GALE FORCE 3D is a concept GALE FORCE pioneered in 1996 for the online reporting of motor sports events. GALE FORCE developed special software which uses the race lap times to build 3D VRML models automatically.
These models are available from the Home Pages
of each race as soon as the qualifying is over.
The 1998 season Home
Pages are linked to our front page.
The
1997
and
1996
seasons models can be found in the Archive for that season.
The following still pictures are from our model of the 1996: Australia Grand Prix Grid and show some of the main features.
Each car is represented in the model by a highly accurate 3D wire frame which is then mapped directly with the teams colours and sponsors :-). Actually its a coloured brick on 4 wheels. As VRML is rendered in real-time upon your computer we felt that the brick would be a little more practical than a true model car. A grid of 24 highly accurate 3D cars with colour mapping would require a medium sized Silicon Graphics to render in real time at a useful speed. The models which we create are just acceptable on a 486/66, Pentiums or SGI are recommended. Each brick has a driver name board and is coloured approximately like the real car (some are not coloured correctly yet). Each car is also a hyperlink to the drivers statistics in our web database.
The cars are placed upon the track in rows of 3 and in positions proportional to their actual track times. With this arrangement it is easy to see exactly how close the cars really are. Cars on the left-hand side of the track also have a timing board on the grass which shows their actual times.
The 107% Bridge is placed according to the pole cars time. If you are further down the track than the Bridge on Sunday you ain't racing.
Each model contains several different camera positions so it should be quite easy to jump from view to view. Switch on the view point animation and fly between the camera locations.
All the images shown here were captured at 600 pixels wide and reduced to 300 - thats why the text definition is not so good.
Please send you comments and suggestions to f1@monaco.mc
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