Railworks America

Ok, so I downloaded and started using Google Sketch Up and here is what I have come up with so far for my first model. I know it's big and I am probably biting off more than I can chew, but go big or go home. I will most likely be needing a lot of help when if comes to applying the textures and such and I would be willing to send the file off to anyone will to help me out once the basic rendering is finished. I am using Google Earth to view a modern coal mine up in the PRB. Let me know what you think and what needs to be changed and I will try like heck to make it happen. So far, I love this program. Thanks you all.

That's exciting. I've wanted some coal mine structures, even though I don't have a place to put one yet (I might just have to add a little fiction to the route, lol).

very nice

just curious, any update on your progress?

No, no update yet. I have been really playing around with sketch up and trying out some new things; you know, really trying to get to know the program. I also have to buy a Pro copy of 3D Crafter so I will be able to import it into RW. I will post progress on this up and coming project. Thanks for the interest.

ok i will check in on this thread from time to time. Wish you luck with your project

Hi,

That looks good, actually really good for a first time model! Great work, keep it up!

If I may, I'd like to add a few hints for building stuff in Sketch Up so that there won't be too much head scratching later on when it comes to game setup and exporting:

1) paint/texture only the white faces ("sides") of the SU model. If the outside face comes up as a dark one (blueish-grey) by default, right click that face and select "invert face" so that the white side will show up outside -- this is necessary because several exporters from SU will ignore all of the dark faces of the model

1b) This in turn also means that it is pretty useless to paint on both sides of a face. If you want to have a double sided object, start with a cube instead and paint the outer white sides as usual. Then delete the upper/lower/front/end faces if you only want to have the sides (like for a fence, for example.)

2) Try to use as few complex parts as possible. Avoid arcs and cylinders whenever possible, these will be modeled with far to many polygons

3) Try to build the model in smaller segments. (Like in this example of the coal mine, there could be one model for each building, seperate models for the conveyors and chutes, smoke stacks, etc.). This will help keep the polycount down (SU is really not good when it comes to poly budgets) and has the nice side effect that you can use the models more freely later on in the world editor.

Most of all however, have fun!

Cheers,
Michael

Thank you very much for the advice and I will defiantly use it. I will have to go back and change some stuff now after reading this. I actually started over on the entire thing and it's starting to look good. I have found a tutorial on how to export an SU model into 3DS and then play with it. It will be a learning curve indeed, but if I stick it out, it will pay off. SU is a very easy program to use once figured out. I just wish someone would create a plugin that would allow SU to work directly with RW. Life would be so much easier.