• Welcome to PiBoSo Official Forum. Please login or sign up.
 
March 29, 2024, 09:38:49 AM

News:

GP Bikes beta21c available! :)


Isle Of Man

Started by Reactive, December 26, 2013, 11:35:21 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

PiBoSo

Quote from: Storris on April 11, 2016, 08:25:17 PM
Having the data & funding crowd sourced, will simply save you the costs of developing for other titles, so I hope you can sort of see how this project will be to your benefit.  If you believe it is, then I'd really appreciate the input from actual developers such as yourself.

If you are serious and can successfully find the funding, this would for sure beneficial to the TT simulator, because it would spare us a tedious Kickstarter campaign and the pressure deriving from being under the public eye so early in development ( not to talk about the almost sure backlash from announcing a new project while 4 mores are already in development ).
"La perfezione non è il nostro obiettivo, è la nostra tendenza".

Storris

I don't plan on having rewards for backers other than the knowledge that they have brought themselves one step closer to racing on the TT course.   However, if we succeed with minimum funding we will look to the stretch goals of hiring developers to build tracks.  I haven't got details of this finalised yet, so there is no concrete information to give.

I know for a fact that I am willing to donate simply to make the data available, and I am receiving plenty of support so far, but whether enough people feel as I do will only be answered by doing the project.  We will see in ~60 days how successful it is.

The scanning company undoubtedly has what is needed to create the mesh, but they will also have to clean the point cloud first.  This will undoubtedly add costs, but it could be added as a stretch goal.  I'll have to wait until office hours for information from the scanners before trying to make this decision.

If PiBoSo were willing to support this project as the 'official' 2-wheel track builder, then I think it would be a great incentive for 2-wheel sim racers to add their own support to it.

Vini

April 11, 2016, 10:14:51 PM #287 Last Edit: April 11, 2016, 10:17:07 PM by vin97
Quote from: PiBoSo on April 11, 2016, 09:23:10 PMWhat makes you think that someone would donate to laser scan the Mountain Course without the direct support of a developer / modder with the time and skills to actually model and texture the whole circuit?
I would, because I know that there are enough skilled modders out there who will do just that (including you, I hope).

Quote from: PiBoSo on April 11, 2016, 09:23:10 PMAlso, please note that not all simulators / games may be capable of loading a 60km track.
Well, that's up to you, isn't it? :P


...Just saying, I don't care who opens up a kickstarter or who ends up doing the work, I just want a rideable 3D model of the IOM.
As long as the model will be freely available to anyone, I will donate.

PiBoSo

April 11, 2016, 10:17:52 PM #288 Last Edit: April 11, 2016, 10:21:39 PM by PiBoSo
Quote from: Storris on April 11, 2016, 10:05:49 PM
I don't plan on having rewards for backers other than the knowledge that they have brought themselves one step closer to racing on the TT course.   However, if we succeed with minimum funding we will look to the stretch goals of hiring developers to build tracks.  I haven't got details of this finalised yet, so there is no concrete information to give.

I know for a fact that I am willing to donate simply to make the data available, and I am receiving plenty of support so far, but whether enough people feel as I do will only be answered by doing the project.  We will see in ~60 days how successful it is.

The scanning company undoubtedly has what is needed to create the mesh, but they will also have to clean the point cloud first.  This will undoubtedly add costs, but it could be added as a stretch goal.  I'll have to wait until office hours for information from the scanners before trying to make this decision.

If PiBoSo were willing to support this project as the 'official' 2-wheel track builder, then I think it would be a great incentive for 2-wheel sim racers to add their own support to it.

There already is a person working on the TT ( trackside objects, textures, shaders, ... ), so no additional developers are needed on this side ;)
Kickstarter suggests a 30 days campaign... 60 are maybe too much.

Official support may be tough call. If we are to be actively involved in the campaign and announce our project, then we could as well do our own campaign...
Exactly what kind of "support" would you expect?

P.S. Please note that we already planned to add at least one car for those that are not into motorcycles, so our simulator will not be two and three-wheels only  ;)
P.P.S. If you are serious about the project, feel free to contact via PM or email, in case you feel a public forum is not the best place for further discussion
"La perfezione non è il nostro obiettivo, è la nostra tendenza".

Storris

All that would be needed from you is an explicit statement that you will be using the scan as part of your TT Simulator.  If I can get the same statement from one of the big 4-wheel sims, or a well known independent developer, then we should be pretty much ready for the tyre smoke. 8)

You could go with your own campaign, you'll be building your own track whoever funds the scan, but your work, and your backers hard-earned money, will be ported to other titles at some point soon afterwards.  This way represents an opportunity for the whole sim racing community to be involved in creating something that all of us want to see.

As an incentive, as an Isle of Man resident I might be able to help in arranging & attending meetings & discussions between yourselves and the Department of Tourism, if you were looking to get official licensing.  CAn't say I'd make much difference to any outcome, but I'm here.

RiccoChicco

April 11, 2016, 10:57:44 PM #290 Last Edit: April 11, 2016, 11:00:10 PM by RiccoChicco
The idea is great on the paper and donate for this project will be a pleasure. But some points need to be clarified :

- Do you have any guarantee that the IOM government will allow laser scanning?
- How can we be sure that the track will not get in a big investor hands without any ability for bakers to get a hand on the laserscan?
- How do you plan to manage the track licensing between modders providing IOM for free and some developers selling it?

If all of that is clear for everyone, my Paypal account is ready  ;D

EDIT : Polyphony Digital was at IOM nearly 2 years ago to laserscan the track. We don't have any more informations yet but maybe something is not that far from release from them. Of course it won't be open source.

PiBoSo

Quote from: RiccoChicco on April 11, 2016, 10:57:44 PM
The idea is great on the paper and donate for this project will be a pleasure. But some points need to be clarified :

- Do you have any guarantee that the IOM government will allow laser scanning?
- How can we be sure that the track will not get in a big investor hands without any ability for bakers to get a hand on the laserscan?
- How do you plan to manage the track licensing between modders providing IOM for free and some developers selling it?

If all of that is clear for everyone, my Paypal account is ready  ;D

EDIT : Polyphony Digital was at IOM nearly 2 years ago to laserscan the track. We don't have any more informations yet but maybe something is not that far from release from them. Of course it won't be open source.

Very good points.
"La perfezione non è il nostro obiettivo, è la nostra tendenza".

Storris

April 12, 2016, 12:26:13 AM #292 Last Edit: April 12, 2016, 12:40:03 AM by Storris
Quote from: RiccoChicco on April 11, 2016, 10:57:44 PM
- Do you have any guarantee that the IOM government will allow laser scanning?
The TT course is a public road so the rules are the same as for any other road user.  There will be official assurances of this before the campaign goes live next week.

Quote
- How can we be sure that the track will not get in a big investor hands without any ability for backers to get a hand on the laserscan?
If there were any big investors ready to do this, the KickStarter would not be necessary.  Also, when the campaign goes live it will include the contract/invoice between the campaign and the scanning company with relevant links & contact information for anyone to check.  The KickStarter will state explicitly that the results of the scan are open, freely available to everyone that wants them.  There will be file hosting, there will be back-ups, there will be redundancy.  There will be no opportunity for the data to be hoarded by wayward megalomaniacs.

Quote
- How do you plan to manage the track licensing between modders providing IOM for free and some developers selling it? 
By not managing it.  The only job of this campaign is to have the TT track scanned.  The resultant data will be let loose for people to do with as they wish, free of charge until it becomes redundant, or until the heat death of the universe.  What people choose to do with it, will be up to them.  I can only guarantee that tracks will be made if I can secure the cooperation of partners such as PiBoSo.  I cannot guarantee that they or anyone else will provide content for free.  But, I can guarantee that it is in the interests of track builders to get their products into the community's hands, & it is in the interests of the community to have track builders.  A balance will be found between the two.

Reactive

April 12, 2016, 02:09:18 AM #293 Last Edit: April 12, 2016, 01:26:54 PM by Reactive
Quote from: PiBoSo
There already is a person working on the TT ( trackside objects, textures, shaders, ... ), so no additional developers are needed on this side ;)
Very good motivation for everybody who had waited for modeling, thanks.
Excuse my English, its not my native.
Ryzen7 1800x / Aorus GA-AX370 Gaming K7 / Hynix 16Gb x2 2993MHz / Samsung 960PRO 512 M.2 / nVidia GTX1060 6Gb / Windows 10 pro x64

Grooveski

Had a mess around and got those GPS laps in as an editable 3D spline suitable for extruding along in any modeler.
In LW they're great but for some reason when I export they're being broken into a bunch of bits.  ???
Still - joining half a dozen splines together is a triviality compared to redrawing one of this length so here they are for anyone who may want to play with them.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/7e2xa4mg4lizk0a/Isle%20of%20Man%20TT%20course%20Splines.rar?dl=0

DWG format (.3ds and .fbx don't support splines)

HornetMaX

Quote from: Storris on April 11, 2016, 10:05:49 PM
Quote from: PiBoSo on April 11, 2016, 09:23:10 PM
Could you please write what do you plan to give as reward to the Kickstarter campaign backers?
I don't plan on having rewards for backers other than the knowledge that they have brought themselves one step closer to racing on the TT course. 

Quote from: Storris on April 12, 2016, 12:26:13 AM
Quote
- How do you plan to manage the track licensing between modders providing IOM for free and some developers selling it? 
By not managing it. The only job of this campaign is to have the TT track scanned.  The resultant data will be let loose for people to do with as they wish, free of charge until it becomes redundant, or until the heat death of the universe.

Best answers ever. This is open spirit to its best, I really praise your approach.

Get it scanned and make the data public. Each developer will be able to use it how he/she wants.

It's a great initiative and a facepalm to all the "locked content" guys.

I have to agree with Piboso though: going from a point cloud to a track is not trivial, especially for that kind of size.
But challenges are what smart devs look for, so we should be good here :)

Keep us posted, I guess your KS campaign will have some money coming from this forum.


Hawk

Quote from: Grooveski on April 12, 2016, 03:35:38 AM
Had a mess around and got those GPS laps in as an editable 3D spline suitable for extruding along in any modeler.
In LW they're great but for some reason when I export they're being broken into a bunch of bits.  ???
Still - joining half a dozen splines together is a triviality compared to redrawing one of this length so here they are for anyone who may want to play with them.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/7e2xa4mg4lizk0a/Isle%20of%20Man%20TT%20course%20Splines.rar?dl=0

DWG format (.3ds and .fbx don't support splines)

With Matty's help I got the GPS data into .fbx format. I was then able to import that file into Maya and it's looking good!  ;D

I'm in the process now of correctly scaling it by copying a curve from the track edge - offsetting that curve so it's in the centre of the road and then I'll group everything together and scale the length of that curve up to 37.73 miles. That will give me an accurate scale for the length of the track surface.

Then I'm going to export that into a .map and .trp file and then load it into TrackED to get the centreline drawn, but this could be the big problem... Firstly, creating a track centreline that big will be a long and a laborious process with no guarantee of success at the end of it? From what I remember the max limit for the number of centreline segments was removed but I'm not sure about that, maybe someone can confirm that?

Hawk.

Grooveski

April 12, 2016, 12:09:51 PM #297 Last Edit: April 12, 2016, 12:13:04 PM by Grooveski
Yeah, I saw the BTB moidel.

The line I popped up is scaled(if you're looking for a size reference).  It's also slightly rotated to OS grid north to suit map backdrops.  Maya should load it (being an Autodesk product).
Was more for the offchance that your test works and you were maybe looking to re-loft to tweak/smooth the model and create verges.   :)
(and partly curiosity - I'd never done a lat/long import before).

Good luck with the test.  ;)

HornetMaX

If it's GPS data, I'm not sure how precise it will be in terms of height. Height provided by GPS is a bit of a mess.

Incidentally, I'm working on a side project for which I'm outputting GPS coordinates from GPB :)

Storris

Quote from: HornetMaX on April 12, 2016, 12:16:11 PM
If it's GPS data, I'm not sure how precise it will be in terms of height. Height provided by GPS is a bit of a mess.

A cursory look at the data shows it to be mostly accurate.  This is probably smartphone GPS though, so there will be a larger margin than from dedicated GPS devices, but it is still good :)  There are literally hundreds of these data traces available so any discrepancies should be easily remedied.