Asset/Object Viewing

[tntrainer]

Neophyte route building question here.....

For the purposes of route creation and looking for a particular asset/object or looking through available objects for one that would fit, is there an easier way than scrolling through the route editor's game object list? Does TStools or another program have a viewer that will load all assets/objects and let you see a decent size thumbnail of them with the object's name/route?

It would make life easier when looking for that "just right" building, bridge or scenery asset. The more routes from which you import objects, it begins to make a very long list to scroll through. I find that the "tile" feature in the list rarely populates every object imported as a thumbnail.

I did see a very old RWA thread from the early 20teens in which this idea was discussed then abandoned as it did not seem possible. Maybe one of you computer savvy folks can brainstorm another idea.

Thanks,
George

[mindenjohn]

I know the problem, which is not helped by some developers calling an object one thing and others something else making the search facility less friendly but that is still useful. Go to the Assets list and then the search facility top right and try a name of what it is you're looking for - you should get a list.
The other way I use is old fashioned but works - as I am driving around scenarios I look out for useful scenic objects not just buildings but bridges etc as well. I sometimes take a screenshot for future ref. I then go into editor and right click on the object of interest and the right hand flyout gives info on what it is. You still need to do a bit of detective work to find the developer's name but this where TS Tools and its list of scenic items can aid. I then write it down in a notebook - developer/folder/object and if I took a screenshot write the details on a printout or in the pic title for future reference. Yes, it might take me up to 20 minutes of searching when I next want to use the object but it narrows down the search. I'm sure there are other ways but in the words of the song "I just haven't found you yet".

[tntrainer]

Thanks for the reply John,
I followed your methodology with one question. I assume in your first suggestion you were referring to opening the Railworks/Assets folder in a windows browser and using the search feature? I gave it a try on a generic word like "House" and got 797 results from the routes I have downloaded.

I can definitely see the second method being a help to me. Had not thought about flying through a route and "cherry picking" the assets I like and making a list. Good thought!

I'm wondering, from the perspective of a non computer code savvy person, where the difficulty lies in creating an asset viewer? Is it that only the Railworks program recognizes certain file types? Proprietary issues?

Obviously, the program is able to take the shapes and skins and turn it into a 3D object that is viewed in the program and editor. For the route creator, being able to scroll through a list of large thumbnails of assets on another monitor/computer, would be an excellent tool to speed up route creation and decorating.

Thanks, again,
George

[mindenjohn]

Scrolling thumbnails of scenery assets would be a great asset (sorry for the pun) but the problem is that there is (as far as I know) no location for the thumbnail. It could be a project for someone to establish, maintaining it would be a further project. Maybe one day....

Edit. Just a thought, some developers guard their scenic items very "jealously" for example using names which are deliberately inaccurate or (Rich Garber for example) using strange Hex/numeric coding to hide the object (look in the .bin file for a proper name). So those particular developers would probably not be happy for their items to be in such a folder, others more than happy welcoming the wider usage. Funny old world.

[Chacal]

The idea has been around for a long time. Mike integrated a thumbnails library for rolling stock in RWTools a decade ago.
It works, but only for a small subset of modelers who know about it, are willing to provide and maintain a thumbnail.

A real-time asset viewer would work around this problem. It would actually be a simplified graphics engine.
It would need to:
1- Open a route file and extract a list of all scenery assets with their properties, build a database from this list (XML would do nicely);
2- For each asset, retrieve the shape and textures, build the textured 3D object, place a camera and take a snapshot, add this to the database.
3- Save the database for future use.
This initial load would take a long time.

Then the program would show the database contents in a GUI, probably a web browser for simplicity.
The program would offer controls for filtering, sorting, etc.

Building this kind of application is doable but not trivial. With all the public code libraries out there, it wouldn't have to be coded entirely from scratch.

[Cardinal51]

Perhaps related, perhaps not. But at least it sounds promising , , , ,

I noticed there is a command line option -AssetViewer but have been unable to get any effect of using this option.

Does anyone have more information ?


PS: More info on command line options over at - viewtopic.php?f=6&t=11182&start=15#p277389