Stentec can you sail your OWN MADE boats in next sail sim 5?

[Barry]

We can make a variety of boats and ships, but at present only some can be got to float and none can be sailed. Those that can be put in the simulator still have to have the collision spheres fixed in wordpad or other boats will sail through any collision spheres put on with the Object Editor due to the unfixed fault.

Basically will the sail and motorboat sims stay as they are now to practice navigation and sailing skills, and for on-line racing, or are you developing it into a full sailing simulator, where you can sail your own made boats and create your own REALISTIC routes with vegetation, trees, etc.

For me there is now little interest in sailing one default boat that has the Stentec name on it, even on my own routes that have towns, docks, harbours, etc, but no trees or vegetation.
I would be interested in trying to create a range of sailing ships, such as the square riggers of years ago, etc for the types of routes I am interested in, with a busy animated scene.

I am now unable to get the alpha function to work with Blender in the 1.2. for trees etc in the motorboat version CD, although it did work when I first tested the 1.2.motorboat version and made a tree with Blender using te alpha function.

I have had no response about the various problems including the non moving water at times in the motorboat sim, and the edge of the waves being seen so the ground is visible as well whichever way I set the monitor screen height, etc. This also happens in the sailsim to a lesser degree.

Barry

[ajnasreddin]

I would also like to see more possibilities open up for the SailSim 5. Technically, with the faster machines of today, it would not be impossible to link maps together so that one could sail from one into the other. That would make sailing around the British Isle, for example, possible. Or think about sailing down the US East coast, or sailing around the Mediterranean!

I also don't see this as incompatible with Stentec's other areas, but would rather enhance them. One of the many doubts that I have about using a Nav program is being able to use them over vast distances. How would a program help if I couldn't use it to chart a course for an Atlantic passage? What's the point of training on a sim if it can't be done?

Also, a the Sail Cruiser 33 and the Volvos are nice, couldn't we have an option for something in between? I wouldn't mind being able to sail my own designs as well. Barry's sqaure riggers would be interesting, even if I would never sail them in real life.

[Barry]

May have another look at Virtual Sailor as there are some lovely boats on it all sailable and drivable made by third party.

Just not for me any longer, driving one default boat.
Have made routes with extensive docks, locks, and canals and that was in a train simulator plus drivable ships, boats and barges on fixed track, as well as about dozen routes with towns and docks for the Stentec simulator with over a hundred or so 3D items.

"IF" the functions are available in a simulator the users of the simulator can soon develop the ship, boats, square riggers, racing yachts, steamers, liners and submarines, plus all the coastal areas, inluding towns, villages, and vegetation. These need not be a drain on the frame rates, if made carefully, and I regard the coastal landscape of towns, villages and vegetation, ports, docks, and harbours, just as important for any realism.

Barry

[ajnasreddin]

I had a look at the web-site. Looks nice. Let me know more about it if you do get it and let me now what you think. I noticed the virtual Sailor Net has lots of different boats to download too.

About the frame rate - I was always puzzled about why Stentec depends on a frame rate for their sim. I know from my previous work in vedio production that a motion picture film, for example, uses a standard 24 frames per second. So if my sailsim shows me something like 73 fps (not with Altugs scenes of course!) then I just have to say to myself - What a waste!

Tell me what you think of the V-Sailor, Barry. Stay in touch.

AJ

[Barry]

Hello AJ.

Thanks for posting. Observation are just my own opinions.
Have had Virtual Sailor for a while now and I do keep having the occasional go with it, but although you can add models and make routes it appears to be too complex for me that side of it.

The Stentec sailsim only needs a few clicks of the mouse to install items into the route editor, and I can make some of them with Blender fairly easily. Basic routes can easily be made in the Stentec sims from dem data but we need to be able to work on them like in Trainz creating whatever we wish after the basic map is created.

The scenery in VS has some items such as houses, lighthouses, etc.
You can sail several boats at once but the sails are not realistic as they flick suddenly from one side to the other when changing course, etc.
but an excellent variety of 3rd party boats of all types on VS site and other sites. All sailable/drivable.

If we could just be able to sail our own made boats in the Stentec sail and motorboat sim and IF they improved the route editor so you could work on the route easily, after creating the dem map, plus vegetation it would be a lot better. But with little input from Stentec lately I don't know what the answer is. So near yet so far.

There is a demo of VS you can download from VS site, but lasts only for about 5 mins but you can keep restarting it to pick up from where you left off.

Barry