Off topic

Just for a change of scenery I offered to help John Bennett with a couple of items for his Bacup route.

The first was an attempt to transfer one of John's sketchup models into Railworks using an import script I found for 3ds max. The importer worked fine, but then I had to tidy the model up a bit followed by renaming to RW standards.

Also took the opportunity to add night textures, stencil shadows, smoke and waterscenery effects.



John also asked if I could use one of his watercolours as a basis for a Burton the Tailors shop.



A generation ago these were on every High Street and all had distinctive "Art Deco" facias. On a personal note, at one time I used to do alot of business with Burtons and visited their Leeds HQ on many an occassion, but that was in a former life:)

Anyway, I gave it a try and with a bit of artisitic licence, came up with the following.

Problem solved

In my earlier blog on crossings I mentioned a problem with Pilton Crossing. Although the crossing is single track, on the Pilton Yard side there is a junction so it quickly becomes twin track which meant the trigger was too close to the crossing.

Thanks to AndiS, the problem is solved by the simply increasing the number of triggers in the blueprint to 3.



Click on the image for a better view.

.....and finally!

At last! The final station building for the route, Lynton & Lynmouth Station.



Over to Gary now to scenerise things.

Level Crossings

I was a bit fed up with doing buildings so, for a change, I have been updating the level crossing I made for Braunton Rd.

Had some fun learning the basics of 3ds max animation, which, like everything in 3ds max, is very powerful but easy to get wrong. Thanks to the guys on the UKTS forum I was able to overcome my difficulties and produce the results below.





Thought I may as well continue and make the crossing for Pilton Yard as well.





These are based on AndiS's lua scripts as I don't know how to use the new RW crossing scripts. Perhaps I'll update them again when RS eventually release the details of their new crossings?

AndiS, if you're reading this, perhaps you can tell me if its possible to have a single track level crossing with more than one trigger for when there are two tracks converging to one, just before the crossing?

Goodshed

After a major crash of 3ds Max, at long last the goodshed for Lynton is finished.

I must try RSDerek's less is more approach to modelling, it must be less stressful.



Must tone down that white brickwork on the chimney a bit!

Lynton Yard

There are a couple of strange structures in the Lynton goods yard, as can be seen in the following picture. (click the picture for a larger version)



On the right is an unusual leanto building which appears to have been some kind of store. To the left are some odd wooden structures which I believe were intended for the use of the coal merchant for storing coal awaiting bagging.

Anyway, here's my attempt at modelling them.

Lynton Revised

I have been reliably informed that my Lynton locoshed is too small. Apparently, it was extended during its life to be large enough to accept a carriage.

Consequently, as the route is being built as it was in the 1930's, I have revised the model and taken the opportunity to add the disused coaling stage and inspection pit, to the south of the shed.