How do I make a bus for OMSI 2? (1 Viewer)

I'm planning on making a 2007 VDL SB120 Wright Cadet. I've seen some tutorials on YouTube which I don't quite understand. Some use Blender and some use SketchUp.
Has anyone got any tips on how I could make a bus from scratch please?
It would be a really big help. :)
 

LeylandNationalStagecoach

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Hi ArrivaPulsar!

Now, I have never done anything for OMSI or OMSI 2.
Yet, I have modelled quite a few buses myself. Now, I've always used blender for modelling them, so I suggest you use that.
Blender has got a steep learning curve, but once you get to know how it works, it's pretty easy to work with.

If I wanted to model a bus, I would always search for a Paperbus image of that bus, say an Optare Esteem, then bring that picture into blender (Shift+A > Empty > Image), then choose the paperbus picture, turn it so that the bus on the picture stands on the grid, so move it down a bit, etc; then bring it back a bit, duplicate the image but don't move it, and on one of the two images, at the right under 'Object' (orange cube) tick 'X-Ray', then two down under "Object Color" make it transparent. (bottommost slider.) I'd suggest you choose something like 0.3. So then, I'd always start with a cube, and then just refine it to match the paperbus' shape. For the windows or other details, I'd always use the knife tool (K), to cut the bits out, and then press E, right click and scale it down, and then assign different materials to the different bits. For texturing the buses, I've always used Pixelmator. Here's a picture of the finished Optare Esteem and WIP Optare Olympus inside my own game, in Unity3D.

Screen Shot 2018-07-13 at 17.21.28.png


Now, I don't know if that's the best way to do it, people have said that using paperbuses isn't good because they aren't very accurate, but for simple buses that don't have that many curves around the front or rear (like for example the Optare Esteem), I found that it works quite fine.
Also, as I said, all this I have never done for OMSI or OMSI 2, so maybe you'd have to approach it entirely differently.

Anyways, I hope this helps nonetheless, and good luck creating the Wright Cadet!
 

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whistlehead

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I would strongly recommend against using paperbuses as a template, because they are made entirely through guesswork and will very rarely bear anything more than a passing resemblance to the real vehicle. Basically you're playing a game of Chinese whispers, adding inaccuracies on top of inaccuracies. You'd be much better off working off reference photos and overall dimensions, or, if you can get them, original diagrams of the vehicles (though those can be hard to come across).

As to how to model the bus, please don't use Sketchup - it's a great program for making buildings, but that's about it. It's a program designed to be simple to use, not one designed to be used to create complex 3D geometries, and as soon as you start using it for more than its intended purpose it quickly becomes a nightmare. On top of that, it is lacking in many features which other programs have, particularly with regard to texture mapping, and on top of that it has no way to export models into a format that OMSI can convert (.x), so you have to learn to use Blender for the last bit of the process anyway. You'll end up working harder and learning two programs to create a model which is less optimised and of poorer visual quality.

When people ask me how to start in Blender, there's a set of tutorials here which I like to point people at: 44090 Digital Models | Tutorials - the first one demonstrates how to make a model, and the second shows you how to texture map it. You can ignore the third one because it's not relevant to OMSI, and the fourth one shows you how to use the skills from the first two in the latest version of Blender, as well as showing you a few more tricks. You might need to jump back and forth between the first two and the fourth one a bit, because the Blender UI has changed significantly since the first tutorials were made.

Alternatively, just go on Youtube and look for Blender modelling tutorials until you find one which works for you - to put you on the right track, you don't need anything to do with rendering or subsurface modelling, those are advanced techniques for making photorealistic images and aren't relevant to making models for video games and sims.

Good luck :)
 
Hi ArrivaPulsar!

Now, I have never done anything for OMSI or OMSI 2.
Yet, I have modelled quite a few buses myself. Now, I've always used blender for modelling them, so I suggest you use that.
Blender has got a steep learning curve, but once you get to know how it works, it's pretty easy to work with.

If I wanted to model a bus, I would always search for a Paperbus image of that bus, say an Optare Esteem, then bring that picture into blender (Shift+A > Empty > Image), then choose the paperbus picture, turn it so that the bus on the picture stands on the grid, so move it down a bit, etc; then bring it back a bit, duplicate the image but don't move it, and on one of the two images, at the right under 'Object' (orange cube) tick 'X-Ray', then two down under "Object Color" make it transparent. (bottommost slider.) I'd suggest you choose something like 0.3. So then, I'd always start with a cube, and then just refine it to match the paperbus' shape. For the windows or other details, I'd always use the knife tool (K), to cut the bits out, and then press E, right click and scale it down, and then assign different materials to the different bits. For texturing the buses, I've always used Pixelmator. Here's a picture of the finished Optare Esteem and WIP Optare Olympus inside my own game, in Unity3D.

View attachment 34659

Now, I don't know if that's the best way to do it, people have said that using paperbuses isn't good because they aren't very accurate, but for simple buses that don't have that many curves around the front or rear (like for example the Optare Esteem), I found that it works quite fine.
Also, as I said, all this I have never done for OMSI or OMSI 2, so maybe you'd have to approach it entirely differently.

Anyways, I hope this helps nonetheless, and good luck creating the Wright Cadet!


Hi LeylandNationalStagecoach,
Your response seems very good for a beginner like me.
I've tried to follow the steps for the modeling and they don't seem very clear. Would it be okay if you could give me a step-by-step guide how to do the modeling please, or could you redirect me to someone else's guide for the same method.

That would be a great help if you could do that.
 

LeylandNationalStagecoach

Developer
Outreach
Jun 28, 2018
3,171
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4,618
Fayton Heath, Caldshire
Hi LeylandNationalStagecoach,
Your response seems very good for a beginner like me.
I've tried to follow the steps for the modeling and they don't seem very clear. Would it be okay if you could give me a step-by-step guide how to do the modeling please, or could you redirect me to someone else's guide for the same method.

That would be a great help if you could do that.
Thanks! If they aren't clear, sorry.
OK, so yesterday, I've recorded making the Wright Cadet based off a paperbus, and it took me 1:05:54 to do it.
Here you go, hope this helps: Wright Cadet London Spec #1 1280x720 smaller.mp4
 
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Hi ArrivaPulsar!

Now, I have never done anything for OMSI or OMSI 2.
Yet, I have modelled quite a few buses myself. Now, I've always used blender for modelling them, so I suggest you use that.
Blender has got a steep learning curve, but once you get to know how it works, it's pretty easy to work with.

If I wanted to model a bus, I would always search for a Paperbus image of that bus, say an Optare Esteem, then bring that picture into blender (Shift+A > Empty > Image), then choose the paperbus picture, turn it so that the bus on the picture stands on the grid, so move it down a bit, etc; then bring it back a bit, duplicate the image but don't move it, and on one of the two images, at the right under 'Object' (orange cube) tick 'X-Ray', then two down under "Object Color" make it transparent. (bottommost slider.) I'd suggest you choose something like 0.3. So then, I'd always start with a cube, and then just refine it to match the paperbus' shape. For the windows or other details, I'd always use the knife tool (K), to cut the bits out, and then press E, right click and scale it down, and then assign different materials to the different bits. For texturing the buses, I've always used Pixelmator. Here's a picture of the finished Optare Esteem and WIP Optare Olympus inside my own game, in Unity3D.

View attachment 34659

Now, I don't know if that's the best way to do it, people have said that using paperbuses isn't good because they aren't very accurate, but for simple buses that don't have that many curves around the front or rear (like for example the Optare Esteem), I found that it works quite fine.
Also, as I said, all this I have never done for OMSI or OMSI 2, so maybe you'd have to approach it entirely differently.

Anyways, I hope this helps nonetheless, and good luck creating the Wright Cadet!
Hi Arrivapulser, thanks for helping. Myself new to making buses making a hard to make bus (the enviro 400 city) the paper thing really helps, anyways thanks a lot
 
Hi ArrivaPulsar!

Now, I have never done anything for OMSI or OMSI 2.
Yet, I have modelled quite a few buses myself. Now, I've always used blender for modelling them, so I suggest you use that.
Blender has got a steep learning curve, but once you get to know how it works, it's pretty easy to work with.

If I wanted to model a bus, I would always search for a Paperbus image of that bus, say an Optare Esteem, then bring that picture into blender (Shift+A > Empty > Image), then choose the paperbus picture, turn it so that the bus on the picture stands on the grid, so move it down a bit, etc; then bring it back a bit, duplicate the image but don't move it, and on one of the two images, at the right under 'Object' (orange cube) tick 'X-Ray', then two down under "Object Color" make it transparent. (bottommost slider.) I'd suggest you choose something like 0.3. So then, I'd always start with a cube, and then just refine it to match the paperbus' shape. For the windows or other details, I'd always use the knife tool (K), to cut the bits out, and then press E, right click and scale it down, and then assign different materials to the different bits. For texturing the buses, I've always used Pixelmator. Here's a picture of the finished Optare Esteem and WIP Optare Olympus inside my own game, in Unity3D.

View attachment 34659

Now, I don't know if that's the best way to do it, people have said that using paperbuses isn't good because they aren't very accurate, but for simple buses that don't have that many curves around the front or rear (like for example the Optare Esteem), I found that it works quite fine.
Also, as I said, all this I have never done for OMSI or OMSI 2, so maybe you'd have to approach it entirely differently.

Anyways, I hope this helps nonetheless, and good luck creating the Wright Cadet!
ok slight problem
how do I add the template?
 

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Albastru

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You need to texture map the model by doing UV maps, This can be difficult so search on youtube, Then you need to bake it again Youtube is your best friend here
I think he means the template for reference, not for repaints ;)
 
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Albastru

Somebody stole my fantasy
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ok slight problem
how do I add the template?

If I wanted to model a bus, I would always search for a Paperbus image of that bus, say an Optare Esteem, then bring that picture into blender (Shift+A > Empty > Image), then choose the paperbus picture, turn it so that the bus on the picture stands on the grid, so move it down a bit, etc; then bring it back a bit, duplicate the image but don't move it, and on one of the two images, at the right under 'Object' (orange cube) tick 'X-Ray', then two down under "Object Color" make it transparent. (bottommost slider.) I'd suggest you choose something like 0.3.
From @LeylandNationalStagecoach
 

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