SimHoTToDDy BATs

[Cockatoo 2,256]

Ahh, where are the shadows!?

[deathtopumpkins 43]

OK, these are highly impressibe buildings! I know you wanted more constructive feedback, but hey, it's positive!

Good luck finishing them up and lotting them, and I can't wait to see them on the STEX!

[SimHoTToDDy 2,938]

Cockatoo: Here they are! ...kind of

I was still using the default light rigs for some reason (EWWWWW!!!) But I put in the ones I got from Bixel and things look good now. I changed the main wall texture (courtesy of Gn_leugim ), toned down some of the other ones to match with max lighting, and re arranged some of my uvw maps to make some of the roof junk look more unique texture wise. I am starting to really love this!

I think I made the window ac units too small this time, but then they are still close to a meter long, so I guess its just me.  Also, do you think its too green?

Let me know what you think, I am about to start on some nightlights and then try to get this baby exported.

-Todd

[JakeMD 107]

The AC units do look a little too small, but thats an easy fix.

Grean Smean, I think the textures are great!

[spa 968]

Wow that's bleak looking, but in a good way. The roof top penthouse is nicely done. I would suggest adjusting the roof texture though so that it's not obviously tiled (the white discolouration grabs the eye). You might want to darken the white textures somewhat but it's tough to say without seeing it against the game's colour palette.

[bixel 1,223]

Wow looks great!!!! You are progressing nicely! Makes me wanna do some more pencil towers.

[Gn_leugim 853]

the wall texture came out pretty well ein? it might be a little green, but that is a easy fix the AC units are pretty small, they should be double I think.. but, eeiii.. If you would put this on STEX as it is, I got one dl from me

[SimFox 802]

it's good, but the rig has to be changed, I believe.

It would be good representation of quite overcast day, with basically no shadowing to speak of and just indication of the brighter part of the sky dome. This type of lighting is ideal for truNite night view since it better indicate the shape then completely flat lighting, but still has no clear shadows. Actually it may be a bit off even for that... the illumination difference is appears ONLY on vertical surfaces but completely missing from any of the horizontals.

BTW have you migrated to Max2008?

First of all the shadow is way to bright and also it's got very wrong color tint...

[SimHoTToDDy 2,938]

SWAT-MEDIC: yeah, those acs were a breeze. I like what I have this time, you can see the units without them being too big. The green texture did go away when I changed my light rigs though, but I'm glad you liked the moss-y look it had going while it lasted

Spa: Thanks man, I was kinda concerned with white blotch, but I though it looked ok, with the exception of  its tiled friend on the other side of the building. I have fallen in love with the result though, I can barely tell its tiled 2.5 times down the length of the building. I was thinking I have to get it in game before I can really be final on the textures too, which changed again with the new rig. Oh well, I have much better shadows now.

Bixel: That is EXACTLY what I thought of when I saw this preview for the first time "that looks like one of bixels towers!!!!". Thanks a lot, and I think you need to make more too

Gn_leugim: Well both of those are fixed up nicely I think this time around, though the texture was mostly do to a change in lighting...I actually think its kinda dark now But, I'm happy its good enough for a DL!

Simfox: Your wish is my command, I found one of your rigs (no offence bix, but I am too new to mucle yours around ) and it turned a lot more realistic, plus I have REAL shadows this time. And no, I'm still trying to get my hands on 2008. I might have a chance to get one, but that is still a while off unfortunatly.

And a back shot, just for the hell of it.

Well I think this speaks for itself. I only changed the lighting rig, nothing else. Nothing except the AC size, I added a texture for the top of the outer walls, and removed the white blotch from the roof texture. Nothing major as far as that goes. I do think the wall texture might be a little dark, but I want to compare it ingame first.

I exported this to try out the textures against the game's. I did the PM work and got as far as LE, but it turns out I have an old version of LE and have no "replace Item" button under building... and I can't seem to find the account on the EA site to download it again. What a place to get stuck eh? I'm waiting for the EA support section to come back online at SC4D to get a new version, but an in game shot IS coming!

This is fun

-Todd

[Godzillaman 21]

Gets my approval. If I ever started a communist city (HAH! ) then I'd use it.

[Almighty Nienaber 3]

that looks good 'n grimy.

[Renas 0]

Nice buildings Hotdog

[SimHoTToDDy 2,938]

Thanks guys!

I have an in game shot finally, click for full size. I tried to pick some comparable maxis buildings to compare the colors, along with some W2W.

I think it is OK~~~ but I need your opinions on what to change, if anything.

I'll also have to trim a few things so I can get it to fit on the 1x3 lot, but that isn't a big deal (mostly the over hang above the ground floor on the right side. I might make the yellow colored balconies a bit less pink and make them stand out a bit more. The windows should be less black too, again an easy fix. But I don't know if I should do any other bigger changes, so lemme know.

-Todd

[Jasoncw 11,840]

Yeah, I agree about the windows. And I also think that the storefront needs some work (try doing it the same way as you'll do the other windows).

Also, and I've seen this on a lot of these types of BATs, you have a tall box/column type thing on the facade (you have two of them on the facade). I'm wondering what they actually are, and if they exist on real buildings like this, or if this is some kind of architectural detail that was invented by the SC4 community (I'm really asking since I don't know). I personally think the BAT would look better without them, or with them tucked back more.

[jacqulina 162]

great progress there

[SimHoTToDDy 2,938]

Jason: I really don't know why I didn't take those columns out with out having to wait for someone to say it, they are ugly and pointless and probably just left overs from when this was a misguided attempt at re-creating a building. I know what you meant though =P

Jacqulina: Thanks!

Alright, I think I am finally happy with this. I made the store front have some dimension, I got rid of those stupid columns, I added a drain pipe in place of said columns (That might have been it, I needed something to brake up the monotony of that wall!), made the windows more gray with a subtle, slightly random texture, adjusted the yellow balcony texture, and fixed the first floor's overhang so the building will fit a 1x3 or 3x1 lot.

Any last words before I try to figure out night lighting? Then again, I probably post too often to hear what every one has to say... Oh well, at least it doesn't still look like the junk on page one.

Thanks everyone,

-Todd

[Gn_leugim 853]

now that looks better, both wall and windows.. maybe you could try to take off some saturation on the texture.. just a sugestion

[SimFox 802]

It looks great!

But I have a little problem with it's size... I mean windows are too big both in height and also may be width. Buildings on teh left aren't really good comparison, they are out of scale themselves and also virtual boxes wioth some texture (sort of inside out or to be precise viewed from down up) slapped on, which also alters perception quite a bit. You should look fro ques in the building in front...

Another thing is that building like this shouldn't really be W2W. Very rerelly this type would be found in such setting. Also it should face the street with it's narrow side (one with shop). By that time (I mean time buildings like that would be mass built) new view on cuity plkanning and also "ergonomics" of living were in full sway. So building would normally NOT face the street to minimize noise.

We have plenty of these in Helsinki built normally in between 50 and 60 And they aren't really very low wealth, but more of the egalitarian type. They plainness also speaks of this "equality". At any rate truly Low wealth structure should have all those "devices ont he roof -which only could be central AC and some such that is NEVER present in low and even middle wealth buildings Also that top floor is absolutely not necessary from practical point of view, hence it is there as an architectural detail. this also suggest that this is more then just very cheep housing.

In fact you can and I believe should make the whole set of them. Remove the top "gallery" and all that extra roof junk, make windows a bit smaller and you have good R$, brighten colors a bit make windows more "inviting" and you have very good impression of typical Scandinavian R$$ of 50-60

At any rate this is a great bat!

[SimHoTToDDy 2,938]

Gn_leugim: I tried desaturating it, but the rig turned it a bit reddish, so I just bumped up the contrast which had the same effect as desaturating and lightening it. The picture really isn't worth uploading though, not for such a small change anyway.

SimFox, you couldn't read my mind better. While sitting at work doing nothing (Slow day at the movie theater since the Phillies were playing- and winning the world series) I sketched a few ideas to make a, more or less, set that would go along whit this building. I have to admit that is a bit of an ugly duckling in that it doesn't really go with anything else put into SC4, so I came up with some 1x2 or 1x3 ideas that would use this building as somewhat of an end (I'm not about to scan my ugly sketch, but you get the idea). That and I really want to be able to use my first real BAT.

As far as the style goes, I really had no idea that I was making a building that was something you were so familiar with. This was just a bit of an attempt at copying a building I saw in a picture (which I stopped following after I started to get comfortable with using Max).

The windows, to me, looked relatively large when compared to the size of the floors, so that's how I made them. If you think I should get rid of some of the roof junk to make it part of a more realistic style, then I'll see what I can do. Its kind of hard to tell whats up there by this shot . The "gallery" is one of my favorite parts of this whole thing to be honest, though I was thinking of making it just a flat roof at some stages of this. I was afraid that the building would look to bare without something to add interest up top, although removing it would be rather simple. One bonus to this building is that I will be able to extrapolate lots of different models very easily and make a decent set out it (with and with out the top floor )

[EvilCoolKid 9]

Hello, its looking really good and noce to cee ur having a go at the BAT

[Cockatoo 2,256]

That really dose look fantastic for a first BAT IMO. It's amazing that you could pull off that sort of quality on your first attempt.

Sure there are some things that wrong, but you'll learn them later... Simfox will always be here to point them out! I think that lost more roof junk is needed. General rule: the more roof junk an urban building has, the better the outcome.

[bixel 1,223]

FANTASTIC!!!!! Gogogogogogogogogogogogogogogogo!!

[SimHoTToDDy 2,938]

EvilCoolKid, Thanks man, Glad to see you here again! I had been excited about that German armor set you had going there =P

Cockatoo-210893: Yeah I have already been exposed to the Point-It-Out machine we like to call SimFox, and thank God for that! Although he would have to disagree about the roof junk part for this model, I know the value of a good, junked up roof. I think my BAT would look less spectacular if I was just using gmax or something, the higher modeling programs really make a difference. And thanks for the support!

Bixel: THANKS! I'll have this thing up, going, and gone as soon as I do nightlights!

Well I finally go a hold of Max 2008 so I have few questions in how to get my model(s) into 2008 with the BFF SimFox suggested. I am not sure how to actually use it now that I have it ready to go. It seems like it is simple enough based on the shockingly small amount of information given with the download, but then I don't really want to blow up my model just yet XD. I figured since I got it, I should just finish things up in 2008 (which is just nightlights basically, still haven't decided what to do with the roof junk). So any help for the n3wbi is welcome.

I'll start on more modeling as soon as I get this going, I swear!

-Todd

[Gn_leugim 853]

looking forward to see =)

[SimHoTToDDy 2,938]

Well, I have started a new project. I have to admit, I'm surprised no one has picked it up before me, oh well, this is one of those things I have wanted to see finished since I joined the site. I never thought it would be me finishing it!

Remember this? This is just a render I did to see what it looked like in max 2009, no modifications. Even without textures, its a beautiful model.  ( Thanks to thequiltedllama for this piece of art. Again, THIS IS NOT MY MODEL) click for larger

Some work on the stacks I did, I am quite proud of actually getting a brick texture to cooperate with me. I also added a few details that were missing at the top of the stacks themselves. I have to work something out to get rid of those bright spots where you can see the top of the texture, the way it was modeled made it a bit difficult to cover that up. I'll probably add some grit to the top of these as well.

And this is what it looked like after a few hours of messing around and fixing some weirdness going on when I tried to texture. I think its ok, but it obviously needs MUCH more work. I'm not really sure how I feel about the main roof's texture yet, but the side's look like it might just need the white turned down in certain spots. Click for larger

I am going to have to add a lot of details to this before its done, there is an upsetting lack of roof junk that need to be taken care of. Jason, before you even say anything, yes, I am going to remake the windows so they look like they are set into the structure, rather than on the face of it . And do you think that the brick is too saturated, light, dark? I'm not certain, and probably won't be until I have more of this textured.

Let me know what you think,

-Todd

[sese 1]

very nice !! u only need some better textures for the side walls , all the other textures are great !!!!

[toxicpiano 125]

So Battersea might finally see it's day in the game

I would say that the brick texture colour is about right. Obviously the brick are a lot a smaller in real life but it's unlikely that kind of detail would ever be carried over to the game so it doesn't matter but it looks very nice indeed.

[bixel 1,223]

fantastico

[SimHoTToDDy 2,938]

sese: Thanks! The walls you are talking about aren't even textured yet, no worries!

toxicpiano: You think so? Hmmmm, well I guess they stay. I know the bricks would probably be 10 smaller, but I want to be able to see something at zoom 5, you are exactly right , and that's why I did it. Thank you, and glad you like it.

Thanks Bix and Gn_leugim. Happy to see ya here inspecting the goods!

Anyway, more renders

The tops of the towers are really starting to bug me, those light spots just kill the look. I suppose I'll do those next, before I get working on more walls.

Still open for sugestions,

-Todd

[spa 968]

Looking good. I would say you're on the right track with the brick and smoke stacks. Unfortunatley, I think there is still work to be done with the roof. It's a rather overpowering set of textures you've chosen and they feel like they're not big enough for the large roofs. If I may suggest, I think the part on the small tower on the bottom left is close to right (not too in your face but some detail). If you took that and worked that across the whole surface with some variation I think that might look better.