Both, if i need physics like the rlt lga supertourer, i’ve asked to ivan_csx. If i create a car, sometimes i give the folder for testing. For the rest i use lfs website for seing the new updated cars, I choose one and i try it. I’m not okay with a closed encrypted system. SCAVIER give access to modding, that’s better than dlc system, or gran turismo cars. Some mods takes times especially at the beginning, lfseditor isn’t for all racers, you really need to learn before upload. It’s hard to find good mods. Burger, bed, piano, drift drift drift... Cat! Why? I prefer object mods with physics but we can’t use them on track editor. I hope track editor one day.

I have a suggestion relating to OBJ imports, and how to make external modelling workflows more efficient. The OBJ already come with material mappings per tris, just like LFSE. By making mappings, cutouts and pages persistent trough OBJ imports, and assigning the mappings to tris based on OBJ material names, you could minimize the work you would have to redo inside the editor upon re-importing changes you've made to an external 3D model.

So imagine that when you import an OBJ the first time, it creates mappings based on the list of materials tied to that OBJ file, assigned to the correct tris. And when you import the OBJ a second time it impose the previous mappings onto tris defined by the OBJ materials. That way you can assign the mappings in the external 3D modelling program and not having to redo the mapping assignments, cutouts and page setup each time you re-import the OBJ.

While you currently can merge an SRE into main to recycle some work, the tris have to be assigned a mapping all over again.

Last edited by pärtan, Sat 20 Jan 2024, 20:24.

About the turbo lag, I know it's been a long time but finally I've had a look and I confirm there was an oversight in the code when converting from an older system to the newer system.

The error affects both the moment of inertia (reduces the inertia) and the rpm at which max boost may be achieved (reduces the rpm for max boost).

I can't change much at this time while keeping an incompatible version. I'm sure the turbo simulation should be improved at some point though it's not the highest priority any time before the new physics and graphics version.

There is one thing I can change in the editor that works in a compatible version. That is the maximum value for "Turbo MOI Multiplier". I could put that up to 2 if it would help? Then at least you can have slower spooling turbos even if they still have other issues.

I think you mean: multiple, selectable wheel styles in a single vehicle.

It's something I'd like to do eventually but it's a big job, cannot be done in a compatible version.

As I keep saying, I'm working on the development version now, not mods (which I've been working on for two years already).


EDIT: OK, apparently I'm losing track of time. Here's a rough history.

We have been working on the new graphics and physics versions for years.
2021 I spent most of the year on mods which we released that year.
2022 was a bit more on mods then back to graphics, multithreading, etc.
2023 I seemed to get pulled back onto mods for most of the year.

The end of 2023 was an unforgettable extreme push on mods so it would be much appreciated if people wouldn't keep asking for big changes to the mods system right now. I can do a few updates here and there to the editor. But my main focus is the new development version.

Last edited by Scawen, Fri 19 Jan 2024, 09:59.

New LFS Editor 0.7E2:

Spoke and Rim limits:

New triangle budget of 4240 is shared between Rim and Spoke objects
- rim objects produced in rim editor are convenient for most rims
- each surface of the rim object contains 120 triangles
- some wheels may be built entirely as a spoke object

Spoke editor:

A wireframe of the tyre and rim are shown in "wire" view mode
A new 3D rim guide is included, representing a minimum wheel rim
- the shape is similar to the rim flange of a thin steel rim
- alloy rims should exceed the guide as they are thicker

When exporting for upload:

Rim and spoke limits are checked when you export the model
Model limits are checked in all configurations

https://www.lfs.net/forum/thread/106792

The rim guide is visible in the rim editor and also in 3D in the spoke editor.

Here is a new video explaining the rim editor and rim guide.



Some examples of following (and always exceeding) the guide in different ways:

Steel rim style:


Alloy example 1:


Alloy example 2:

Last edited by Scawen, Tue 20 Feb 2024, 20:48. Reason : added video

Hello Mod Creators,

Here is a PATCH for the LFS Editor. Editor 0.7A or later must already be installed!

This is not a thread for random requests regarding the mods system.
For mods suggestions, use the Mods System Suggestions forum section.


Changes in Editor E8:

Option to include or exclude PNG textures when exporting for upload
- Exclude PNG to reduce file size and allow a faster upload
- This does not affect the appearance of a mod in game
- The PNG textures are not required for a functioning mod
- DDS (in-game textures) are included whichever option you choose
- PNG files can be useful if you allow derivatives of your mod


Changes in Editor E7:

Drag selection box:

Function to make drag box from points now available in points mode
Scale / rotate / shear axes are now hidden while making a drag box
Grey button shows drag info to avoid left buttons moving around

Typing individual values to align points:

ALT + click r/f/u numbers to set all selected points to same value
- relative values compared with last selected point not preserved

New modeller line guide:

Set up a trace then click "guide" to create a line guide
- the guide is visible in most editor modes and all views
- options to hide/show the guide or draw it open/closed

Merging subobjects:

You can now merge a subobject fully into another subobject
- this is a step towards moving a selection between subobjects
- triangles can now be transferred via an intermediate subobject


Changes in Editor E6:

Much faster "reduce detail" function
Command /rtex can be used to reload textures
Editor unlock no longer affects LFS unlocks
(S3 number of unlocks now matches S1/S2)


Changes in Editor E5:

Earlier versions can no longer be used for mod uploads
More updates and fixes for some of the official cars


Changes in Editor E4:

Rim editor:

A complete rim profile cross section is now shown
Options for rim guide well offset and reverse mount
Points are a different colour in surface mode
Protection against adding duplicate or opposite surfaces
FIX: + and - buttons did not instantly update the 3D model

Spoke editor:

A complete 3D rim profile is now shown
Separate show options for spoke / rim / tyre / guide
It is now possible to rename the first mapping in the list
A "rim" button is shown beside the first mapping (used for rim)

Misc:

A new set of vehicles is included with updated dash and wheels
Engine damage and shift light can be enabled in the dash editor


Changes in Editor E3:

Modeller cutout screen:

FIX: Number of materials and material index were wrong for subobjects
- helps when optimising a model for frame rate by texture sharing

Engine editor:

Increased maximum value of "Turbo MOI Multiplier" to 2.0
- allows turbo to spool up slower (more turbo lag)

Rim guide in rim editor and spoke editor:

Decreased the minimum width of car rim flange (was 12mm, now 11mm)
- this is correct for the 'J' rim profile used on modern road cars


Changes in Editor E2:

Spoke and Rim limits:

New triangle budget of 4240 is shared between Rim and Spoke objects
- rim objects produced in rim editor are convenient for most rims
- each surface of the rim object contains 120 triangles
- some wheels may be built entirely as a spoke object

Spoke editor:

A wireframe of the tyre and rim are shown in "wire" view mode
A new 3D rim guide is included, representing a minimum wheel rim
- the shape is similar to the rim flange of a thin steel rim
- alloy rims should exceed the guide as they are thicker

When exporting for upload:

Rim and spoke limits are checked when you export the model
Model limits are checked in all configurations


Changes from Editor 0.7C to 0.7E:

https://www.lfs.net/patch-7e/editor/changelog


DOWNLOAD:

LFS Editor PATCH 7A to 7E8 [If you already have LFS Editor 0.7A or later]
Editor 0.7A or later must already be installed!
EDIT: Download link removed, official update 0.7F is now available: https://www.lfs.net/forum/thread/95664

Last edited by Scawen, Sat 27 Jul 2024, 10:07.

Quote from rayman95 :

https://clips.twitch.tv/PopularTenuousLEDKeyboardCat-rxGQ1MU0DNlCRtOT

We were rendering 40 x Maximum (and as Scawen eluded to, over-maximum) cars with an NVidia T4 GPU and look at what that did to the frame rate. The collision mesh of this mod is also extremely detailed and LFS was never designed to cope with that level of detail, especially with such a huge pile-up.

This is the first time we've experienced this level of lock-up in 351 broadcasts, and there's very little anyone (except mod creators) can do to improve the performance. Game engines like UE5 would struggle with this problem. The mod is just far too detailed.

Quote from marijamopleenjoyer :

Yes, the freezes occur when someone is leaving pits, usually when it's downloading a skin.

That's because LFS is currently single-threaded. LFS normally waits until you're stationary before loading a skin to avoid issues associated with loading the texture. Hopefully loading cars/skins gets moved to another thread in the proposed multi-threading update.

Quote from Scawen :

Another thing on this model, a problem that N.400S does not have - the middle LOD is way too high at 8104 triangles. The maximum is 8192 triangles but middle LODs should really be less than 1000 in my opinion.

100% agree. Could that be enforced somehow in the editor?

Quote from Bokujishin :

I'm not sure what the threshold is where the problem appears, I know some people talked about it after the NDR GT4 Sprint Cup with the N.400S GT4 (there were 35 cars racing + safety car and rescue vehicles), I didn't personally notice any stuttering but I do have a rather powerful computer (Ryzen 7900X, AMD 7900XT, 32GB of RAM, NVMe SSD).

We (Sim Broadcasts) also noticed some frame drops during our broadcast of round 1 last Sunday. We'll be trialling a new AMD CPU with a 50% higher clock speed for round 2 to try and combat this (3 cheers for AWS ) - Your experience would have been smoother than ours because you were driving, not observing 35 cars at full LOD all at once.

Last edited by mbutcher, Thu 18 Jan 2024, 12:23.

Following on from what I suggested yesterday, this morning I've coded this 3D Rim Guide that is visible in the Spoke Editor.

It represents a minimum rim (like a steel rim) that should be covered to create a realistic rim.

Some thoughts...

First 2 paragraphs are just "history of last few days" you can ignore and go to "Summary of some issues" below.

1) Although I didn't want to get involved with mods again this month, I ended up falling into it when we discovered the exploits some people were using. I'm not talking about moderate amounts, but some ugly abuses of the system. In conjunction with reports of pit-out glitches, it was important to act. We need some sense in the mods. I became aware of some terrible low quality mods, for example: (a) massively high polygon model, with stripped out main config to pass the export check (b) wheels with over 10,000 triangles. So we had to do something and the obvious starting point was to enforce the limits that have always been there and are allowed in the current editor.

2) Discussion, participation and cooperation on this thread has done at least two positive things (a) increased awareness of the Rim Editor that has improved a lot since the older version and (b) increased my understanding of some of the limitations of the Spoke Editor / Rim Editor combination (especially when using the proper limits).

Summary of some issues and possible solutions, future and present:

1) The Rim Editor suffers from lack of material selection. This isn't a problem for most rim designs but there are still a lot of rim designs for which this is a serious limitation. Rims use the first mapping in the Spoke Editor, for their texture and material settings. A mapping selector could be added in an incompatible version at some point, but that is not desirable at this time.

2) In cases where Rim Editor does not provide enough flexibility, Spoke Editor's limitation of 1600 triangles can be a problem. Rim editor actually allows 22 surfaces * 60 around * 2 triangles per quad = 2640 triangles. Today I have been thinking that the triangle budget could be shared between rim and spoke object, a total of 2640 + 1600 = 4240 triangles per wheel.

3) This budget sharing suggestion allows an empty rim object and up to 4240 in the spoke object if that is the way you prefer to do it but this has a limitation that the "steel rim guide" (yellow in rim editor) cannot be seen in the spoke editor. This is a problem in my opinion because in the real world, wheels of a certain specification must have a rim flange in the right place and the right size. This is necessary so that different manufacturers' tyres can be mounted on different manufacturers' wheels. The shape of the rim flange (on the inside, where it meets the tyre) is specified by standards organisations such as ETRTO. Road cars use a "J Rim Profile" in case you want to read about it (though information is scarce). This is not easy to enforce properly in a freehand editor. I've been wondering about a 3 dimensional version of the rim guide that is currently visible in the spoke editor, for the spoke editor, showing in a bright colour the minimum amount of material that you should cover to produce a realistic rim for the given wheel dimensions.

4) Additionally the editor needs to check limits properly before export to avoid confusion when uploading. I don't see it as a big deal to release an editor test patch if the output is fully compatible with the public version of LFS.

Last edited by Scawen, Wed 17 Jan 2024, 18:54.

Quote from NENE87 :

@R_evolution, maybe you can modify a specific texture with spoke editor. After that, maybe you can attach surface at the texture in rim editor with the same name?

I've tried, but matte doesn't work, chrome sometimes is working, but not always (not sure why).

EDIT: Now I'm thinking wouldn't be better if the spoke and rim editor are merged into one 'wheel' editor? Some time after the big update of course. This will probably make it much more easier for modders I think.

Last edited by Evolution_R, Wed 17 Jan 2024, 17:24.

I'm pretty proud of the result

@R_evolution, maybe you can modify a specific texture with spoke editor. After that, maybe you can attach surface at the texture in rim editor with the same name?

Quote from Scawen :

But the wheels on the right look odd as well because you should be able to see the edge of the rim flange. That wheel has the look of an old-style LFS wheel from before the recent updates

It's because I don't like that shiny edge sticking out of the tyre, I prefer a cleaner look with a rim protector, but with that option set to YES, the tyre polygons are always visible (attached RB4 screenshot).

Now I do understand how to do it properly, my only issue is that "horizontal line" is shiny and there is no option to make it matte. In the first attached shot I've added this horizontal line in the spoke editor as matte and it looks cleaner.

EDIT: added Hirochi rim screenshot from BeamNG, which is done as it should be (with the exception of the shine line ). Maybe that's down to preference (irl too I guess), I've seen (mostly online) "messy" rim/tyre situation and also a very clean combinations (latest shots).

Last edited by Evolution_R, Wed 17 Jan 2024, 17:02.

I don't have an answer about the materials at this time, or seamless merging, but I want to comment about the wheels on the left (in the first 3 screenshots):

I can see the 30-around polygons of the tyre. But the rim provides 60 around which should look smooth, like the wheels in the two screenshots on the right. If the rim would protrude as it should - covering the steel rim profile, as described above - then you shouldn't see the tyre polygons at all.

But the wheels on the right look odd as well because you should be able to see the edge of the rim flange. That wheel has the look of an old-style LFS wheel from before the recent updates.

I'm not getting the message across very well so far, that the rim cross section needs to exceed the "steel rim" guide profile shown in yellow in the rim editor. I've done quite a bit of studying of wheels to produce the new system, but I have not yet made enough effort to explain it, and the thinking behind the new rim editor and how to make realistic rims.

Last edited by Scawen, Wed 17 Jan 2024, 11:52.

For some of the rims types I've managed to merge it seamlessly into the spoke part.
But for other types is just acceptable.

In Rim Editor I'm only missing that I can't choose the materials - to match the chrome/shine/matte parts of the spokes.

I understand that type of rim can present a different challenge, but I would like to understand more. So if I may ask some questions / propose suggestions and you could explain if they may be reasonable, difficult or impossible?

Is it possible to make the rim part using the rim editor, or is there a problem with material types or some other problem? I mean, do the black parts and the silver parts need a different material?

If they use the same material but only the colour is different, then I think the rim parts could be made in the rim editor using colours and smoothing groups. By careful alignment I wonder if they could then appear to merge seamlessly into the spoke part? Or does that not work out?

Update new dashboard, new dashboard update, I modeled it myself. While modeling, I had a nervous breakdown caused by blender or editor, but I somehow managed it.

While giving due respect for the pretty mod, it does have a lot of triangles (maxed out in one config and slightly over in the other config) and the wheels exceed the limit.

It's almost exactly the same story as for the N.400S here: https://www.lfs.net/forum/post/2074548#post2074548

Wheels could be made more efficient by using the new rim editor, anyway all the info is in that thread.


EDIT: But I don't believe that making the wheels legal would really sort out the glitch. It should be done, and the new rim editor should be used, and that would help a bit, but I think the maximum number of polygons for the main body is really too high for most computers. Personally I would go for half of the maximum, but I know not many people will agree with me. The RB4 is 2/3 of the maximum.

Another thing on this model, a problem that N.400S does not have - the middle LOD is way too high at 8104 triangles. The maximum is 8192 triangles but middle LODs should really be less than 1000 in my opinion.

One thing I hope is that you will find the pit out glitch is reduced in the new physics and graphics version. I have worked on it. Some of it is spread over more than one frame, especially if you aren't looking at the car at the time. The physical model is built in a physical frame and the graphical model is built when necessary in a graphical frame. Also, in the case of a car that hasn't yet been loaded, and is then loaded the first time since starting LFS, the textures are loaded over multiple frames so that worst of all "first time load" glitch is further reduced.

Last edited by Scawen, Tue 16 Jan 2024, 20:34.

Quote from Scawen :

I'm wondering what could help, if the tyre and the rim could have a "wireframe" image option for 2D views, in the rim editor and the spoke editor? That wireframe view would appear simply as circles, for the LFS tyre and the user defined rim points.

Not sure I would use that, I use the reference mostly in blender to accurately model it, and then I need it in the rim editor, but I don't know how to use it because it's a side view in a cut. And not so much the reference itself as the visibility of the spoke mesh, as I've shown in a pic, it would help more. But maybe not worth spending time on it if it's complex to develop, and I've kind of learned in rim editor to compare result to the rim in vihicle editor view and it works out pretty well, it's a matter of getting used to it.

The trick is to get the right size spokes, and if you have found the dimensions from the reference it will help a lot, I did not find them, so I had to sweat a little bit.

P.S. The same picture shows my progress on getting closer to a more correct rim shape. I reduced the diameter of the spokes and now it's better. And it's still pretty close to the reference.

Last edited by Aleksandr_124rus, Tue 16 Jan 2024, 18:46.

To illustrate what I am trying to say, here is the reference image aligned so the wheel rim is *just* visible inside the LFS tyre.

I did find this hard (and it's probably not accurate) because the reference image is so dark, and the tyre cannot be viewed as a wireframe.
[EDIT actually my alignment is quite bad, I start to get better results by repeatedly pressing "show wheels"]
[EDIT2: added a second attempt. This is tricky, especially with a black wheel!]

I'm wondering what could help, if the tyre and the rim could have a "wireframe" image option for 2D views, in the rim editor and the spoke editor? That wireframe view would appear simply as circles, for the LFS tyre and the user defined rim points.

Last edited by Scawen, Tue 16 Jan 2024, 17:59.

I'm interested in this task of matching a reference image.

I think the approach is to start by aligning the reference image with the edge of the visible tyre.

The way I have done this, in order to reduce the number of flexible tyre triangles (which are very expensive as they are downloaded to the GPU every frame) I have started the visible tyre at a level which is the same as the outer diameter of the wheel rim. Not the "rim diameter" but total diameter of the wheel, including the "rim flange" that holds the tyre on.

So you can actually see that in the spoke editor if you go to "wire" view. You could align the reference image so the outer part of the rim is just visible inside the visible part of the tyre.

I understand there appears to be no simple way to continue to align the various "rings" of the rim with a reference image. Maybe there should be an equivalent of "wireframe" for the rim object.

I don't know if my rambling text can be followed. But this may be good stuff to include if I make a video.

You could try and do a 2 tri square with an alp texture in front and line up your points as a reference, I've done that in the editor before but not the spoke editor yet.

Thanks, that's good that you did the cleanup and reduced polygons.

As far as I can tell you have plenty of detail in the spoke object. But I would like to talk about the rim profile, for you and anyone else reading.

I really need to do a video about this but I had a cold during the holidays. Now I can talk normally again so maybe I should get on with it. I think the new rim editor is not well understood yet, and as it now has so much flexibility there is also potential for errors.

The rim editor contains a "STEEL RIM" profile shown in yellow which is the least amount of metal to make a rim. Alloys really have the same shape inside but have a different outside (thicker metal for strength, also potential for styling).

So taking your mod, the way you have done the new rim is really not correct for this wheel size. I've done a quick edit to show an example that is realistic in the rim area for this wheel diameter. Although there is a lot of variety in alloy styles, it should not be *above* the steel rim profile. Just *outside* it. I hope my attached screenshots explain (also in the first post of this thread but I think I need to explain this more).

By the way, if sharp edges are wanted you can use smoothing groups on the surfaces.

Last edited by Scawen, Tue 16 Jan 2024, 16:37.

Quote from Scawen :

Regarding the N.400S GT4

The spoke object does exceed limits. It has 6095 triangles but the limit is 1600 so this has been inserted into the veh using a hack.

The main model is only 20 triangles below the limit at 65515 triangles. This limit was only intended for extreme cases, it's not a target or a guide. Really models should be a lot lower than this and still be good quality for a game. Lower polygon count is better for game models.

Given the very high resolution main model, I don't know how much of the generation time is caused by the spoke object. But the spoke object is excessive and also wasteful - there is a lot of detail also in a rim object that mostly can't be seen as it is hidden by the so-called spoke object.

This is my mod and I have already explained my position on this matter. As for the spokes, it's a bit surprising to me to see messages about "hacks", when the LFS official discord channel was calmly discussing instructions from draggo on how to do it and there were mod reviewers there as well. And I thought it was common practice to do, just dont need to be an moron and make spokes over 10k and veh file over 2mb. And because it turns out to be such a big deal seeing this thread yesterday I started changing the spokes and rim to hit the limits. Its your game and your rules.

And I uploaded it to the site today with other fixes over an hour ago, but for some reason the LFS still has the old version. And new version is not published

Quote from Scawen :

Given the new rim editor allows good detail to be produced by the rim cross-section, I can see no reason why the rim editor could not be used as intended in this case and use the spoke model for... spokes.

Because the rims in this mod were made before the rim editor was updated, which allowed making details like flanges and bead and what I was talking about earlier. And because of this, I had to use the spoke editor in those days..

Last edited by Aleksandr_124rus, Tue 16 Jan 2024, 13:53.

We learned that some mod creators have discovered loopholes and used hacks to exceed the limits for models.

The limits are needed to provide fast loading and the smooth online experience that LFS is known for. They are defined and enforced in the editor to maintain high frame rates and minimise glitches when people leave the pits or when their car is damaged.

These limits are now checked by our online system when a mod is uploaded and it will be blocked from online use if the limits are exceeded or there is an invisible LOD as described below.


New checks:

1) One notable loophole was that the local editor did not check all configurations before allowing the model to be exported. Some people submitted mods with a lot missing in the main configuration, to allow them to include excessive detail in other configurations.

To check this before submitting a mod with multiple configurations:
- Enter the modeller from the vehicle editor
- Click the configuration buttons below the layer switches
- If a configuration exceeds the limit you will see a red number of "tris" or "pts"

2) Another method used to bypass the limits was a hack for spoke objects in which a model with much greater than allowed size is placed into the veh file using external software.

The rim editor was improved a lot in version 0.7E, allowing much more flexibility in the rim design. Mod creators should become familiar with it because in most cases you can use the rim editor as intended (for rims) and use the spoke model as intended (for spokes). But some rim designs may be better suited to being part of the spoke object. A new triangle limit of 4240 has been set, which is shared between the rim object and the spoke object. This is supported in the new Editor Patch and there is a new video about creating realistic rims in the LFS Editor.



3) Another mistake was often made by some mod creators, who submitted mods with nothing at all in LOD2. It causes cars to have no shadow and to disappear in the middle distance. There is no need for this. It is acceptable for an unfinished mod to only have 2 levels of detail. This is explained in the thread about Invisible LOD2.


Current limits:

LOD1: 65536 (points or triangles, including all subobjects)
Middle LOD (if there is one): 8192 triangles / 12288 points
Total for rim object and spoke object combined: 4240 triangles


NOTE about limits:

The limits are very high and are not targets to aim for.
Higher triangle counts are bad for performance and load times.
LOD1 65536 is really too much and can cause various types of slowdown.
LOD2 8192 is really far too much - a sensible number would be around 1000.


Editor update:

A new editor has been released to help with limits and wheel editing: https://www.lfs.net/forum/thread/106792

Last edited by Scawen, Fri 23 Feb 2024, 19:51.