Targa Florio Scanned Build v.0.3.6 [Assetto Corsa]

hello hello helloo everyone!

and welcome back to Targa Florio!

and welcome back indeed!

I hope you are all are in good health. I hope you are still out there enjoying racing in any of your favorite sims. Project Motor Racing trailer just came out the other day, and it looks interesting. We still have to see how the handling will feels, but trying out new racing sims is always fun!

Assetto corsa Evo still have a long way to go. not to mention the modding. But kunos showed us a glimpse of the new editor and it looks like it's going to be much more complicated than the old KSeditor, which is great! Can't wait to dive into it!

Anyway, let's get into our main track shall we?

We've released the scanned version preview some time ago, and we are very grateful for the feedback.

after the release, we did some evaluation and basically, ironing out the wrinkles.

The version that being released today, is actually the 6th build after the preview. hence the version, 0.3.6. I keep making changes and adjustments until I'm satisfied with the result, and it end up taking quite some time. I'm really sorry for the delay..

So, without further ado, here is the Targa Florio Scanned version 0.3.6

we named it Targa Florio 73 Scan, separating it completely from the old version. obviously, there will still be changes, especially the grass at the side of the road, as we're working on the retainer walls along the track. The invisible walls are also still a temporary build, as it will be adjusted accordingly based on the position of the retainer walls and other objects.

now for the next part of this post, I will hand it over to Beni, and he will share his overview:

Here's a quick overview of the process that we use to create the new version of the track. In short the track is based both on laser scanned data and photogrammetric scans. The laser scanned data used are the Landscape models from the Italian government. But even though they are much more detailed than the landscape that was used before they still lack the detail for the road surface. For this we had to actually drive down the roads with a 360° camera on a pole to catch footage around the track.

It helps to have the right kind of weather, overcast so there are no hard shadows is best, but not too dark. Mostly we got lucky in 2024 but a few sections had to be re-scanned in 2025. The resulting 360° video is then turned into frames which can be loaded into a photogrammetry software:

The first result is a sparse cloud of points, which each point being a detected match between 3 frames or more:

The sparse cloud then needs to be adjusted to the geographical position. The photogrammetric calculations are pretty good at detecting the shape but little errors along the way will still lead to developing shifts in scale or orientation. Once this is corrected the dense cloud can be calculated, this is the most time-consuming step. The results are many more points showing matching spots with the according color:

From this point cloud we generate a mesh:

This mesh will then be used to generate the road mesh and place scenery and objects. To help with that we also calculate a texture:

So this is the ideal case but in case of the Targa Florio the roads have deteriorated quite badly in some sections, for smaller defects we basically 'repair' them how they would be fixed in reality, as long as enough good road is left it's not hard to see where the surface would have been. And the period pictures we collected help to decide how the road conditions in a particular place would have been back in 1973.

The worst part today is the section before Scillato, where the whole hill slid down and the road was completely destroyed. As this stretch is currently being repaired we used a drone to scan the building site. But of course we still need to estimate the layout from old maps and photos as there just isn't enough left:

In general the question could be asked if scanning today's road gets us any closer to the track as it was in 1973 and we are sure that it does. This example shows it pretty well we think. The first street-view picture is the current state, the 2nd shows this section in the mid-70s. Even though the section has been re-paved, patched and probably re-paved again the character of the surface still remains (it's not exactly the same point of view admittedly):

And so the new scanned road surface is much more detailed as compared to the previous version (2nd picture):

Not every pothole will be in the correct position as it was in 1973 but things like the camber of the corners and little and medium sized bumps are added that weren't in the base data before. Repairs and patches will still be added according to period photos. And it's not just the road surface, also the landscape right next to the road has much more detail now and objects like walls, bridges, houses and even the road signs can be placed precisely thanks to the scan data.

So thank you for bearing with us whilst we optimize the workflow and soon progress will be quicker!

Beni