversion. Those gaps are not perfect for realroad, especially for wet road, and it will cause visual issue. Thus, in order to fully utilize realroad, must fix all the gaps. In the version 0.31, I have finally finished implementing realroad and all the necessary textures, including all the UV channels that were manually set correctly. And after some evaluation, I think reconstruction the remaining road edge and fixing gap is finally a viable option to me, and this will be the last and most important thing to do. So my current reconstruction is focused on subdividing this whole remaining road edge meshes, then close any gaps in between the grass and main road. I estimated that this process alone will take around one hundred hours. And yes, your assumption is correct for bend/smooth the turns. The original surface is very low poly quality. In order to bend or smooth out, the only option is to manually adjust every vertices. It will be an unthinkable amount work (many months), and I don't plan to do it. However, I may choose to smooth out a few U-turn, if I feel necessary. And thanks for support. ---------------------------------- Edit: a pic for better understanding: Green: main road, subdivided in version 0.27. Purple: subdivided road edge mesh, and fixed gap. Red: not yet subdivided road edge mesh.
thx for your great explanation, I know alot about 3d and manipulating vertexes in this scale is enormous. Hats off for your incredible work.
How to use Blender's LoopTools addon to smooth road: 1. Main menu > EDIT > Perferences > Add-ons, search keyword "loop" and find Mesh: LoopTools, enable it. 2. Enter Edit Mode view, active edge select (press 2) 3. Select the continued edges you want to smooth (you can hold Alt to do loop select). 4. Click right mouse, on top select LoopTools > Relax 5. At lower left screen, click Relax message box to expand, and adjust 4 smooth options. Note: 1. Regular checkbox will evenly distribute vertices, which may distort UV map, recommended to uncheck. 2. Linear Interpolation gives much rounded results, but may destroy some corner bending. 3. Parallel (all) input can also smooth paralleled edges without select them, works great for symmetric road, but be aware that it may break some road with uneven edges. 4. Sometimes smoothing a long section may cause model broken, usually undo and repeat Relax should fix it. ------------------------ finally found a way to bend/smooth flat edges, using Blender's LoopTools addon("Relax" function): also helps smooth the elevation (will have to add some noise otherwise would be too smooth):
Wait, you work with blender and have this kind of productivity and quality of results for rF2 ? Now thats impressive, and shame on me for not getting anywhere near that with Goodwood and some other stuff I have to bring to rF2 too.
Great I think this process could be very useful for all rf2 track conversion from old gen sims Poor 3d road mesh is usual the major problem
The problem I have when reconstructing a road surface I need to map it again. I use 3dsmax so methods may be different. Wonder if there is a way to do it but keep all the mapping info?
My usual steps for reconstructing surface in Blender: 1. select the object and press "Tab" to enter "Edit mode". (may want to merge separated objects together first) 2. press "a" to select all vertices, press "m", select "By Distance", then adjust "Merge Distance" value carefully until all gaps are closed. (has to be done, otherwise face merging and loop cut may not work) 3. a few ways to merge triangle faces to quad face (has to be the same material): a) select all vertices, then from menu select "Face" > "Tris to Quads", or by pressing "Alt+J" to convert all faces to quad. b) manually select 2 connected triangle faces and press "F" to merge them into a quad face. c) in case of some remained vertices, manually select 2 connected triangle faces and press "X", then select "Dissolve Faces" and check "Dissolve Verts" box. Or, merge face first, then select those unwanted vertices and press "X" > "Dissolve Vertices". d) "Slide Vertices" (Shift+V) is also great way to fix some complex issue with face merging. 4. Use "Loop Cut" (Shift+R) to subdivide the face.
Great work. Also nice to see someone using Blender. I presume you're aware of the ability to edit multiple objects (feature added in v2.8)?
Yes, the 1900 main surface objects were subdivided individually without being merged into one piece, in order to preserve the original SCN structure and LOD values (since the LOD value require a large amount time to manually set and adjust). However, the main issue is that this track's surface mesh condition is extremely complex, and has enormous amount surface gaps and holes across 3600 (current version has) terrain surface objects. In order to fix those mesh gaps as well as to properly subdivide and smooth mesh, all these objects have to be merged into one piece to perform quick vertices merge (vertices from separated objects can not be merged together), then split again into smaller pieces and adjust LOD manually. I'm currently also rebuilding many part of land surface to fill all the visible holes from main view (also affects nearby objects position and needs manually adjustment), this process is very time consuming as well:
Man thats crazy! But with this track, isn't everything crazy? That screen shot makes it a big improvement. Looking forward to it.