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| July 17,
2005 |
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Train
Artisan Goes to the NRHS with the 4449!
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Portland
is starting to become a second home to
us!
We
went back out to Portland for the National
Railway Historical Society Convention.
Lots of activity on this trip as we got
to tag along with the SP 4449 crew while
they participated in several activites
for the convention.
First
up, a rare and historic double-header
trip to Wishram led by the SP&S
700 and SP 4449. We needed more pacing
and chase shots of the locomotives for
the documentary we are shooting so we
paired up with SP 4449 crew member, Richard
"Durango" Hie and his Hot-rod
Monte Carlo for a white-knuckle train
chase.
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But
first, we needed to take Doyle McCormack,
the SP4449 engineer, and Pat Tracy,
the fireman, to the locomotive. Everybody
in the car was in a good mood as we
made our way to Union Station from the
Brooklyn Roundhouse early in the morning...
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Durango
has the reputation for being an aggressive
train-chaser and we got a lot of
great dynamic pacing shots using the
power of the Monte Carlo and
Durango's driving to pan and dolly around
the locomotives as they raced at speeds
near 60 mph towards Wishram.
All of the video we took on this trip
was in 1080i High Definition
video - at 1920 x 1080 pixels per frame,
we're gonna have some great, detailed
footage.
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Oops!
Maybe we were too aggressive...Fortunately,
the cops were after someone else!
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Unfortunately,
our fun with the Monte Carlo came to an
end, not because of a traffic ticket,
but because a seal tore off of the transmission.
She didn't sound too good....On the way
back from Wishram, we were fortunate enough
to go with Jerry, Vicki, and JJ
and film some runbys
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We're
finally back - the locomotives each
take a turn on the turntable to go back
into the roundhouse.
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The
Next day, the crew was busy preparing
for an exclusive night shoot
of the locomotives at the roundhouse.
Everything was polished up from the
stream locos to all of the diesels to
even the PA...
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Nice
and shiny - everything was ready for
the exclusive night shoot. After the
photo session, there was an even more
exclusive night shoot of the PA
near 2:30 in the morning - those
shots were for a possible magazine
spread.
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The
next day was the roundhouse tour with
both the SP 4449 and the SP&S
700 taking turns on the turntable
and posing for the bus loads of people
arriving for the tour. We were in the
cab for the morning as Doyle ran the
locomotive. We also experimented with
tiny wireless cameras and attached
them on various parts of the 4449. We're
going to have some interesting and unique
footage...
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We
were also invited by Jim Abney,
the president of the SP&S 700
to ride along in the cab with engineer
Greg Kamholz.
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More
pictures can be found at www.SP4449.com,
under the NRHS section. Don't forget
to also check-out www.orhf.org
Our
thanks go out to the crew, once again!
It was great fun! Now, its time to edit
all of that video!!!
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| June 16,
2005 |
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Train
Artisan Goes Cruisin' with the 4449!
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Ahh!
Another trip with the crew of the GS4
4449.
This
time, the locomotive when to a classic
car and hot rod show in Sherwood, Oregon.
The sight of a polished and shiny streamlined
4-8-4 locomotive next to hot rods was
quite a sight!
We
were fortunate enough to be able to hang
out with the 4449 crew along with the
Sherwood City Officials - they gave us
access to some great views!
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Afterwards,
we jumped in a car and chased the 4449
to Hillsboro..then chased it
all Sunday as Doyle and the crew were
breaking in the new roller bearings
on the trailing truck - preparations
for the NRHS convention in July.
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We
took alot of great footage of the train
as well as interviews with the members
of the crew - all in High-Definition
video (1080i) - we're working with
the crew to create a documentary
to help bring more attention to the
issues surrounding the survivability
of the 4449 in the future.
We
definitely covered alot of ground in
this trip!
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I
even got to move one step up from painting
tires to painting...the smoke box
- among other things...
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More
pictures can be found at www.4449.com,
under the Cruisin Sherwood section.
Don't forget to also check-out www.orhf.org
Our
thanks go out to the crew - especially
Harvey R. - this event was his baby
this time!
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| October
20, 2004 |
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Train
Artisan and the 4449 in Montana !
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We're
back from Montana after a fantastic trip
aboard the Montana Daylight with motive
power courtesy of the GS4 4449!
Our
trip started in Portland with the
crew trying to get the locomotive ready.
We took plenty of footage and pictures
along the way and we'll have some up on
the website soon along with an article
about the trip.
In
the meantime, jump over to www.4449.com
and www.orhf.org
for more info and pictures from the
trip. We will also be posting pictures,
sound files and video clips
to those sites once we've had a chance
to organize everything.
Our
thanks go out to the crew - especially
Dave B. for making it all happen!
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| July 3,
2004 |
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TA
Simulator Progress: New Dash 9 and Multiplayer
Tests
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We've
been busy this summer working on the Train
Artisan Simulator!
Here's
more video to show you what we've been up
to!
First
up - a
video showing our new Dash
9. Check
out the animated
3D cabview
with working
controls, sliding windows,
and
animated fireman.
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Next
- a side by side view of a multiplayer
session test. See a Dash 9 and
a E9 meet. The player has control
of the locomotive as well as the animation
of the engineer.
You
can wave to your friends in a multiplayer
session!
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Last
- A four person multiplayer test
with an additional Dispatcher player.
We're
getting excited about the potential that
multiplayer can bring to the simulator.
We've
begun work on dedicated server code
to allow a much larger number of people
to join a multiplayer session. This
can open the door to virtual persistant
railroads over the internet.
Imagine
the fun you can have running trains with
friends or new people from around the world!
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| May 25,
2004 |
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Steam
Loco Tests for TA Simulator
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We
love steam locomotives at Train Artisan
- we couldn't even imagine making our own
simulator without featuring these fantastic
machines!
What
you will see below are some tests that we
did to get steam locomotives and their
animations working in TAsim.
First
up, we've been working to get interactive
functionality into the 3D steam cab
view.
Not
only can you work the controls, but
you can also move the windows
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You
can open and close the firebox doors
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The
fireman even animates! This is a
glimpse of a new communication / interaction
feature we are working on for multiplayer/online.
Imagine
being able to team-up over the internet
to run a locomotive and see each other!
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We've
also been working on the user controlled
animation system for the external
view.
Our
goal is to allow developers the ability
to animate anything that they want and
map the control of that animation to
any keyboard key or simulator event.
Below,
we've animated the bell and the running
gear.
We've
also been working on the particle system.
We're going to try to make the smoke and
steam as realistic as possible.
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Here
are some more detail animations we tried
- you can open the windows and make
the fireman wave.
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Here's
another look at the smoke particle system.
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Wanna
see this in action?
Check out the MPEGs...
TAsim
Steam Cabview (4.8 meg)
TAsim
Steam Animations (5.0 meg)
All
video of the TAsim
was taken from a Laptop (Dell
Latitude 1.3Ghz Centrino processor with
an ATI Mobility Radeon 9000 graphics
chip).
As
you can see from the videos, the performance
was very smooth considering it was
only a mid-power laptop.
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| May 10,
2004 |
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And
Now It Can Be Told........
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While
we are sad about the fate of MSTS2,
looking back, we were very fortunate, over
the past year and a half, to have
the opportunity to work with Microsoft
on the Train Simulator Franchise.
Now
that the cancellation of MSTS2
is official, we can finally talk about what
we've been up to.
If
you are interested in what we specifically
did for Microsoft's Train Simulator Franchise,
goto This Link
You
can also check out the ABOUT
link and look under Clients.
We also have information about our work
with Kuju Entertainment Ltd. on MSTS
1.2 and our work on an interactive
kiosk and in brokering a new
relationship between Union Pacific
and Microsoft.
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We've
Been Pretty Busy at Train Artisan.......
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We
definitely have been busy, not only with
the work for the above companies, but also
in technology development, reference gathering,
and content development.
Want
to know the specifics? - click on this
link for more info.
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| Train
Artisan in the Future |
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So,
what is the point of having all of this
new content, technology and reference
knowing that MSTS2 is cancelled?
What
is in the future of Train Artisan?
Since
we had been working with the Microsoft
team, we had known about MSTS2's
fate early on.
We
got a head start and spent the last several
months, not only working on new contacts
and relationships with other simulator
developers and publishers, but we also began
development on our own train simulator.
Click
here to find out more.
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Archive
June
2003
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| Archive
Feb 2003 |
| Archive
Nov 2002 |
| Archive
June 2002 |
| Archive
May 2002 |
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