Show us your (Classic) Tutorials

[ilikehotdogsalot 308]

In the last few days, I have been getting many PMs and comments about making mosaics, so I decided to make a step-by-step tutorial on...

HOW TO MAKE A MOSAIC

Step 1: Open up your Simcity 4 game, and choose a city and area you wish to photograph.

Step 2: Open up photoshop and create a 1024 X 5000 pixel document, the height of the document can be larger if you decide you want to take many pictures.

Step 3: Next, Photograph the area in Simcity by using the

Prt Scr SysRq Key

 located on your keyboard, this key photographs the entire screen. Make sure to have the Pause off and the menu hidden

Step 4: Now that you have taken your first picture, Paste it into your photoshop document, do this by pressing CTRL and V at the same time.

Congratulations! You have successfully taken your first picture!

Step 5: Head back into Simcity to take another picture. To do this correctly, Only move your arrow keys up or down so that it lines up with your last picture, Donot move them left or right or else your pictures will NOT allign! Try your best not to go too far up or down or else your picture will not allign with the first, Use your judgement, If you make a mistake, Just go back and try to take the picture again.

Step 6: Now that you have taken your second picture correctly, Paste it into photoshop, do this by pressing CTRL and V at the same time.

Congratulations! You now have correctly done 2 pictures for your mosaic! If you wish to do more, Repeat the steps above, I will do one more picture to complete the mosaic.

Step 7: We now have all the pictures pasted and ready to go in photoshop, they are all seperate layers [ie: picture 1 is layer 1, picture 2 is layer 2, and picture 3 is layer 3]

We are now going to allign Layer 1 and 2 [pictures 1 and 2] to create the mosaic affect.

Step 8: Select the cursor tool and select layer 2, I have highlighted them in red.

Step 9: Drag layer 2 [picture 2] so it alligns perfectly with layer 1 [picture 1], You can also use the arrow keys.

They're alligned! Hurray! Congratulations! If they didn't allign well, Try the above steps again.

Repeat these above steps with layer 3 [picture 3] and you've created your first mosaic!

But this is where it gets tricky, so pay attention!

Step 10: Now that everything is alligned and your mosaic is ready, Select the rectangular marquee tool and marquee all the pictures > Then go to Edit> Copy Merged, This copies all the layers into one.

Step 11: Open a new document

Step 12: Paste all the mosaic by pressing CRTL and V at the same time.

There! Now for the final steps, We are going to break up the mosaics into 800 x 600 images...

Step 13: Press CRTL and R at the same time, You should notice a ruler appear, I highlighted it in red.

Step 14: Select the Marquee tool, at the top you should see Style: [drop down menu]...Go into the drop down menu and select FIXED SIZE. The Height and Width Bar should open up by now, Insert 800 x 600 px, I highlighted in red for you

Step 15: Go to Image > Image Size...You should see a popup come, This is where you change the image size, Change the Width to 800, however, Keep the Height the way it is.

There, your picture is now resized! This is the stage where you can edit your picture, add borders, etc, I'll leave the picture alone and move on to the next step.

Step 16: Select the Rectangular Marquee tool again, Now if you click anywhere in the picture, You will notice a marquee box will be created, The box is 800 x 600, This is a guide to help you seperate the mosaic into different images.

Step 17: Now go to Edit > copy, This will copy the image, Open up a new document and select CRTL and V at the same time to paste the image.

Your image will now be pasted!

Step 18: Go back to the mosaic document.

Step 19: Remember that ruler I was talking about earlier? Well, Click on it and hold your mouse and drag down, This will bring up a marquee line, This line was made to know where you last left so that your images allign when you upload them. Drag down the line to the bottom of the marquee box and let go.

Once you let go, There will be a blue line, This is to help you decide where to put your next marquee box.

Step 20: Now repeat repeat steps 16-20 to seperate all your pictures in the mosaic, You are now finished!

All you have to do is save each picture document and upload the pictures into a picture hoster imageshack.us/photobucket.com or flickr.com...

To post them on simtropolis or other websites:

YOU'RE DONE! You did your first mosaic, Congratulations!

EDIT: I resized the images for ST standards, To see the pictures a little clearer, Right click the image and select View Image!

If you have any questions or concern, PMs are always welcomed!

[BurroDiablo 222]

I forgot to Post this one here... duuh-

 

This is for the benifit of the majority of you who like a smooth working road network. You may have seen this picture, or, you may not-

Its a great working roundabout that beats those horrible 4 way avenue interchanges... this is how to make one-

[THINGS YOU'LL NEED]

1. The latest NAM

2. [optional] SimGoobers Narrow Canal pack

So...

Firstly, you lay out 4 avenue piece like so, making sure theres a 6x6 gap between the ends-

Secondly, you take the one way roads and connect the avenues up to each other thusly (obviously, if your using the RIGHT HAND version, its the other way round)-

Thirdly, you the connect each TOP arrow to the next DIAGONALLY to achieve something like this-

And don't forget those middle bits-

Fourthly, continue to connect the roads to the avenues untill you come up with something like this (and it should look EXACTLY like this... unless you have the right hand version of course, then the arrows should be pointing in the opposite direction... but no lumpy bits... god help you if I find lumpy bits!!)-

Fithly... destroy the centre so it looks alot neater-

Sixthly, its still a little empty... so, grab SimGoober's NARROW CANAL LEFT DIAGONAL TURN-

And make this-

Then do the same to the gaps with the RIGHT DIAGONAL TURN, so it looks like this-

Finish it off with some Foliage (I used the narrrow canal filler piece) and... viola... violin... perfectionne-

There you go... now you can stop complaining that NAM has no Avenue roundabouts

4X4 Avenue Roundabout-

If your low on space, you can always make one of these (roundabout to the right hand side)

Simply follow the Above steps, but make the Gap in STEP ONE 4x4 instead of 6x6-

[Rochefort 13]

excellent El Burro, needs to be in the Omnibus

[BurroDiablo 222]

Thanks Rochefort, it honestly does beat the 4 way interchanges... its not just eye-candy, it works really well too

Theres a more compact Roundabout I made... its 4x4 instead of 6x6, the principle is the same but it tends to look a little sloppy

-edit-

Updated the roundabout Tutorial slightly

[Silur 3,304]

Excellent topic with fantastic works. This is my favorite topic on Simtropolis today.

There are many great talents here !

Thanks for all !

[Cjah 15]

Hello everyone...

SHS wants more tutorails...so I'm stepping up...again...

you all know me best from the CJ forum...and of course in this very thread....

I wanna begin creating new tutorials and also alter older tutorials...such as under water tunnels and use split highways and avenues with the help of the NAM and some slope mods....

Please be patient...and do ask me for tutorials...request anything...

latest work....

Please comment!

[Cjah 15]

[mightygoose 92]

there are so many things here that should be in the omnibus....

[Sim1013 1]

I have a tutorial on how to construct a city at hard diffuculty while supplying services and making an income. I'll post it below!

All of your tutorials are amazing and I thank you all for putting so much work into them!

[Sim1013 1]

Hello everyone!

 

Welcome to my Level Hard City Tutorial. I’m going to teach you how to initiate a city at this level without using any cheats or unrealistic mods. When you’re finished you will have a happy, healthy, and educated city with about 8,000 Sims and much room for growth. Keep in mind that city building at this level takes longer than on other levels, but it’s very gratifying once you master it!

 

The way I play, I’m not satisfied until every house is covered with all services and the Sims’ live are as happy as possible. Because of this I don’t make as much money as I could. You will be able to make much more money however, if you choose to provide fewer services, parks, or perhaps a less expensive, more polluting power plant – Feel free to apply your own personal philosophy to the game once you complete this tutorial.

 

 

 

Here is a list of all the downloads I use for this tutorial:

-Rush Hour Expansion Pack

 

-Deadwood’s Road Top Bus Stop Set: 
https://www.simtropolis.com/stex/index.cfm?page=1&keyword=DEDWD%20Road%20Top%20Bus%20Stop%20Set&type=all

 

-The NAM (Most recent version):  

https://www.simtropolis.com/modding/index.cfm?page=1&view=all

 

-Teirusu’s Beach Mod (I use the white sand version): https://www.simtropolis.com/stex/index.cfm?page=1&keyword=Beach%20Modd&type=all

 

-SimTropiaProductions Gray Marble Rock Mod: 
https://www.simtropolis.com/stex/index.cfm?page=1&keyword=SMP%20Gray%20Marble%20Rock%20Mod&type=all

 

-Mikeseiths Hyundai Delarships and Automata (Not required but just in case you were noticing some different looking cars): 
https://www.simtropolis.com/stex/index.cfm?page=1&keyword=Hyundai%20Dealerships%20And%20Automata&type=all

 

-JbSimio’s Schools(You’ll need both packs): 
https://www.simtropolis.com/stex/index.cfm?page=1&keyword=School%20Pack&type=all

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 

Let's get started, shall we?
 

 

I’ll be using this lovely piece of terrain right here:

 

 Your map doesn’t have to look like this at all, but I do recommend having a similar body of water so that some of the game factors match up better.

 

A trick I use to make plopping seaside lots easier is to take the “Quick Level Brush Tool” and quickly drag it from my shore to my mainland until part of the terrain on my mini map turns to a lighter green. I then use the tool to level all of my land to that height. Take a look below to get an idea of what I’m talking about:

 

For those of you who don’t know, holding down shift makes the radius of any tool larger and more powerful while holding down control makes the radius smaller and weaker. You can also hold down shift then press a number from 1-9 on your keyboard to adjust the radius to a size relative to that number. This makes the whole business of terraforming much easier.

 

 

Once you’ve finished beautifying your landscape and are ready to begin building, plop

5-7 beaches along your shore and build a 32 x 30 road square directly above them. Then fill the square with light residential and medium commercial as seen below:

 

If you’re having trouble measuring the roads, consider this: each road tile costs 10 simoleons to build, so a road 32 tiles long would therefore cost §320. This method makes it easier to measure the lengths of your roads.

 

You may also want to hold down shift or control while zoning to get the zones to face the right way. Don’t forget the bus stops either!

 

See that road in the above picture? Now draw one just like it that leads to a 15x15 zone of medium industrial as pictured below:

 

Again, don’t forget to add some bus stops to your new zone.

 

The next step is to add some power and water. Place a water tower as shown below and establish a sufficient pipe network; then go ahead and plop two wind plants next to your commercial zone and two next to your industrial zone.

Because each city builds differently, I can’t say exactly when to add more power plants or water towers to your zones. If your Utilities Adviser pops up or you see a warning message, just plop more power plants or towers next to the ones you already have.

 

Go ahead and let your zones fill up a bit. If you get the Mayor’s House reward, plop it in or above your residential zone.

 

Now we’re going to add some educational buildings! Start by plopping a “Handley Elementary School”, a Medium Park, and a Library next to your residential zone and adjusting their funding levels to slightly above the usage amount.

 

Next we’re going to add a College and a Museum. Plop them as I did below and adjust their funding levels. If you can’t place the museum exactly, don’t worry about it, just place it somewhere in the commercial zone.

 

Good work! Your Sims now have a mediocre education system, but before we can improve on that, we’re going to have to add another residential zone. Draw a 25 x 33 tile road block as shown below, and fill it with light residential.

 

Add some bus stops and a pipeline to the zone and let it grow. At this point you should also raise the taxes on R§§§ to 9.4 and the taxes on dirty industrial to 9.5. I raise the taxes for the higher income Sims to keep their houses from abandoning because they can’t find a job. Adjusting this rate is something you will have to do throughout the life of your city. When you start to notice the higher wealth houses abandoning, query them to make sure it’s not from something else then go ahead and demolish their house. You should then raise taxes on them to keep the demand down until you get more businesses.

 

You may have gotten the House of Worship and Cemetery rewards at this point. You may plop them anywhere to the right of your new residential zone.

You will also have to adjust the funding levels to some of your educational buildings to accommodate the new Sims.

 

The last thing to do at this point is to enact the Nuclear Free Zone ordinance, the Smoke Alarm ordinance, and the Free Clinics ordinance.

 

 

I think your city could use some health care at this point, don’t you?

Go ahead and plop a Large Medical Center along with a Large Flower Garden for the patients above your commercial zone. Don’t forget to adjust both funding bars for the medical center to accommodate your city.

 

Now to expand your education system. Plop the “Washington High School” to the right of your elementary school and adjust its funding.

 

Well we just spent a whole bunch of money now didn’t we? To balance out our checkbook it’s time for another residential zone. Like before, build the zone above your previous residential zone. This one is 25 x 25 tiles large.

 

Don’t forget the pipes or the bus stops!

 

Now we’re going to draw a road from our new zone to our industrial zone to ease traffic. While we’re at it why don’t we expand our industrial zone as well.

 

 

Our new residential area needs some amenities. Place an Elementary School and a Library in that unfilled spot towards the top and adjust their funding levels.

 

You should have a somewhat high demand for commercial by now as well, so go ahead and expand your commercial zone with more medium density commercial like below:

 

Remember the water and bus stops!

 

How about a small medical clinic for your new residential zone. Plop it here…

 

…and adjust its funding.

 

Let’s also add a Small Police Station and a Small Fire Station next to our first school.

 
Wow! We’ve expanded quite a bit, haven’t we? The next step is to age your city for ten years. Go ahead and relax. Play some missions if you wish. If you get any messages about under funding, go ahead and give the buildings what they need.

 

Once your city has aged, it’s time to expand yet again. This time we’re going to build to the right of your commercial zone. Build a road square that is 30 x 24 tiles large and fill it with some light residential and bus stops as pictured below.

Now is a good time to expand your beach by the way.

 

Naturally this new zone is going to need some source of education. Add another “Handley Elementary School”, a Library, and a park.
 
 

 

Don’t forget the funding levels!

 

With these new Sims moving in it’s about time we added a more advanced form of law enforcement. Let’s replace our small police and fire stations with their larger counterparts.

 

All those new Sims are going to need places to work. Let’s expand our commercial zone and get our first bit of high-tech industry. Set both dirty and manufacturing industrial’s taxes to 13% and then zone as follows:

 

We’re definitely going to need some garbage disposal at this point so go ahead and place SimGoober’s Modern Waste to Energy Plant as seen below and set it’s funding to zero.

 

As your Hi-Tech industrial zone grows, start to de-zone sections of your dirty industrial zone. That way your city can begin to modernize.

 

The last step is to add a Small Police Station and Fire Station next to your medical clinic.

 

Wow Mayor, give yourself a pat on the back! You made it through this tutorial alive and you have a great town to prove it. Now it’s up to you to expand this town as you see fit. Enact more ordinances, continue to dispose of your dirty industrial sector, and zone more residential in areas where your radius can reach. Remeber, don't compare your income on this level to that on the other levels. If you're making §1,000 a month, then your doing great!

 

How this town expands is up to you!

 

 

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and I was able to teach you something. I wish you the best of luck with your cities and may all your Sims be content!

 

-Sim1013

If you have any questions about this tutorial feel free to PM me!

[JakeMD 107]

Very nice tutorials everyone!

[Snakecollector 0]

Wow excellent tutorials!  This will help me very much in my future CJ.

[blasterman 0]

Yes! This topic is just what I need! Thanks, all!

[smstevenms 7]

There are some really nice ideas here, I hope to try some of this stuff. If there was a tutorial on the nam bridges (on how to creat smooth looking bridges) in conjuction with sunken hwy that would be great.

[prkrsmth 0]

these were all very interesting and cool, could someone put int a tutorial about how to make the most realistic style cities?

[Skram 4]

can someone make my a tutorial making large realistic airports

[delldimensions 0]

I second Skram's request.  None in the Omnibus, but it would be really useful

[pilotdaryl 25]

Actually I was working on that but other airport projects have forced me to put that on hold--but if you need any help with airports just give me a PM and I'll see what I can do.

[Mikeaut1 261]

An airport tutorial would be a cool addition to the Omnibus. Many people would like to know how to construct a realistic looking airport with the new packs that are out. Anyone who is willing to create a nice tutorial with pictures can PM me, and we'll set up something for you to create one!

That goes for anyone too who is interested in contributing to the Omnibus. I like to write these messages every few months in here or in SHS thread to remind that those opportunities are available.

[politicman 1]

Very good explication super

[smstevenms 7]

This would be a great idea, considering I've had a DWR or RWD something like that airport pack that has so many pieces, I have no idea where to start.

[Skram 4]

Originally posted by: smstevenms This would be a great idea, considering I've had a DWR or RWD something like that airport pack that has so many pieces, I have no idea where to start.quote>

lol me anyways what do you need so that on the runways it dosn't look at messed up??

[smstevenms 7]

Skram, no it's more like working with puzzle pieces of a picture you didn't get a good look at. The pieces don't indicate what they are, or where to best put them. I've had the thing so long and never even used it yet. I just like knowing where I'm heading before deciding if I want to go.

[Dsrwhat316 12]

Well, several people have been asking me how did i make this...

I am referring to the GLR slope underpass in these pics. please note that I did NOT make the sidewalk pieces you see here. they are found in the STEX; European Style Sidewalk Package. I simply modified them to form a foundation in the lot editor by tweaking lot max number (see below) to 90.0 in the elevation change section of the lot tab (again, see below). also set the THRESHOLD to 0.00 so that a foundation is formed.

so, now let's take that new lot and use it in our city

Step 1

Use the Hole Digging Lots by smoncrie like so (use the ones for sunken).

Step 2

Run the road through it (simple enough).

Step 3

Demolish those pieces. Then, lay single road tiles in this fashion to make a 1x2 hole.

Step 4

After demolishing the road tiles, drag a GROUND highway starting from the flat part of the hole outwards until the slope equals the tiles above.

Step 5

Demolish the highways. Then, using single road tiles as levelers, narrow the slope ditch.

Step 6

Now we put in the road piece from the NAM. Note: you can use any road piece, not just GLR (i.e. another road, train, etc.)

Step 7

Finish laying out the GLR or whatever...

Step 8

Drag out the road on the upper level.

Step 9

Okay, here's the important part. Place single road tiles like so...

Step 10

Now, just plop those lots and see what you get! This can work with ANY building/lot that forms a foundation. Just make sure that the arrow that is displayed before you are about to plop a lot is pointing AWAY from the slope.

Final Results

TAAA DAAA!!!! An attractive piece of work, wouldn't you say?

I used as a basis for this tutorial the work of S.A.C., which is found in the game experiments forum. I just thought I could make it a bit more detailed, so most of the credit should go to him/her.

If anyone has any questions/concerns, feel free to PM me. As always, enjoy the game!

~ Dan

[exodus 10]

How to Build a Realistic Airport

 *By realistic I mean something anyone could look at and believe was a real airport. It may not meet every aviation rule.

I just started building an International Airport for my city. It was the first time I tried to make a realistic airport and didn’t really know what I was doing. I spent hours searching through the forums for information on how to do it. I thought that I would try to put some of that Knowledge together for easy use. I’ll try to keep this pretty simple and if anyone has anything to add then tell me and I’ll add it.

 

Things to Remember

 

General

Google Earth is your friend; use it to look at airports around the world. If you zoom in enough you can see ground marks which can be very useful.

http://earth.google.com/download-earth.html

Patience. If you’re like me and want everything to be perfect (even if you don’t) it’s going to take a couple tries. Be ready to bulldoze the entire runway because a taxiway doesn’t line up or you’ve ended up with an odd number of tiles.

SAVE. Maybe it’s my computer but airports seem to like to crash to desktop, usually right after I’ve finished 2 runways and an entire terminal. Save after every small portion.

Plan ahead. Take a look in Google Earth or on the forums and at least figure out a vague plan.

Realism (Canada at least)

If you’re planning on building a large airport, something that can handle a 747 (jumbo jet), use a large city tile. Anything smaller is unrealistic. Remember that one tile is 16m and that a large city has 256 of them. That’s 4km. Many major airports in the world have runways as longer or longer.

A pretty normal runway is 3000m, thats 190 tile in game. Thats not counting lights at either end.

A touch down zone has to be 914m or a third of the runway. 914m is 57 tiles.

pilotdaryl pointed out that the RMIP (see below) has skid and non skid tiles. Usually the touch done zones would have skid marks, the middle wouldn't (Unfortunitly the RMIP doesn't come with a lot of non skid tiles. If you can work the LE it would be easy enough to create them though.)

(anyone have more major points to add)

 

Things to Download

 

The RMIP sets by Voltaire are a must. There are 4 and they provide you with all the runways and taxiways.

https://www.simtropolis.com/stex/details.cfm?id=15604&v=1

 

[Benedict 3,119]

This is not a tutorial about how to do something in the game, but how to create a realistic transit diagram or map. This is the most frequently asked question over at this thread: https://www.simtropolis.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=23&threadid=81508&enterthread=y&STARTPAGE=1

Tutorial 1:

How to make something without curves that looks reasonable.

OK, I am going to use Shingure's last map. When I redesign a map I have it is my background.

I hope it isn't too confusing to see my work superimposed on the map.

I'm using Photoshop on a MacBook Pro. Make sure you turn the gridlines on (apple ' on my computer).

Also, start a new layer - I called it 'green'.

Now, using the rectangular marquee tool, enclose and area that roughly matches the length of vertical line that you want. I usually make my lines 1 square thick (0.25 in) but in this case Shingure's map has thicker lines - I'll go for 2 squares.

Now use the eye dropper tool to get just the right shade of green, and fill the marquee.

Now I do the same for the lower vertical portion.

Next, fill a longer strip of line using the marquee tool. This is going to be rotated for the diagonal part of the green line, so keep the marquee tool on.

Once the 'line' portion is filled, rotate it using the Transform menu. This line will be transformed 45 degrees.

Here is the line now on a 45 degree diagonal - don't worry about some of it 'disappearing' off the edge of the grid.

Now, move the diagonal into position. Once you are happy that the diagonal overlaps the 2 vertical parts of the line, it's clean up time. Use the marquee tool to cut any bits of the diagonal that protrude.

In this example I ended up moving the lower vertical portion further down my canvas.

Now clean up the connection...

That's the green line done, now start a new layer for the blue line and repeat the steps. Next, make a new layer for the stations.

To copy Shingure's style for the stations, switch to the elliptical marquee.

Position the circle where you want it and fill with white. If you keep the marquee tool on, after you fill it you can drag the outline anywhere and fill the rest of the stations in fairly quickly.

Now the redesign of the map is done, I've stayed fairly true to Shingure's original. It is ready for decoration and text as you wish!!!

A real world map that uses a similar style (i.e. sharp corners): Moscow.

Next: Easy curves<

[Benedict 3,119]

Transit map tutorial 2: Easy 90 degree curves, the simple way. (Note this is not the only way to do this)

Turn the grid on, and start a new layer. Use the marquee tool and select elliptical.

Outline a 1 inch (4x4 grid blocks) circle and fill it in with the color of your choice.

Now use the elliptical to highlight a 2x2 circle from the center.

Cut the outline...

Now switch to rectangular marquee...

...and outline one quarter of the circle.

Now click on the move tool...

...and separate the 'turn' from the circle.

Repeat for the other quadrants...

And now you're ready to change direction with a perfect 90 degree curve for all occasions. Just duplicate layers or copy and paste. For wider turns use circles with larger circumferences.

A real world example: St Petersburg

Next: Simple curves using the path tool

[LarksTonguesInAspic 28]

Just a BTW, I found an airport tutorial by NASA for RL airport design. It has some good info.

[Patricius Maximus 236]

Since embedding YouTube videos is a trend that is rising among CJ'ers, I thought I would tell how you do this.

First, you upload or select a video at YouTube. To the right of the video, you'll see a box with text in it with the word 'embed' above it. Highlight ALL the text in the box.

Then press CTRL-C to copy it to your clipboard.

Now that you have a video link, go to Simtropolis and the thread you want to post in. Hit the REPLY button.

You will see above the text field of your post, an icon that looks like an anchor. Click on it. You will see a line where you can put text in. Click the line, and press CTRL-V to paste it to the line.

Then click OK. You will see a wierd icon below your reply text. This is the embedded video.

Once you have the reply you want, press REPLY and in the thread, you will see the video embedded in your post for all to see.

That is my video tutorial. If you have any questions post it in this thread.

Hope you enjoyed it.

-Patricius Maximus

[manubeas 0]

Hello everyone! I'mgoing to show you how to do nice looking suburbs!

I know there's a tutorial on the omnibus also but I just wanted to post one of my own.

I was to lazy to take out the pause lines sorry hehe.

Okay, first of all, here are some pics of what your final suburs will look like:

First of all, lay out a road circuit(it makes a complete circle)of a medium size but don't do it just like a boring square, be a bit more original so that at the end it looks nicer. maybe something like this:

Then, inside the circuit put a lot of streets, again, in a creative way a bit like this:

It's important to see how many tiles you're leavingin between th road and the streets and also in between the streets.

There shouldnt be more than 3 or less than 2. Here are some pics to show you what Im talking about:

Why this? Because we are going to plot 1x1 residential lots thorough all the streets and roads.

If they join they will have the possibility of turning into 1x2, 2x2, 2x3 bla bla. Like this:

As you can see, my lots are always separated by one tile except in some edges, you should also try to plot the lots facing the streets and not the roads, this is just to give realism. I do face them to the roads sometimes.

Now the final part, download PEG's random woods or seasonal wood (I prefer the random ones) and plot them into all the spaces in between the lots like this:

Then just let it develop and that's it! Remember to put some commercial zones in between the suburbs to provide enough jobs. Note that you won't be able to have high wealth houses in this.