JS Residentials

[JayStimson 211]

I finally got around to actually starting a real residential building and figure I can make a set of 3 or 4 different (but similar) R$$$ homes over a period of time. Here's a BAT pic of the first one. I'll call this one the Terry Farrell.

There's still a lot of details to add / complete but the general design / style is pretty well set. I'd appreciate any advice / suggestions.

[SimFox 801]

Bold start! But need some work on the modeling side! Look at the roof, shouldn't in overhang the walls. And also take a look at you garage! The part above the door is way too small. Anyway just use common sense and your creation will look good!

[JayStimson 211]

Here are two pics showing the current status of the Terry Farrell House:

Front:

I lowered the garage door and extended the roof edges as well as adding an edge to them. I also added a foyer moving the front door forward. I moved the main house up 1/2 meter and added a concrete base (foundation). Double flues added to the top of the chimney and modified the roof (shingle) texture to remove the ugly tiling effect.

Back:

Added a backdoor and windows to the garage. Added a sliding glass door and a wooden deck.

That's it for now. Anyone have any more ideas, comments, suggestions ?

I'll try to get a successful render over the next couple of days and we'll see what this puppy looks like in-game.

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Hmmm... is it just my impression, or have you made the windows by slapping a flat box against the wall and applying a photo texture to it? I have my doubts whether this will look good. You see, normally the window frames of a house are set back into the walls by quite a bit, and the windows in turn sit inside the window frames and are a further few inches towards the inside. I can imagine that if you modeled the windows this way, the house would get much more structure and contours.

Speaking of the windows, this wild mix of different window styles looks a bit surprising to me. Are you making this one in recreation of a real-world building?

The wooden deck in front of the entrance and that little step under the side entrance door are really neat touches, though. The design as a whole is good as well, so please do carry on, and I hope I didn't discourage you! That would not have been my intention.

[JayStimson 211]

Very keen observation T Wrecks !!! You're absolutely right about the windows. They're just boxes with a photo texture applied. I do this intially to get an idea of where I want the windows to go and the size I want them to be. It helps getting things spaced and proportioned. Converting the windows to their final version will be one of my last steps. Part of the final little details just before adding night lighting. Maybe you could peek in at that point and tell me what you think ? As far as the mix of windows goes, I don't think it's that unusual. However, I will keep my eyes open as I drive around town and make some mental notes on this. I could be way off. Glad you like the wooden steps on the rear deck (back of the house ... off the kitchen I reckon). I thought the deck with steps and rails worked out pretty good too. I'm assuming that's what you're referring to. Correct ?

Anyway, a bit more work to do, then try to render this bad boy, and I'll be back with another update.

[____----____ 37]

i think it is looking great and it is cool to see you taking the advice

of Twrecks and Simfox. The only small gripe i have is that all

the windows have different colored frames.

regardless this is looking good and i wish u luck.

oh yeah and maybe u could make a few versions/color variations

and release a set?

AK

[JayStimson 211]

aleking: Appreciate you stopping by and offering words of encouragement. As far as the BAT looking good, I've decided I don't like it. I've decided to put it aside and start a new design. One based on some house plans I copied off the web. One thing I noticed looking at lots of plans is that all the windows on a single house are all the same design and only vary in size ... except in special cases where 1 window might be different such as a bay or cathedral window. Imagine that !!! It's amazing the things you notice in the world when you start playing SC4 and BATting.

As far as listening to advice from others .... I've always found it useful. No one knows everything. I'm surprised you mention that though ... do you have me confused with Queen C ?

All: Here's a pic of the new house I'm going to work on.

It's not like the original at all but I do have a couple I copied off the web that are and those I'll attempt later. For now, I picked this one because ... well ... I think it looks really nice ... and ... it's simpler ... geometry-wise ... which should make things easier for a 1st R$$$ project.

And here's a pic of the window I started for this house.

I'm open to any and all suggestions here but the main thing I'm trying to fix on it is the UVM mapping on the stone arch piece. As you can see in the pic, I'm using cylinder mapping aligned right to the center of the "circle" but it doesn't give me the radial pattern I'm looking for. It's "capped" in the pic so you can see the texture clearly and if I take the "capping" off, it looks different (sorta radial) but all blurry and squiggled. Any ideas ? .... jasoncw ?

[Jasoncw 11,839]

The cylinder map is working the way it's supposed to, but it's not doing what you'd like it to.

You can try a sphere map instead, but I don't really know how to texture that.

What you can do though, is you can make a custom texture that includes the stones how you'd like them.

To do this, in the front viewport, while in wireframe mode, take a screenshot of the screen, and paste it into your favorite image editing software.  Now crop the image down to the edges of what you're texturing.  Save the texture, and apply it to your shape, with a normal fitted box uvw map.  The lines should line up with your model (you'll see what I mean when you do this).

Now open your stone texture, and copy and paste it into your screenshot image.  Scale, duplicate, move, rotate (whatever you'd like to do) to get the texture how you want it.  Save as you go, and do preview renders to judge your modifications.  You'll need to press the reload (or was it refresh?) button in the material editor for changes to appear.  It's underneath the area in the material eitor that has the path of your file.

You should do this for all of your large or complicated textures since you can customize them all to look better where you put them.

From what I can see, the window looks nice.  Can you also post a preview render of the window?

[JayStimson 211]

Pretty quick response jason. thanks.

I think you're right that the only way to get the realistic radial effect I'm looking for will require a custom made texture. I did play around with the sphere mapping but I couldn't get it to work right either. I'm sure it's doing what it's supposed to do ... just not what I want it to do. lol

So ... I'll go do some custom texturing. Might take a bit of fiddling ... but it'll be worth it I'm sure.

Here's a preview render of the window ... I had to scale it x10 to get some detail to show ...

Doesn't look too bad to me but I'm sure it could use some improvement. Any suggestions ?

Do you know why the pane separators in the upper arched window don't show in the render ?

It's odd because they show in BAT in the perspective view but not in the front view. Do you know what causes this ? Everything's in the same Y plane so I'm confused that the lower section shows fine but not the top section. hmmm.

[jacqulina 162]

although i like the second bat i really loved the first this is the sort of bat that i have been after someone to make i think its wonderfull

[Jasoncw 11,839]

Make sure the top parts has a uvw map, or that it's converted to a poly or mesh.  That's probably why it's not showing up.

I also notice that the bottom sides of the arch have the funny shading.  You'll need to remodel that part so that it shows up right.

After you do preview renders, it should automatically change the active viewport to the camera.  After that you can change that viewport to "user" and it will retain SC4's angle.  Modeling something in perspective is bad, since what you're looking at is not what you will get when you render it.

The new preview sorta helps, but the point of seeing the preview is so that you can see what it looks like when it'll be in the game.  It won't be zoomed in 10x in the game, lol.  I think the window looks ok though.

[JayStimson 211]

jacqulina: glad you liked the 1st one. I still have the file. Maybe I'll go back to it and finish it. I have a couple of house plans I downloaded that I'll be BATting that are similar in style to the original. You may like those better.

jasoncw: I'll check the mesh and uvm settings on the top part. I guess I don't follow you on the "modeling in perspective". I use all the views and preview render as I go along. And yes, I know things won't be zoomed in x10 in the game. lol I noticed the funny shading on arch too. I may just re-make those pieces. Not having much luck with making the radial texture ... may have to make it "literally" by hand. Can't seem to find a tool in GIMP2 that will do the trick. I'll keep at it though. If I discover something useful, I'll let you know. Thanks again for the help. Always appreciated.

EDIT:

Well I fixed the problem with the pane dividers not showing up. It helps to apply a texture and uvm map. lol I also re-did the window from scratch ... I was missing the middle horizintal piece in what was supposed to be double hung windows (at least I think that's what they're called), the number of panes and their arrangement was all wrong ... didn't match the picture I'm working from, and blah blah blah. So here's a pic of the current version:

It's an improvement I think. Always open to suggestions though ... so keep 'em coming. The current problem is trying to get the glass texture to show in a render after I make it partially transparent. I set the opacity in the parent record to different values (60, 70, 90) but it won't show in the render unless I leave it at 100. Am I doing this in the wrong place ?

I also started the house ... just laying out the main walls ... nothing worth showing yet ... but hopefully soon. Sure is easier working from a set of plans instead of making up the design yourself ... as you go. lol Live and learn I guess.

EDIT: And here's the latest:

Still a long way to go. So many details. Do the proportions look correct ?

[JBSimio 152]

Looks good Jay!  As far as I can tell, the proportions appear to be fine.  The window frames aren't quite what the picture shows, but you're way is a little easier, so maybe you did that on purpose.  Two things jump out at me that you may want to look at.

1)  The trim around the roof looks like it hugs a little too close to the wall.  Consider following closer to the edge of the roof instead.  (BTW... chances are the brackets won't show up in game anyway, so I wouldn't spend too much time on that when you get there)

2)  The window trim looks like it sticks out a bit too far.  Since it's a totally different texture than the wall, this shouldn't be necessary and will actually block some of the window glass from showing up in the game's angle.  Usually I only have things like that sticking out from the wall 0.2meters (at most).

Very cool overall design by the way.  Great choice!

JB 

[jacqulina 162]

wow that sure does look awesome so far,fantastic detail,yes i hope you do start the first one again its just what i am looking for

[JayStimson 211]

jacqulina: Thanks for the compliment. I'm glad you like it. As far as the original design I started with ... I was thinking ... if and when i go back to it ... I could name it "Jacqulina Estates" in your honor.

JBSimio:

1. Roof Trim: That's agreat observation. Your suggestion gives me just the idea (I think anyway, lol) that I needed. I knew something didn't look right but couldn't put my finger on it. And it should be a snap to fix. Next update it'll be adjusted and you can tell me what you think. You're right about some details will not show up in the game. Bummer. But I know they're there. lol

2. The windows should look a little goofy right now. I haven't made the cutouts yet to set them into the wall. I was waiting until I was completely satisfied with their position and scaling. The window casements will extend either .1 or .2 (not sure yet) when done and should look okay. I hope. I plan on putting night lighting inside the house that should show through the window panes. We'll have to see how well i can get that to work.

3. Glad you like the design. I do too. Real pretty house I think. Now if I can just get it look (in-game) close to the pic.

[Jasoncw 11,839]

what I mean about perspective, is that it only shows how you modeled something, it doesn't show what it will look like in-game, which is what people need to see to give a worthwhile critique.

Whether or not the depth of the windows is too much depends on how it looks overall.  If there are too many windows and they're too deep the building will look too bold and blocky, while for the opposite, it will look flat and bland.  The overall depth of my windows (from the outside of the wall to the glass pane) is genearlly around .4 or .3 meters, while the actual frame parts are .2 or .1 meters deep. 

But for the trim, I'd have tp agree that it sticks out too much.   .1 or .15 meters from the edge of the wall is what I do.  At that point, I don't think it's too flat, but it's also not blocky.  But I can't really tell from the screenshots if the things are too deep or not.

I don't know what's wrong with the glass transparency, but I personally don't like transparency anyway, I think better results can be made with opaque textures.  Out of my BATs, the only one with transparent textures is monkey dragon games, and the train stations.

Do you have any plans for any Ann Arbor or Detroit landmarks, since you live in the area?