AEX BATs

[simcity4fan12 13]

Hello everyone! Well, I don't really have my own BAT Thread anymore, so I started my own for my non-NYC BATs. I really want my non-NYC BATs to be focused on Alexandria Louisiana buildings, and maybe some other Louisiana buildings. So far, I only made one BAT from Alexandria, and I plan on redoing that one and make more to go with it.

Some info- Sometimes, I will say Cenla or Alex to refer to Alexandria. Cenla is one of its nicknames, which comes from Central Louisiana, becuase it's right in the center of Louisiana. Alex is short for Alexandria. It is pronounced "Ellic" though, not like the name Alex. I will not take Louisiana BAT requests here, or New York requests. You can post pics of the RL buildings I am making to help me finish them though.

One more thing, anyone from Alex is welcome to come here to help. Especially if you know how to BAT and are from Alex. I might not be able to BAT the Rapides Parish Colleseum or the Bently Hotel(maybe the 8 story edition, but not the 1908 main building). So if you are from Alex and can BAT you are welcome to come here and BAT those(show pics of progress) or any other BAT from Alex. But please, if you are, these BATs- Alexandria Tower, Capital One Bank Building, and the Alexandria Museum are allready taken by me.

Here's 2 pics to start off, just a reminder, I use sketchup.


That's the Capital One Bank Building in Downtown Alex. It's a w2w building(only on its back) and is the tallest building in Alexandria and in Rapides Parish. I put the camera to a two-point perspective just for the pic. There is another camera view, "Parallel Projection" that if you move the camera in the right position in this veiw, that it will look like a gmax BAT rendering preview.

Here's progress on the museum also in Downtown. Just a basic shape. It's a modern building w2w with an old art-deco building that both all together function as the museum.


More to come. Comments and suggestions are welcome!


 

---

Buildings Done and to Be Done-

Tallest Buildings list by height from tallest-

• Guaranty Bank & Trust Building(Capital One Bank)- Completed
• Alexandria Tower- Completed
• Hotel Bently Addition- Incomplete
• Holiday Inn Alexandria Downtown Convention Center- Incomplete
• Rapides Parish Courthouse- Completed
• Commercial Building- Incomplete
• Bently Hotel- Incomplete
• 1440 Dorchester Drive(Two Centre Court)- Incomplete
• Masonic Temple- Incomplete
• 1412 Centre Court(Red River Bank)- Completed

Other Buildings-
 

• Alexandria Art Museum(Modern Part)- In Progress
• Alexandria Art Museum(Old Part)- Incomplete
• Alexandria Historic Water Tower- Completed
• Rapides Parish Colleseum- Incomplete
• Alexandria River Front Center(Convention Center)- Incomplete
• Alexandria Senior Highschool- Incomplete
• AEX Airport(Alexandria International Airport)-Incomplete

[kellydale2003 2,276]

Your great haha - You like BATting dont cha! Can't wait for more work, I'm subscribing

[simcity4fan12 13]

Well, I got an update on the Capital One Bank Building in Alex. Here's a pic. I made the black lines hidden, so the don't show the basic window shapes and such right now. How do ya'll like it?

@Kellydale2003- Yes, I do like to BAT.

[simcity4fan12 13]

Hate to double post, but no one was replying. I have an update on the Capital One Bank Building.

I've been working on it for a bit more. I want to finish it soon, since it's smaller than my current NY Projects(which will be show in the NYBT BAT Thread). How's it look?

[Chris M 406]

It looks fantastic. I'm looking forward to seeing it once you've applied more details to the model.

[simcity4fan12 13]

Thanks DA, more details will be added, I'm just working with the basics right now.

I have an update. First, here's a close up at some of the basic details.

Don't mind the diagonal textures, it's just a problem that can be easily fixed. It has to do with changing the Axis in Sketchup.

Here's the fire escape on one of the not so detailed sides of the building. I simply made the part that covers the stairs. It's not finished yet.

This side is unfinished near the base, and much little details need to be added, like window frames, window ledges, ect. BTW, the building will be W2W, but only on it's back, but it's best that a building at 3 stories or lower is W2W with it though, since that's how it is in RL, the windows on the back go down till they almost meet the building behind it.

Just curious, should I make the Capital One logo on the building? Or should I not include it? It used to be a Guantry Bank & Trust when it was first built, in the '20s. It's only 10 stories tall, and held record for Alexandria's and Rapides Parish's tallest building longer than the Empire State Building held record for world's tallest. This builidng still holds it's current record.

[Vlasky 1,803]

You are addicted to the tallest buildings, even when they are 10 stories tall

looking good. It could easily be in nyc.

I like those circles above columns

[LivingInThePast 364]

Originally posted by: kellydale2003

Your great haha - You like BATting dont cha! Can't wait for more work, I'm subscribing quote>

Technically, since he's using SketchUp, that's technically not BATting, but I understand. It's all okay. 

[Magicman9363 1]

Looking good. As for the logo, maybe do one with and one without then post and get votes.

[aj45210 0]

The Capital One building looks awesome, keep up the good work! I live in the Lafayette, LA area and it would be great to see some Louisiana buildings!

[simcity4fan12 13]

I have a big update on the Capital One Bank Building. I finished up most of the basics for it in sketchup, and decided to move on to the gmax process since most of the objects and details left to make are simple shapes. Here's 4 rendering previews. They are in low quality, my computer is running a little slow so I didn't try high.

That blank wall on the3rd pic is accurate, it's W2W with a 2 or 3 story building on that side. The 4th pic, isn't W2W with anything, but the wall wasn't to detailed in RL, most likely becuase of the Stairs being in right there. I haven't added the stairs yet, just the part that covers them up. I'm going to start on window frames first, before any other detail. What do ya'll think about the textures? I'm thinking about making the blue glass have a more bronze-tint, I think that's how the glass for this one is in RL.

These were low-quality renders.

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Looks like you are on the right track. I think you will have to add more detail to the parapet wall and the top in general. I think most of the work you have left to do is just in textures (which is half the work sometimes ). Do you have a RL photo of the building handy? I would love to see what your subject looks like.

Best of luck,

-Todd

[simcity4fan12 13]

Here's some RL pics. The first one is old.

That was after the Hibernia logo was taken off.

Here's a more recent photo.

I was using the emporis pics mostly, becuase it's hard to find pics of Alexandria buildings online, according to the one above, the bricks are darker. I'm going to darken up some of the building's bricks. Update coming later.

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Interesting, I was expecting something a little different. Your pretty spot on with the modeling thus far, you just might need a vertical scale when your done. When you texture try to mix up the brightness so you can accentuate the details (like the window frames and masonry details). Its all pretty much the same "texture" so making the unique parts stand out will be important. There really isn't much up there so you might have to make it a little more obvious. I would hate to see it all blend together and ruin this nice building

Looking forward to what you do,

-Todd

[simcity4fan12 13]

@SimHoTToDDy- I'm definately not going to ruin any building from my hometown!You're advice so far has been most helpful. Here's a high quality render of the progress. Am I getting the idea?

I'm still adding things and texturing others. The circle details above the columns at the top need to be darkened. I think I'm going to exclude the Capital One logo on the building, I think it will just ruin it's beauty.

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

You are doing so good.

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

So far so good, window frames and other small details are always difficult to perfect due to SC4s limited resolution, but I say  it looks better. Maybe give the ones around the regular windows a little increase in depth, but don't go crazy.

I'm going to rip a page out of Jasoncw's book and give you advice the best way one can... with a picture!!!

I'd say, shoot for something like this:

I desaturated things quite a bit and added some red hues in place of the yellow ones, but for the roof put a little blue. I darkened things strategically based on the recent picture, but the top is going to be really tricky. Perhaps I should wait for a better texture across that big open area (try something with a little more noise, and adjust the uvw so its not so stretched).

You might want to think about making that thick parapet wall thinner, reducing it somewhere in the area of 50-33% might look good, but use your best judgement (that goes for all of my suggestions). You made quite an improvement between those last two pictures, so heres to another one!

-Todd

[simcity4fan12 13]

@ SimHoTToDDy- Well, I did some more on it, but I didn't see your recent post about the textures, so this is what I got. But I'll try what you just said. Here's what I currently have.



I really like the way it looks in the pic you showed me, I'm going to try to get as close as I can with it!

[simcity4fan12 13]

I've been working all night and losing track of time. Here's what I got now.

I'll show the other sides later...I'm tired and off to bed for now. I'm pretty satisfied with the textures, hopefully I don't have to change them. For some reason, the second floor with the small windows(that have the stone awning things) seem to be a different color than floors 3-10 but they are the same texture...weird, but I like the way it made it look.

[simcity4fan12 13]

Here's the final version of the textures and details and I'm going to make the nightlighting now.

Thanks to Glenni's roof junk packs and that flag model he uploaded, it help save some time on this. Thanks Glenni!

The real building has those two flags on it just about everyday. The American Flag, and the Louisiana State Flag. How's it look?

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

You have made some substantial steps in the right direction and things are looking great, but I wouldn't call the textures done just yet.

Blue: there is little to no contrast between the walls of your building and the roof texture, this results in a very "washed out" looking product. Just look at the other two arrows to see what I mean. Even the red brick buildings have contrast, although theirs are due to the difference in color rather than tone. When your roof/ walls have a similar color like your building, tone becomes increasingly important.

Red: This texture just doesn't look right. It seems like it is stretched too wide and thus lacks any real "texture" other than a smear on a flat color. I made a little mock up to show you an example of how it should look.

Additionally, I might desaturate your main wall texture and shift your hue little more to red. In addition to that, it might be beneficial to bump up the contrast on that texture as well.

Texturing is probably the most important part of BATing and getting it right takes a lot of practice, tinkering, and preview renders, but the time is always worth it. Your outcome will always get better the more you work with them.

-Todd

Edit: didn't notice you uploaded it, but the fact remains.

[simcity4fan12 13]

@SimhoTToDDy- I'm sorry I never got a chance to see that last comment. I still have the model file, so I can update it. And exporting this building only took about 30 minutes, so it's no trouble. Can you explain some more on what exactly I have to do to make my textures that way? I started another BAT from Alexandria, so it would be great to not have to export it liek twice to get it right lol. I appreciate your help.

[simcity4fan12 13]

Hey all, I got an updated version of this building in the works, and I have another one from the same city as well. Here's the updated one so far, this is a low quality render.

I added more contrast to the top part, and changed the roof texture and the wall texture up a bit. I think the wall is to red/looking....what do ya'll think?

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Well, the first question is obviously: What program do you have at your disposal to edit these textures?

Most programs have the tools to adjust hue/saturation, brightness/contrast, and so on. It is more helpful if you have something with layers like gimp or specifically photoshop for a lot of things. I have gotten pretty good at using Photoshop over the years, so I can tell you just about anything you need when it comes to that.

For the red arrow one in particular, you probably just need to adjust the uvw map so it isn't so wide, but the texture might need some tweaking as well. Basicly adding noise and adjusting contrast in some spots will give you something less flat, but specifics will come later if you have questions.

[simcity4fan12 13]

@SimhoTToDDy- Well, I found something for free, called Infranview. It lets me mess around with contrast, saturation, and all of that. I've been using that. Is the textures for the building looking all right? Someone commented about the base needing to be better...it's a RL building so the base stays the same, what else am I supposed to do with it?

Here's my other BAT and guess what: It's going to be my first BAT in Gmax! No sketchup first then Gmax! WOOT.... Now, this is probably going to be one of the only BATs I only do in gmax, becuase there's too much I still don't understand and I'm still used to sketchup. But this building is extremely simple, everywhere, even the roof. It has a penthouse on it, and maybe some mechanical thing and that's in. But I haven't modeled out the roof and the base yet, it's only 5 stories tall.

The glass hasn't been textured yet, and I'm having a problem with the wall texture. Every time I rotate it, one corner is always a solid color and it moves to the other coner every time. I hope there's a way to fix this! Or hopefully it will go away in the final export. Any help?

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Irfanview is ok for really basic stuff, but in the end it isn't up to par with editing textures. I would recommend GIMP ( http://www.gimp.org/downloads/ ), its free as well, but has the capacity to do much more.

As for the base I think its alright. If no one else agrees with the comment, you can generally disregard it ( I almost gave him a -1 point, but I let him be). Personally, I would make the base a little bit darkened to differentiate it from the body of the tower slightly (see my original pic), but otherwise I don't see the issue with it.

After seeing your little adjustment, it looks better, but it is still horizontally stretched. Try this, select whatever object that top part of your building is (or all of it's components) and put a new UVW map on it, select the "box" radio button and reduce the width so that it is less then the length of your building. That is half your problem I think. See Jasoncw's tutorial to see what I mean ( https://www.simtropolis.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=37&threadid=83418&enterthread=y )

The texture you made looks a little bit too yellow (which traditionally doesn't go well in game), so desaturate it and shift the hue a little to the red like your main wall texture. Speaking of which, that could be desaturated as well, somehow it looks darker and more saturated than the picture before

Both of the roof parts should use the same texture, select both and put UVW on them so they have the same proportions. If you decide to open up GIMP, make a new layer and add some variation to the texture, darken the edges, add subtle changes in color, value etc so its not the same everywhere you look.

Anyway, I would still shoot for the saturation and general appearance I showed you in that first picture. I'll have to make a more detailed walk though of making a nice wall or roof texture some time. Explaining with words gets old after a while

[simcity4fan12 13]

The link you provided will be very useful! Thanks. Here's the Red River Bank again.

I'm still working on the textures, oh it's a low quality render so that's one reason why the texture looks like a thousand dots.

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

WOW!!! thats going to be you first BAT, i thought you have used BAT before.

[simcity4fan12 13]

@Aaron Graham- It's going to be my first BAT using only Gmax, my others, I either only used sketchup to model 100% of the model, or used sketchup, then used Gmax to make minor details. This BAT, I didn't use Sketchup. But it's simple, and made mostly of boxes, so I thought about taking a quick shot of it in Gmax.

Here's what I got now-

The corner is still acting like that, and I noticed one of the window frames dissapeared, and 2 airvents are floating but I fixed those, just not the corner problem. The textures look horrible in a low quality render, I'm going to do a high quality preview render and make sure how the textures will really look. The roof texture still looks odd...

EDIT: Higher Quality Render.

Does it look good? So far...?

[io_bg 249]

Yes, it does, I like it!