Snow accessories, Tank cars, and Caboose

The silence on my blog is deafening, but that usually means I have my head down in a task, or in this case many tasks. I won't cover all the QA work I have done with MadMike, but there are several new repaints available up on RWA for the RS3/RSD5 and 40 and 50 foot box cars. What I have been doing is improving upon my knowledge of 3D modeling and have created a number of child objects to enhance the models found in RW to make them more prototypical. Let me start with the model which has given me the most frustration repainting. Which is venerable Southern Pacific bay window caboose. It was back in June that I dropped this repainting project because there were simply too many windows on the model. I tried to work with the creator, but nothing ever came out of our conversations. As you can tell, I have corrected the problem myself by creating  flat "plate" child object to cover the windows as I need. The second modification is from RWA member Kali, who has created a handy lightweight library to move the auto numbering around the model. I now have them placed where I need them (even over the doors). Additionally I added a point light object to the frog light. Finally I added a few child model details like the cylinder under the bay sides, and the vent on the upper side of the caboose. I still have a few more details to work out before releasing this refit. Remember that you will need to purchase the base model from BLLW if you want to see this in game.

Next item which will soon be released is a SP tank car based on the Kuju default model. Thanks goes out to Pete Willard for his fantastic fonts which add even more detail to this repaint, and also to Kali, because I used his library to change the number textures, and their placement on the model. There is just a bit left to do on this model, and I plan to include a weathered version. I should be releasing this sometime in the next couple weeks.

In preparation for Donner, MadMike and I went a bit overboard and started repainting the GP38-2. Mike did the base repaint and weathering, and I added the snow gear (window grill, breaker bar). With luck this model should be coming out some time this week.

Finally, I have switched from using Google Sketchup to 3D Crafter completely. Thanks goes out to SMMDigitat and GreatNortherner out on RWA for presenting me with some tutorials, and getting me to think out of the box on this. Here is another refit that MadMike and I are working on. It needs some ditch lights and a few other odds and ends.