Tracks LA Canyons 1.2

[Phoenix77]

Most of Upper Big T is in effect.... A straight... After learning the track in some more "tame" cars.... Get in a LaFerrari, select a few LaFerrari's as opponents... Try and stick with them... If you keep up with them as far as the "junction" to Upper Big Tujunga Canyon Road... (The sharp right at the bottom of this hill)

You will easily get up to 200mph... It's more exciting and challenging than an actual straight... because it has some gentle bends.... Get it wrong though and kiss your wheels goodbye

I was thinking about doing the Silverstate... It would have turned out to be 4 stages of around 15 miles or 15km (can't remember which)
But overall, it would have been a bit boring apart from the Narrows section.
I may still do that at a later date... But it's no-where near the road that this and PCH are.

If you're not taking Upper Big T's corners at 140mph+ you haven't learnt it well enough (and that's with keeping it between the white lines)

(In real life, in no way should you do anywhere near this speed, Obviously)

 

[acrox999]

I died countless of times here. I love cruising on this map but it's just too tempting to floor it. I tried loading some AIs but it seems that Track Day isn't supported?

 

[Terry Rock]

Looks very promising.
This was always a fun road to drive when I lived in California, so I'll take it.
It's a massive undertaking.
Have you considered joining up with another track developer to get some help?

 

[Phoenix77]

I died countless of times here. I love cruising on this map but it's just too tempting to floor it. I tried loading some AIs but it seems that Track Day isn't supported?

Yes it is way too tempting to floor it... That's what I kept doing while trying to record a reasonably decent AI line... Either flooring it... or drifting where I probably shouldn't have
I haven't recorded a Pit Lane yet... as I have to put in the large "pit" area....
Where a lot of Matt Farah, from "The Smoking Tire" videos on Youtube starts.
This version was only supposed to be a small test for trying out some textures for Pacific Coast... then I got a little bit carried away and it became a proof of concept for something much bigger lol

I'd recommend trying an F1 car for a few laps... The large amount of downforce should help keep you on track long enough to learn the layout and the rhythm of it... Just try and drive it at 8 or 9/10's mate

During testing I found that after I completed around 10+ laps the layout seems pretty easy.

 

[Phoenix77]

Looks very promising.
This was always a fun road to drive when I lived in California, so I'll take it.
It's a massive undertaking.
Have you considered joining up with another track developer to get some help?

Thanks, yes there is PLENTY of work to do here, and if anyone wants to offer any help I'm more than happy with that...

Pacific Coast is my dedication to my Brother... So for that track I'd prefer to attempt to do it all myself... But with the Canyons, if anyone would like to get involved I'm more than happy with that.

After going back to Pacific's next update I've already learnt a few things that will help the Canyons when I get to look at it (hopefully in 2 - 3 weeks) and where they are both in California, any trees, bushes etc I'm about to make for Pacific... Should translate to the Canyons... So work on either track, is work on the other one

Until then, I hope you have some fun with it in it's current stage Terry

 

[Phoenix77]

When I get the time, I'll do what I've done with the road on Pacific Coast and line up the road spline to this super high resolution satellite image (65536, 65536 pixels).
As you can see, the roads centreline is clearly visible (and I've had to scale down this section to upload to RD).

This will still not be high enough resolution detail for the terrain diffuse... But will be really useful to get a high...ish res mask for the detail textures.

 

[scoobywrxfan555]

even tho i love the pacific coast track, this is the one im looking forward too most

 

[Phoenix77]

even tho i love the pacific coast track, this is the one im looking forward too most

Cheers Scoob... The best way to look at it is (I'm looking at it this way to keep my track making morale up lol) Even if it appears not a lot of progress has been made on LAC... It actually has... Thanks to Pacific.

Now I have some pretty good terrain textures coming through the diffuse, and have learnt many... tricks... even without grass or bushes, these terrain textures take it to another level... and will be easily applicable to all my tracks... including the unreleased ones, as they're all in California.. The Canyons, The Snake, Bixby Creek PCH, Latigo Canyon Road... Having a collection of props will help no end

Also work at combining all the roadsigns into more compact billboard textures (I didn't really know about these when I started out) will be applicable to the Canyons, as it will help keep it more optimal... Which will be seriously needed when all the foliage goes in.

And as they will be sorted before I even place one single sign... That will hopefully save any future back-tracking, which I've done quite a lot of, as I learn. Hopefully I will finish my multiple bush/grass objects sometime over the holidays... and will start scattering them everywhere.

The LAC terrain mesh is going to require quite a bit of extra work though, as I will be refining where the roads have intersections... and the road width will have to get quite a bit narrower for these 'extra' roads.

 

[Phoenix77]

Ok, this isn't the Canyons... But shows nicely the textures and mask settings that will be getting applied to LA Canyons early in 2018. I've learnt a few things

By the time I next work on LAC, I will also have some nice bushes, grass and weeds.

 

[Hachiroku_88PL]

Astonishing progress, you sir are amazing

 

[Phoenix77]

Astonishing progress, you sir are amazing

Cheers mate
Thing is... The speed you drive along here... You might not notice it as much lol
The sense of speed has gone up massively, even without the bushes!

 

[Phoenix77]

Happy Christmas to anyone following this thread... Hope you're all having a great time... Hope to see some of you online for a cruise one day soon

 

[digital1nk]

Both this and Pacific Coast are probably my favorite cruise tracks in all games, keep the good work man.

 

[millen]

Looks really really good. Great work.
How big is your mask texture? or have you broken it up into lots of smaller ones for more detail?

 

[Phoenix77]

Both this and Pacific Coast are probably my favorite cruise tracks in all games, keep the good work man.

Thanks Digital, that's nice to know mate
It should be quite interesting to see the next version... I've learnt quite a bit since I last worked on LAC... I've got quite a few reasonable props made up... and I have some even more awesome scripts to use now.

 

[Phoenix77]

Looks really really good. Great work.
How big is your mask texture? or have you broken it up into lots of smaller ones for more detail?

Thanks mate
I was thinking about doing separate UVW unwraps.... But I'm a bit of a UV'in newb... and also a 4k mask seems to work pretty much ok... especially when the colours are smudged into each other... I could have gone anywhere from 65,536 x 65,536... lol
But have discovered the KS Editor doesn't like anything much more than 12k.

To get 3DS's viewport canvas to work smoothly enough.... I pro-optimised the crap out of the terrain, and went for 2k mask IIRC. Then I'm mixing the viewport canvas'd mask... with the real life, colour separated mask, and overlaying them together. One roughly aligned, one more accurately aligned (nearer any roads).
I will then blur the mask back into the diffuse colourmap as the terrain gets a km or 2 from any roads. At the moment the colourmap is 2k as well, again I have the option to go much higher, and I might go to 4k, all depends how it looks in the distance.

While pro-optimising the crap out of the terrain (only for terrain painting scene obviously)
I'm also considering LOD'ing the terrain panels.. So distant terrain panels are much lower poly... All 23km's of optimised terrain comes in about 80,000 polys (the full terrain is about 400 - 500,000 IIRC)... Modifying it back that far does make a few gaps. So not ideal close up... But I could weld the gaps and they should work for distant terrain

That might hopefully gain a few FPS and allow for more bushes. we shall see

 

[Phoenix77]

Just for a heads up... @correca has been nice enough to temporarily host an LA Canyons sever... Amazing fun trying to complete a lap

If you see this, and you and a few friends fancy a challenge. search for 'canyon'
Currently has 8 each of Merc SLS's, Porsche 911 R's and Ferrari 488 GTB's
Good luck making it round

Another heads up... I think I might have positioned the start line 'gates' a bit off.. when you take the final turn... to complete the lap... keep your car between the white lines (otherwise acs.exe can lockup)... apologies for the ---- up.

You can recognise the final turn by the lollipop guys.

 

[Gunja]

Perfect length (that's what she said), perfect layout for taking the most pleasure out of driving. I'm so in love with this track. I like how you manage to get the road mark lines (white and yellow) to be so clear in the distance on both your tracks. It makes such a difference in VR. I don't know if it's a texture thing or a setting in ksEditor but it is a rare thing not to have blur lines in the distance, except with your tracks.
A small issue i would like to report.
While we were having fun on 32 slots server, a friend tried to join with a Lambo Performante that had slot #26 (25 if you count slot #0 as 1) and when his car spawned, it was violently dropped to the ground and had broken suspension. He tried to rejoin few times with same result and we concluded it is most likely pit position issue. No one else had such issues but we did not drive all cars from each of 32 slots.
I was told it is a dangerous place and to be careful.
Some others didn't get such priceless advice

 

[Phoenix77]

Perfect length (that's what she said), perfect layout for taking the most pleasure out of driving. I'm so in love with this track. I like how you manage to get the road mark lines (white and yellow) to be so clear in the distance on both your tracks. It makes such a difference in VR. I don't know if it's a texture thing or a setting in ksEditor but it is a rare thing not to have blur lines in the distance, except with your tracks.
A small issue i would like to report.
While we were having fun on 32 slots server, a friend tried to join with a Lambo Performante that had slot #26 (25 if you count slot #0 as 1) and when his car spawned, it was violently dropped to the ground and had broken suspension. He tried to rejoin few times with same result and we concluded it is most likely pit position issue. No one else had such issues but we did not drive all cars from each of 32 slots.
I was told it is a dangerous place and to be careful.
Some others didn't get such priceless advice

Cheers Gunja,
Glad you're liking the track, and glad the length is perfect
The road's texture has a normal map which might help the lines be more visible in the distance.. The Fresnel NM shader is used atm around the canyons... and seems to work pretty well... Ideally in future I'll make a separate object for the centreline, raise it up a cm or so, and it should be even clearer. But I'm glad it's working well for you at the moment.

Thanks for reporting the issue, I would look into that... But all the pits will be moving in the next version anyway.
This area near the start will be used as the pits in future... And is the start location of a number of Matt Farah's 'The Smoking Tire' videos.

As you can see by the blue car... I'll be able to fit most, if not all of the cars on that piece of tarmac.
For any future traffic version / free roams... I'll add plenty of these types of parking areas around the track.
As there are plenty dotted about along the real roads.

I'm also going to be extending Angeles Crest Highway (Hwy 2) quite drastically...
I'm also considering putting in the road that leads to Mt Wilson... Starting at the Red Box Gap.
And Big Tujunga Canyon Rd that intersects with the Angeles Forest Highway.... and a few others.
Plenty of roads to disappear down if police chases occur... also plenty of different layout options.

Also there are a few corners on my track that are, in reality, junctions...

This one is on Angeles Crest Highway, right on to Angeles Forest Highway

Then this one is a right, from Angeles Forest Highway... on to Upper Big Tujunga Canyon Road

And then finally this one (at the moment is a high speed over crest), from Upper Big Tujunga Canyon Road.. Back on to Angeles Crest Highway to complete the lap.

That's a funny video clip lol
Another bit of advice I should have given... Sometimes it's easy to get complacent while trying to follow someone around these roads

 

[guidofoc]

I finally gave your track a proper run last night on the Streetfight server with a few other (competent) guys, @Gunja etc. What a blast! As much as I love Pacific Coast, this is next level! The super long twisty road, the mountains in the distance, the desert.. it's just you and the road. We drove our cars close to the limit while trying to stay in our lane, it just never ends, danger is hiding behind next corner, the wide tarmac tricks you into over-confident driving and there you are, over the cliff.. flying. Fantastic. While Pacific Coast is a good driving experience even alone with its narrow twisty road, LA Canyons needs multiplayer, it's something to enjoy with other people at full speed. Great job!