VDK Tranports Inc.

[jmdude1]

Yes! Just like that.  That looks excellent!  I like the color schemes on the Santa Fes. I've been using your rail mods for years, but this set is definitely my favorite.

As I posted on the previous page, I think you could make the Canadian National look real good in game. 

Keep up the great work, it is much appreciated.

Jeff

[vester]

Thank you Jeff.

I am planning to do the CN green livery.

A lot of railroad names with Pacific, Southern, Western, Northern and Chicago,
but here is one of the few ones with Eastern:

Arizona Eastern Railroad, EMD E8A, 6070.

Wiki: "It has been repainted in a scheme reminiscent of Southern Pacific's "Black Widow" livery, since Arizona Eastern was owned by Southern Pacific."

[vester]

Stay with th black color:

[vester]

Staying with the Burlington Route:

[MTT9]

That last one is really nice

[vester]

As I posted on the previous page, I think you could make the Canadian National look real good in game. 

One CN coming up:


Erie Railroad:

[jmdude1]

That looks great! A great start to my vacation. Thanks a lot!

[Gugu3]

Nice job Vester!!!

[vester]

Staying in the Canadian corner:


and one for the South East corner of the US:

[cogeo]

I see a large variety here. I would like to suggest you making the installer like RTMT's, which uses drop-down lists for selecting options (check the textures/markings selection screen). It's quite flexible (it may contain any number of images, as big as desirable) and uses both images and descriptions. You do have the script, and I could provide help if necessary.

[vester]

Haven't been thinking about installer just yet.


Here is a few more colors:

[cogeo]

Yet more liveries!

Question: Did take a look into your last upload, and found that the "XCar" plugins contain the same model as the passenger car but with a pantograph. Yet, it has an IID of 0x10DA0000, which is an ingame automaton, originally a red minivan. How does this work exactly? Will the game be selecting the passenger cars randomly, which means that some cars will have a pantograph and some others not? And as the engine does not have a pantograph, does it mean that a trainset may have not a pantograph at all? And finally, does this rely on some mod located somewhere else (eg marking the automaton as "passenger car") or it works on its own? Could you elaborate?

[vester]

Question: Did take a look into your last upload, and found that the "XCar" plugins contain the same model as the passenger car but with a pantograph. Yet, it has an IID of 0x10DA0000, which is an ingame automaton, originally a red minivan. How does this work exactly? Will the game be selecting the passenger cars randomly, which means that some cars will have a pantograph and some others not? And as the engine does not have a pantograph, does it mean that a trainset may have not a pantograph at all? And finally, does this rely on some mod located somewhere else (eg marking the automaton as "passenger car") or it works on its own? Could you elaborate?

So many questions. The IID comes from other mods I started out with. Not sure which.
You should know by now that the trains are put together totally at random. SO yes, some cars will have the pantograph and some will not.
Yes some trains could end up with no pantograph at all.
Not sure it how it ended up been called a car....
maybe its from the American modders. Over there a railway carriage (UK English) is called a Railroad car. PR means passenger rail.
Think it could work by itself. Never thought of testing that out. I am not the right one to ask that.

Not sure what mod is should rely on.

[vester]

Have correct the IID numberin the old mods.
Nothing to worry about. Just one car not showing up.


Here is a little something new:

[vester]

[threestooges]

Nice work on the Canadian ones. Good to see them getting some showtime. The variants of the Penn RR are well done too. I think the green might be a bit saturated for the Burlington Northern. For automata, does the game produce the same oversaturation of color like the BAT seems to?
-Matt

[vester]

Is this better:


Could make up my mind about the green color. Did keep the saturation of the lines as they are very thin.

Reworked the shape of bottom lines of the white marking and the red lines that follows it.


On the Union Pacific I tried to land the color some where between the "fresh painted" and the picture you showed me from "your" museum.

[cogeo]

So many questions. The IID comes from other mods I started out with. Not sure which.
You should know by now that the trains are put together totally at random. SO yes, some cars will have the pantograph and some will not.
Yes some trains could end up with no pantograph at all.

OK thanks, this is what I wanted to know. Then wouldn't it be better to have an additional model, ie engine with pantograph (for electrified track) and install the XCar plugin only when the electric version of the engine is installed? Not requesting neithering particularly interested in it (I do not have any "electrified track" mod installed, and even if so I could copy the pantograph group to the engine, using the Model Tweaker), just asking.

Think it could work by itself. Never thought of testing that out. I am not the right one to ask that.

Not sure what mod is should rely on.

I meaned if defining another railcar is all what is required, or there is something else that needs to be done (you replied). I was wondering if it's possible to somehow define what a "consist" (trainset) may contain. For the freight trains the consist contains an engine and a variable number of freight cars (which the game apparently selects randomly), but how about passenger trains? Something similar appears to happen here too, only there is only one (two with your mod) cars to choose between. But if we could define that a consist contains this and that and the other type of automata, we could for example put a special car at the end of the consist, and therefore implement things like a caboose, or "symmetrical" DMUs. It would also be good nice to know if automata may be added, and not just replace the original ones. It would be so much better to have, for example multiple freight engines (will have to use different IDs), or expand the freight car sets with some container-carrying cars.

How about making something to replace that awful "Track Checker" unit? I think a small yard engine would be ideal (they often run around deadhead).

[vester]

On some of the models its just a matter of adding the pantograph to the texture.
Why I did the extra car with the pantograph, was to make it easy for everybody.


There is no way to control the order of the cars in the train. Think people have tried different ways to do it.
A thing like adding an extra engine unit (B-unit / engines without a cabin) has been tried using techniques from a truck.



The only Track Checker I know of is a Japanese one: uki Sim page 20.

[Girafe]

For the freight trains the consist contains an engine and a variable number of freight cars (which the game apparently selects randomly),

Not exactly, as the last car is always the same so it should be coded somewhere