Belated hello

Hello everyone,
I have lurked for quite some time and posted a little but forgot to post here.


I am in the UK and stepping gingerly into my fifth decade. In real life I'm an automotive engineer. I worked as an aerodynamicist for many years but for the last four I've been involved in fuel economy. I've used CAD at work, mainly Catia, but can't justify a licence for it at home so took up Blender last year. I completed my first tutorial in March '16



It looks a bit like the one in the book :S

Blender impressed me with it's ability to morph objects but at the same time frustrates me that real world units are such an after thought and it's so hard to work with much precision.

I came to this forum and followed the build your first track thread and created a very simple but working circuit with pits, timing, ai, and cameras. Thanks guys

Anyway, I wanted to make a version of the Trac Mon circuit in Anglesey but then I found a thread on RD so decided to make a circuit around my hometown.



I'd got the road all laid out by sweeping a profile curve along another curve but made a bit of a mess of it, so after reading more posts I decided to re-do the road by the plane --> array --> curve method. To check that method I started looking at a short hill climb. Finishing projects has always been an issue.



Sometime in the future I want to look at the physics for the car mods. I could use some of my real life expertise there, but I'm resisting the urge to start yet another project.

If I get any of these projects close to releasable I'll start WIP threads, until then I'll carry on lurking and learning.

WW

 

howdy,hi and welcome Willy Wale. I'm an old git too. btw if you register for discreet as a student you can have fun on any of their stuff for a full 3 years, its all automated too, no questions asked.

Anglesey would be a great little project, I'm sure their is LIDAR for that. there are no trees to model. just COWS ! moooo ! and because the Cows ate al the grass, it doesn't need 3d grass haha.

 

There is LIDAR for the hills nearby but not for the circuit. However, I do have the OS Mastermap which gives the track edges and has a dozen or so spot heights. In combination with the contours on the regular OS map I've got enough points to make a good go of it. The chap over on RD hasn't posted any updates for a while so I'm biding my time.

 

that's a shame. having lidar ensures minimal discrepancy, I'm sure it will be available soon. from experience, nothing compares.

 

There is the OS Terrain 50 dataset. Resolution is a bit rough (50m spacing)



Needs lining up properly of course.