Track Conversion To Assetto Corsa: General Discussion

[LilSKi]

When in AC driving, I can see a wave on the edge of the track where the bumps occur. Found a few more. In Blender I assumed it would be the areas I "patched up", but they are in the middle of sections that are straight; for the most part. I can get you a link in a minute.

Couple of issues here. I'll sort them out and show it here.

 

[Ricardo Rey]

I want to thank @LilSKi once again. Any work you see posted that I have done the track mesh updates on; all the credit should go to @LilSKi, because he is the one who taught me how to smooth the tracks and has helped offline as well. I simply followed his advice and listened to his council. I can't thank you enough.

 

[Ricardo Rey]

Taking a break from working on Mexico track for a few days, I thought I would get back to this section.
Get Permission to convert.

Evaluating a track (Suggestions, revisions, comments welcome)

Before you go about getting permission, there is nothing wrong with taking a peak under the hood to see what your in for. Some tracks are just not worth the trouble for several reasons. I loaded an old GPL scratch track and found that the track was very broken. I didn't want to bother. Doing a conversion right is not necessarily easy.

But first, ask yourself why you want to convert the track and would it be of interest to you or anyone else. Research to see if a new version is in the works. I have converted a few tracks for personal use knowing that it was not what anyone else would care about. Is it mainly for online racing...etc.

Using 3DSIMED, import the track. If it has a SKYBOX, right click, then hide, object, skybox, to move it out of the way. There may be collision walls as well that you can hide. Zoom in and look around to see whats there. Next Go to DISPLAY > WIREFRAME. This will give you an idea of the mesh and what will be needed to clean it up.

After evaluating, think about how much time you want to spend, at minimum smoothing the track mesh, maybe some texture updates. From here make a list of what you work will be. If you are satisfied, next step; getting ready for conversion.

 

[Ricardo Rey]

What is the best way to extract the track mesh from the file? I would assume Blender.

 

[Ricardo Rey]

3DSIMED question:

There is an option to rename textures on export. I have tried Yes & No and not sure that it makes a difference.

 

[Ricardo Rey]

· How to choose a track.
· How to evaluate the quality of the track using various tools.
· Creating a plan, a workflow including tools and resources.
· How to begin the conversion process. Folder structure, etc.
· How to extract the track mesh to smooth track. How to add back the track.
· How to update textures
· How to do “surgery” on broken parts.
· How to get your track conversion in AC.

From the outline above, we are now at the update texture stage and starts to get over my head at the moment.
So basically, have a tutorial that completes all of the above except update textures.

I have spent most of today working with the editor and photoshop. This part may take me a while because a lot of it is new to me. Or, we could point this part to the tutorials here on texturing, like will be the case for smoothing the track which is @LilSKi's tutorial.

I still have a question in my head about how much to do in 3DSIMEd and what to do in Blender. 3dsimed definitely has it's drawbacks and limitations, but is easier visually on a few things. It has crashed on me with larger projects.
Hope to have it all wrapped up soon.
Cheers!

 

[Johnr777]

Is there anything in photoshop that's stumping you?

 

[Ricardo Rey]

Is there anything in photoshop that's stumping you?

It's kind of you to ask. Thanks!

I'm beginning to wonder if any detail needs to be added to the tutorial regarding texturing. It's probably it's own tutorial and already a few around here. I think I will write a draft and see what you guys think.

As for me personally, I've realized I need to learn a lot more, at least what it takes to make an AC track shine. So, I know I will have questions.. Currently fumbling my way around the kseditor, and at the moment, making it worse, . I watched the Kunos video and reading the sections here.

I will let you know.

Many thanks

 

[Johnr777]

Haha, no problem!

kseditor has its flaws and limitations, but I think it's an amazing tool to have! Having a realtime preview to what the shaders are going to look like in game makes life very easy

 

[Ricardo Rey]

Haha, no problem!

kseditor has its flaws and limitations, but I think it's an amazing tool to have! Having a realtime preview to what the shaders are going to look like in game makes life very easy

I agree. I finally got through a whole track and looks pretty good in-game. Only to find I had missed some small objects here and there. I basically mimic what looks good in other stuff and will figure out what it means later.

For me, getting some accomplishment, then going, oh, I see what that does, also teaches me what it means and the change effects. usually it's like what's this do, like stepping into the drivers seat of instrument panel for the first time. I have always been a very basic Photoshop person. I know how to save a .DDS file etc., but I want to learn all the other exotic things. Like the road skid effects and wavy sign banners...layers, channels...

 

[Ricardo Rey]

I have a question about material naming. In the image below, the track and pit are 1 section, even after splitting objects by material. Since AC needs a pit road, will it make any difference If the starting straight is prefixed 1pit?

 

[luchian]

Yes, because you will have limited speed on the pitlane.
So any surface with the name will have limited speed.

 

[Ricardo Rey]

Yes, because you will have limited speed on the pitlane.
So any surface with the name will have limited speed.[/QUOT

.

Forgot about that. Thanks! Again, this is the walk-through for conversion tut

 

[Ricardo Rey]

I'm wondering the best way to set collision walls in conversions to keep from going into space/off track map, without having to actually do too much work; if possible. Also, with buildings. I think there may be a setting in 3dsimed to do some of this before export.

EDIT: I may have figured it out for buildings...

 

[DrDoomsLab]

Hi there,

I find that i use 3Dsimed mainly for exporting / a few small changes. I also use some other tools. I then use 3dsmax as that what i learned at uni long ago. With parts of the road you need to splitt its a lot easyer in a proper 3d editing program i find. Just select the mesh then edit and select one part or the road mesh, the pit side lets say, and splitt that to another mesh. Then name it all.

With collisions the dirty and quick way is to just select the wall objects and call them 1WALL but really you should make a very simple mesh thats invisible, running along where the walls are. You then have this as a separate kn5 model. But im jumping the gun a bit there.

I've been thinking of doing a video tutorial for a while now but im not very good at any of it and am trying to find a track that someone will let me do a conversion on and a tutorial, well its been tuff.

Cheers,
DrDoomsLab.

 

[Ricardo Rey]

With collisions the dirty and quick way is to just select the wall objects and call them 1WALL but really you should make a very simple mesh thats invisible, running along where the walls are. You then have this as a separate kn5 model. But im jumping the gun a bit there.

Hi, Thanks for responding.
Yeah, since I posted this I found that using the 1WALL is probably best for these conversion. Been trying to write this tut for a while.

Let me know if you post videos, would love to see them!

Cheers,

 

[Ricardo Rey]

Is this the correct setting for 3dsimed export (going from kn5)? It seems to be wrong when I import to Blender then to editor in fbx. I did not have this problem before.

 

[Pixelchaser]

you want control point vertices and for Assetto corsa you don't need vertex rgb,

 

[Ricardo Rey]

you want control point vertices and for Assetto corsa you don't need vertex rgb,

Thank you!

 

[Ricardo Rey]

The track conversion tutorial is almost ready for review. I will try and have a draft done in the next few days. The process is actually quite simple to convert. The real work is in your 3d program and adding the right shaders in the editor.

Cheers