Maxis References

[Francis90b 748]

Lol, i'd gladly get rid of maxis university in my cities as soon as i can, yet, if the true washington university was to be BATed, i'd welcome it...it's a bit funny, and a bit sad.

Still, on the university they did a fair enough job, and i'm just picky .

[Shy Dude 149]

Yeah, it is a bit sad. I would gladly accept a Sunset Tower BAT over Nichols Manor. It's a pretty good model of it, there isn't much wrong with it besides the color.

So has anyone recolored buildings that have already been rendered? That would seem to be a seemingly simple fix for this building and Butts Condos to be more like realife.... Or is it too much effort/impossible?

Resized buildings, on the other hand, are something that definitly have to be modled though (too bad for the university).

  Edited May 13, 2012 by Shy Dude  

[Francis90b 748]

Well, i don't really think it's possible to recolour a building.

BATs are made up by rendered images compiled together, so maybe it would be possible to photoshop them.But, it would take a lot of time and skill, and the result wouldn't probably be very good anyway.

[SimFox 804]

Actually it is possible... since all we see are pictures those could be open in, say, Photoshop, and color corrected to just about anything you want! You also, if you good with the tool (said Photoshop) add or remove any details and so on...

[Shy Dude 149]

I thought it was possible but now that I really think about it, the work is a bit tedious. There are five zoom levels and four angles that is at least 20 pictures and a lot of the bigger buildings have their images split, turned sideways, and are bunched up with unrelated buildings in the one FSH file. Some buildings also have spotlights at night that show off their original color too, those would also have to be redone. Woah, this is a lot more work than I thought it would be.

The biggest help would probably come from a way to find all the FSH files a Maxis building uses I'm not aware of. Even then this is seeming close to impossible.

[Rearviewmirror. 3]

Wow, interesting thread.

[Yuu Caa Sim 55]

The university is loosely based on Washington University. Fun to look for these.

{image}

Man, I never thought that the university would be based on a real one. I wonder if other rewards / civics are based on real buildings?

There don't seem to be any industrial references here, so I think I've found the first one:

SC4:

The Tubing Facility

Real world:

Uploaded with ImageShack.us

It's from the {NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View}. Actually, I'm not sure if this is a unique facility, but it looks pretty similar...

  Edited June 19, 2012 by yunxiang  

[T Wrecks 10,210]

Wow, good catch!

[Sgt Pepper 864]

I never even thought of the Industrial buildings before! Surely there are...more..?

[Jasoncw 11,949]

Yeah I always wondered about the industrial buildings. A lot of them seem like they're just made up.

[T Wrecks 10,210]

Yes, but this is precisely what I would have said about that building yunxiang posted - until I saw the picture. I also thought that most industrial buildings would just be generalised and vague attempts at recreating a generic look, but I'm not so sure about that now.

[Shy Dude 149]

That's an awesome find, yunxiang. That's the only Silicon Valley building in the game?

I think that there are only very generic variants of decent recreations already made by Maxis. For example, the curved Colosseum apartment building I posted is pretty close to the original but two other variants including a rectangular one were also made. There are quite a few buildings with 'generic' variants no one has found yet.

Anyways, It's going to be hard to look for those other industrial buildings. I'm trying to look for that reoccurring dirty industrial revolution type building.

  Edited June 21, 2012 by Shy Dude  

[io_bg 249]

I just started my own thread over at SC4 Devotion when I found this! Looks like I'll need to update mine! Here are the ones that you haven't found

Marquette Building, Chicago, 1895

Herald Towers, New York City (but Chicago tileset)

[Jasoncw 11,949]

It's amazing how much they screwed up the residential building. It barely looks like it! But it does have the distinctive angled part and a few other elements of the real building. It's definitely one of the more cartoony maxis buildings.

Lind Entertainment is actually One North LaSalle in Chicago.

Not too long ago I found a new building, I think in San Fransisco, but now I can't remember which it was.

[io_bg 249]

Lind Entertainment is actually One North LaSalle in Chicago.

Could be, but its overall shape reminds me more of the Woolworth building in NYC.

Any ideas about this one? It somehow reminds me of the Adams Express building in NYC.

[Shy Dude 149]

Funny thing, I was looking at the Herald Towers a while ago because it reminded me of that building but I failed to see how the top windows really give it away as the influence.

I don't think that building is Adams Express, too many differences but I shouldn't be saying that after what I'm going to post.

Braccia Building

Bresford Hotel, Glasgow, Scotland. The Maxis version is downright ugly.

Miguel LLC and Dolan Contractors. Dolan Contractors is a generic variant of this though.

Wainwright Building, St Louis Missouri

And I think Roberts Apartments is actually...

Val D'Amour Apartments, Los Angeles

Here are some that I've been hesitant to post because they are too generic and appear to be combinations of styles of different buildings:

Federal Prison

Eastern State Penitentiary, Pennsylvania

New Jersey State Prison (walls); or some other sort of Egyptian revival prison

Kauker Manor

The Bellevue-Stratford Hotel, Pennsylvania +

Waldorf Hotel, New York City (turrets)

International Airport

Kresge Auditorium, Massachusetts rearranged to sort of look like the TWA Flight Center in New York

Here are some non building things:

Even though the golden gate is obviously the Golden Gate Bridge and the medium suspension is obviously the Brooklyn Bridge. This one is probably obvious too but not for me.

large steel arch:

Sydney Harbor Bridge, Australia

And this sign

Sands Motel, Grant, New Mexico

  Edited January 3, 2013 by Shy Dude  

[bluestardust79 0]

I think Kauker Mannor looks more like the old facade of One Brodway in New York

[Shy Dude 149]

Cool, the gables on top sort of look like it. Maybe Kauker Manor is too generic to call much like the game's highschool which looks like every other school from the 1890's to the '20s in one way or another (what I determined after looking through countless old postcards anyways).

Its pretty interesting how the exterior of 1 Broadway was renovated in the '20s so now it is unrecognizable as that building on the left. Nice to know.


Edit: Some other seeming generic buildings and their closest influences.

Byall Tower

Has stubby spires similar to the Mutual Building in Cape Town, South Africa (which was converted to lofts). Other than that nothing is similar. Maybe they pulled of another Lind Entertainment and this is supposed to be a building without spires but I think the facade looks really generic.


The Long building

Isn't the roof just basically from the Union Square W Hotel in New York (formerly an office building)?

 

Correction: Manhasset Apartments, Manhattan.

[Shy Dude 149]

Lurk, lurk, bump.

 

Multiplex 13

Just the sign from the Orinda Theater, in Orinda, California

 

Peck Cinema

Castro Theater in San Francisco.

 

Chalmers Co

Based on the main entrance of the Graybar Building in New York City

No wonder it looks so awkward, the lackluster modeling doesn't help either.

[Shy Dude 149]

I was thinking about starting to BAT a Chicago School type building and found some good reference pictures of one... Then I realized it was Fisk Insurance, one of my favorite Maxis Buildings.

The Republic Building in Chicago (its even got the flagpole on the corner), demolished sadly.

[Jasoncw 11,949]

Good find!

[Terring 6,476]

This C$$$ building in the European set...

 

 

... looks very similar with this Greek gymnasium!

 

[Shy Dude 149]

[the ugly old] Lighthouse

Yaquina Head Lighthouse

It's colored differently now.

[MandelSoft 2,775]

Excellent find, Shy Dude! They very much look alike

[T Wrecks 10,210]

The lighthouse! I had totally forgotten about it, but now that I see the pictures - jackpot! Thank you for this contribution.

[Jasoncw 11,949]

I have to say, when you first posted (for some reason the photo of the rl building hadn't loaded) I thought "lighthouses all look so similar this person probably just found a random one that looks vaguely like the game's" but that really is the same lighthouse!  All the right details are there.

[Shy Dude 149]

Jasoncw: Yeah, I've come across this lighthouse before (It seems to come up a lot just by simply image searching "lighthouse") but all the pictures were during and after the recent renovation so I never really noticed the resemblance until now.

[Shy Dude 149]

Here's a new one.

 

Hyde Condos

 

Is a shorter Master Apartments (310 Riverside Drive, Manhattan) minus the tower

[Darknono35 3,138]

Yep, you have good eyes to recognise this one

It's could be funny if some BATer can give an second version of Maxis stuff, because, now they are so ridiculous

[APSMS 1,893]

I wonder it's be possible to replace the IIDs of the model files so that they could be direct replacements with no demolishing necessary (not that I have BATting skills, but possibilities...oh, the possibilities!).