Help with AC3D and Rodeos video's

  • I have decided to attempt to make my own airport and have watched and read all the tutorials by Rodeo. I have made photo scenery and installed it into fs2. This worked perfectly. I then added the simple airport so it shows in the navigation screen. This also worked perfectly.

    After this I downloaded trial version of ac3d, 14 days to make my airport!!!!!

    I have followed the video tutorials and copied exactly what rodeo states and have imported the background image and orientated and sized it accordingly. Now here comes the problem, I add a mesh and use the settings rodeo gives in the video, the width of my runway is 30 metres so I put in 3000 by 3000 and press size to and it is absolutely massive. The other thing is it doesn't look like the mesh in the video which is half blue at the top and white at the bottom, mine is just one massive square of the same colour????

    My question is, am I missing some setting that needs to be enabled in ac3d which creates the mesh like rodeos. I am a complete beginner and starting from scratch and I know that rodeo says in the video's that some working knowledge is required but unfortunately I don't have any (yet).

    I am pleased with how far I have got but knew it was going to well.

    Any help appreciated.

    Thanks Grant.

  • Hi Grant,

    congratulations first that you went through all this stuff. it's an impressive performance for a beginner with these tough topics!

    There are no special settings required. So I suggest to get familiar with the mesh function in AC3D.

    Make sure you selected the top view window.

    Make sure to use mesh, not rectangle.

    Start with only 2 X sections and 2 Y sections and draw your mesh over the screen.

    Do you see the 4 rectangles of the mesh?

    Now adjust the size by entering 10 by 10 meters.

    Still everything ok?

    When you now try a runway with higher XY settings, make sure to enter the high values for the runway length, not the width.

    You can manually stretch the mesh before you enter your runway size, to have a better visual control.

    Good luck to you!

    Btw, Spit40 will soon publish a tool which allows runway design without entering a 3D tool like AC3D.

    Regards

    Rodeo

  • Hi Rodeo,

    Thanks for quick reply, I've got to dig my car out of the snow then ill give your tips a try.

    I was zoomed in too much which is why it appeared so big but I still can't get the mesh to have the top half blue and bottom white like yours. It's still one big square, I know I must be doing something wrong but ill give it another go.

    As previously said I've got 14 days of the trial so plenty time and maybe spit40 will release his magic gizmo before then.

    Thanks again Grant.

  • Hello again Rodeo,

    Sorry to bug you with this. I got the mesh working I think, it still didn't look like yours in the video tho????

    In any case I made the runway added the decals no numbers tho and added some buildings. I then completed the tsc file as per the vid.

    I then exported the .obj, .decals and .rwy. When I go to convert I get errors. I've attached the logfile if you could have a look and tell me what it means when you have a minute.

    Thanks again Grant.

  • Hi Grant,

    tm.log:

    converting geometry file './dundee__decals.tgi'

    ERROR: (file './dundee__decals.tgi' is NOT in tsc file. skipping file.)

    tsc file:

    <[tmsimulator_scenery_object][element][1]

    <[string8][type][decal]>

    <[string8][geometry][dundee_decal]>

    <[tmvector3d][position][-3.0226747 56.4525317]>

    >

    The naming is not the same: 1 or 2 underscores, decals vs decal.

    dundee__decals vs. dundee_decal

    Try to correct these 2 points and run t again.

    You'll succeed!

    Rodeo

  • Thanks Guys,

    Rodeo, I thought I had double checked the names, I think I was getting underscores mixed up from the naming in the hierarchy which is double and the naming in the tsc which is single.

    Steve, after you mentioned about the lights, you're right there's something amiss, I'll change it to standard lighting or no lighting if that doesn't work.

    Thanks again Gents, that's tomorrow's job when everyone's out of the house.

    Cheers Grant.

  • Hi Rodeo,

    Success at last, I re exported the decals and corrected the errors in the tsc and I now have an airport in the sim. The only problem is that only one building is shown in my airport and it has no textures just a black square. I made several buildings but they don't show at all. I also put two static planes in which have turned out fine.

    So for a first try I'm very pleased, the runway is slightly out of line but I know why so I'm going to delete it all and start from scratch again now that I sort of know what I'm doing.

    Thanks for your assistance Rodeo.

    Grant.

  • Hi Rodeo,

    Just a small update on the missing buildings, I found a forum topic by ed patino in which he also had missing buildings and you suggested changing the tsc file in the library folder in the main install location. Bingo !!!! it worked, all buildings now showing and my small airport is looking good.

    Next stop is taxiways and cultivation.

    Thanks Grant.