The story so far...
About 15 months ago, when the plans for SW7 were released, I created this quick No Limits recreation of what the ride appeared to be like:
The MK1:
I've never thought of myself as an amazing No Limits designer, and I didn't have a clue how to do custom scenery, but the overwhelmingly positive comments for all of you persuaded me to keep going with my recreation to see how far I could get on my limited talents. Over the following week, lots of supports to represent fencing and so on gradually evolved the recreation into this:
The Mk2:
The rather crude station building in the MK2 was my first ever venture into 3D modelling, and must have taken me about three or four days to do! A couple of months later more drawings for SW7 were revealed showing the theming elements, and was starting to get a grasp of the basics in 3D modelling and custom scenery, so I thought of having a go at modelling the rest of the X-Sector. I cheated a lot as I didn't want it to take over my life, downloading lots of models from the internet so that I could get it done. In the end it took about a couple of weeks to turn the recreation into this:
The MK3:
Ten months later...
In January this year SW7 was revealed to be The Smiler, the artwork had changed as well as much of the landscaping and theming elements for the ride. But I had a serious case of CBA with regards updating the recreation to suite, as it would pretty much need to be started from the beginning again. So when the extra inversions were 'revealed' I just tweaked the MK3 to suit, creating what I like to think of as The Smiler - SW7 hybrid.
The MK4:
Now to this week...
Over the past year I have actually been doing lots of 3D modelling work for a few family business enterprises, and as such my modelling skills have sky-rocketed compared to where they were a year ago. But in need of a break from my current modelling work I thought I'd pay The Smiler a visit. I'd given myself a week to get as much done as I can and what follows is the the progress so far. It's nowhere near finished, but I thought I'd share some sneak peaks at my latest recreation.
The MK5:
As you can probably see I have had to start from scratch with the whole thing. Most noticeably the supports are all gone. These will be added once the 3D model is complete. At present this was just a test to see how it was all working in No Limits, and I was amazed to find it runs perfectly smoothly even on my antiquated PC.
Unfortunately I have other 3D modelling commitments at the moment, so I don't know when (or if) this will ever be completed. As with the MK3, I don't want this taking over my life. It might be something I do a little bit of work on from time to time, so I shall use this topic to update you all on its progress. In the meantime, here are a few more shots of the 3D model being built in Trimble SketchUp.
I must give thanks to Rob for all his photos of construction, these are proving to be a great help with what I've done here. If he reads this, a nice square on photo of the ride info panel would be nice Also thanks to JAMMYD777 for his videos of the MK2 and MK3, which I'm sure many of you enjoyed watching, if the ride is anything like those videos we are surely in for a treat. That is, if it ever opens...
About 15 months ago, when the plans for SW7 were released, I created this quick No Limits recreation of what the ride appeared to be like:
The MK1:
I've never thought of myself as an amazing No Limits designer, and I didn't have a clue how to do custom scenery, but the overwhelmingly positive comments for all of you persuaded me to keep going with my recreation to see how far I could get on my limited talents. Over the following week, lots of supports to represent fencing and so on gradually evolved the recreation into this:
The Mk2:
The rather crude station building in the MK2 was my first ever venture into 3D modelling, and must have taken me about three or four days to do! A couple of months later more drawings for SW7 were revealed showing the theming elements, and was starting to get a grasp of the basics in 3D modelling and custom scenery, so I thought of having a go at modelling the rest of the X-Sector. I cheated a lot as I didn't want it to take over my life, downloading lots of models from the internet so that I could get it done. In the end it took about a couple of weeks to turn the recreation into this:
The MK3:
Ten months later...
In January this year SW7 was revealed to be The Smiler, the artwork had changed as well as much of the landscaping and theming elements for the ride. But I had a serious case of CBA with regards updating the recreation to suite, as it would pretty much need to be started from the beginning again. So when the extra inversions were 'revealed' I just tweaked the MK3 to suit, creating what I like to think of as The Smiler - SW7 hybrid.
The MK4:
Now to this week...
Over the past year I have actually been doing lots of 3D modelling work for a few family business enterprises, and as such my modelling skills have sky-rocketed compared to where they were a year ago. But in need of a break from my current modelling work I thought I'd pay The Smiler a visit. I'd given myself a week to get as much done as I can and what follows is the the progress so far. It's nowhere near finished, but I thought I'd share some sneak peaks at my latest recreation.
The MK5:
As you can probably see I have had to start from scratch with the whole thing. Most noticeably the supports are all gone. These will be added once the 3D model is complete. At present this was just a test to see how it was all working in No Limits, and I was amazed to find it runs perfectly smoothly even on my antiquated PC.
Unfortunately I have other 3D modelling commitments at the moment, so I don't know when (or if) this will ever be completed. As with the MK3, I don't want this taking over my life. It might be something I do a little bit of work on from time to time, so I shall use this topic to update you all on its progress. In the meantime, here are a few more shots of the 3D model being built in Trimble SketchUp.
I must give thanks to Rob for all his photos of construction, these are proving to be a great help with what I've done here. If he reads this, a nice square on photo of the ride info panel would be nice Also thanks to JAMMYD777 for his videos of the MK2 and MK3, which I'm sure many of you enjoyed watching, if the ride is anything like those videos we are surely in for a treat. That is, if it ever opens...