Harishna's BATs

[AleccHell 0]

Harishna, creo que sabes hablar español.

¡Hola! ¿Todavía no esta listo la Torre de Humanidades II verdad? Yo estudie en la UNAM y la quiero para mi juego, solo pude descargar la Biblioteca Central y la Rectoría, ¿tienes más proyectos en otra página?

[harishna 847]

Hola Alec,

Si claro si soy mexicano. Todavia ando trabajando todavia en la Torre de Humanidades tengo varios proyectos mas que puedes ver en esta seccion que incluyen varios edificios del dentro de la ciudad de Mexico. Me gustaria hacer mas de la UNAM pero no encontrado suficientes fotografias de calidad...

Yes, I do speak speak spanish (I have been living in Australia but I am Mexican). I am still working on the Humanidades II Tower. However it is a very heavy scene and this makes it difficult, as a render test takes around 4 hours...exporting well that takes some 20 hours...I am consifering to re-do the whole scene. I would like to do some more UNAM buildings however I haven't found enough reference photos from other UNAM buildings...

I do have more projects that you can browse in this thread these are mostly buildings from Mexico City downtown most of them are almost ready for release.

Actually would anyone be interesting in testing my models before I release them? I have 8 models ready for release.

[The Avatar 1,089]

I'd be willing to test them.

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

You good so great, I am so proud of you Harishna!!

[harishna 847]

If you want to test the files could you please PM your e-mails and I will send the file to you?

Cheers,

[Heblem 600]

I admire your work, keep on!

  Edited June 20, 2012 by Heblem  

[The Avatar 1,089]

I'll be testing your BATs A.S.A.P. I'll have a lot of free time today, so I'll most likely get it all done today.

EDIT: Okay, after some (incomplete) testing, the following BATs have grown: (I hope you don't mind me posting the names of the BATs, Harishna)

• Independencia
  
• Farmacia Victor*
  
• Esquina Victoria
  
• La Carmelita
  
• Mesones
  
• Vips
  
• Hostel Amigo
  

Talabertia is the only BAT that didn't grow, but I believe it is not growing because the folder you e-mailed me was missing the lot and desc. files.

*This BAT has a graphical glitch at zooms five, four, two and one. Here are some images:

Sorry for the size of some of the images; I know it's hard to see.

Hope this helps, Harishna.

  Edited June 22, 2012 by MamaLuigi945  

[harishna 847]

Thanks very much for the feedback I'll fix the mentioned issues, do you think they are fine in terms of jobs?

By the way I have been busy re-modelling my Humanidades tower, the 4 hour render preview times annoyed me so much that I decided to start again from scratch, well almost, I kept most of the textures and roof junk un-changed. The good news is that now it only takes over 30 minutes to render a preview...I think that is an leap forward. Here is how both models, old and new, look in game. Give me your feedback, I won't mention which one is which to see if the changes are evident and hopefully an improvement.

By the way I still don't know how to make the trees leaves as rich and dense as Girafe's, I am using Onyx, any tips or suggestions?

  Edited June 25, 2012 by harishna  

[harishna 847]

I started re-exporting the problematic models, I am thinking in exploring the scanline renders mentioned by Debussyman to see how they fit on game. So does anyone has a link or could give me some details on how to set 3ds max to do the scanline renders used by other BATers?

In the mean time there is a bit of progress (still not scaled up).

[Ceafus 88 1,794]

That looks amazing!

Great work, you have the most details in your textures and BATs.

[darn42 1,268]

pic says it all

[zahrul3 471]

I started re-exporting the problematic models, I am thinking in exploring the scanline renders mentioned by Debussyman to see how they fit on game. So does anyone has a link or could give me some details on how to set 3ds max to do the scanline renders used by other BATers?

In the mean time there is a bit of progress (still not scaled up).

I have a feeling that the OLD bat4max versions use scanline, since I believe some BSC members actually used 3dsmax. You need a 3dsmax version that matches the release date though.

I also have the feeling that your BAT textures look tacky and plasticy because you unsaturated the textures a bit too much. Rendered in Scanline, it'll look more like Krio's Helsinki set rather than what BSC have done. The textures on your first 2 BATs are fine though, the mural makes it somewhat less tacky. And also, even if you untile textures all the way to the point it covers the entire object without tiling, if it lacks in variation it'll look quite boring. Looking at CJs and photoshopping the renders on CJs of the same tileset(European) might help with that.

[Cockatoo 2,256]

The old BAT4Max versions (the ones made before SimFox took over development) are designed to work with the Scanline renderer and the traditional night lighting method. The newer ones only work with the truNite and MentalRay workflows.

IMO you shouldn't waste your time mucking about with Scanline in Max. It's out-dated and inefficient, and after using MR for so long you'll really notice the difference in the quality of your renders. If you want to produce something comparable to a Scanline render, save yourself the grief and just use Gmax instead.

[Ceafus 88 1,794]

I also have the feeling that your BAT textures look tacky and plasticy because you unsaturated the textures a bit too much.

I strongly disagree, his textures are among the best out there.

Just look in other threads, enlighten yourself with the beauty and realism his textures have to offer, as they are very realistic.

  Edited July 6, 2012 by Frex_Ceafus  

[harishna 847]

Zahrul3 to be honest I always find hard to understand what is the point that you are trying to make in most your comments. I welcome your criticism but I think it would help if for instance you simply drop the unnecessary and almost ridiculous technicisms. So you are saying that the textures I am using look plastic and tacky, so let me get this straight, what are you trying to say is that I should increase the saturation and brightness in the textures I am using? Is that your point? Are you talking in general or are you referring to this model or to specific textures in one model? Then you also mentioned that my textures are boring, to be honest I found this surprising as most people often says the opposite. I invite you to check references for the buildings I am recreating and provide your feedback based on this.

Cockatoo Thanks, I simply wanted to compare how different the scanline vs MR versions really look in game, mainly from Debussyman request.

Thanks Frex much appreciated.

[zahrul3 471]

@harishna: yes, thats what i mean

[gutterclub 2,729]

To be honest Zahrul, all you bang on about is CJ's and BSC and everything not fitting in with how YOU want them to look with the bats YOU use, every criticism you make is based on how things will fit in around your game...when 90 percent of new bats are made with BAT4MAX. Basically stop being so selfish, its not contructive nor does it help the BATer. Show examples as everytime you slate a Mental Ray BAT and ask for examples you go quiet on us all. Everyone is happy with criticism when it is constructive and makes sense.

Harishna, your models and textures are fine, I've been testing and they look great in game and fit the games pallete (as BAT4MAX was desigbed to). Scanline would be a bad move in my opinion, everyone has moved on.

[zahrul3 471]

To be honest Zahrul, all you bang on about is CJ's and BSC and everything not fitting in with how YOU want them to look with the bats YOU use, every criticism you make is based on how things will fit in around your game...when 90 percent of new bats are made with BAT4MAX. Basically stop being so selfish, its not contructive nor does it help the BATer. Show examples as everytime you slate a Mental Ray BAT and ask for examples you go quiet on us all. Everyone is happy with criticism when it is constructive and makes sense.

Harishna, your models and textures are fine, I've been testing and they look great in game and fit the games pallete (as BAT4MAX was desigbed to). Scanline would be a bad move in my opinion, everyone has moved on.

didn't debussyman compare the differences>

try CJing yourself, post in on the CJ forums/area and see how they get along together. What used to be a CJ oriented community is now a split community with lots active in the CJ area not knowing anything behind the scenes(and not downloading altogether) and vice-versa. Ill-Tonkso, glenni, mattb325, colyn(CSX), Krio had CJs, it isn't like BATters can't CJ. And ofcourse, in the right circumstances can you mix 3ds and gmax in one setting/

[IL. 1,043]

You have created a new style in simcity 4 indeed, is it a real-life architecture style or just one building and you made a whole bunch of building with the same style?

[debussyman 1,348]

Thanks for considering a scanline version

Chris Adam's BAT4Max supports rendering with scanline and MRay. It was released several years ago. I haven't tried it with later versions of Max but according to Marczar it worked with Max 2011.

[IL. 1,043]

pic says it all

you made that founain?

[darn42 1,268]

Yea it's part of my tutorial series.

[Jasoncw 11,840]

Zahrul, I don't know how you manage to do it, but most of what you say is flat out, objectively incorrect, and the rest uses flawed logic.

try CJing yourself, post in on the CJ forums/area and see how they get along together. What used to be a CJ oriented community is now a split community with lots active in the CJ area not knowing anything behind the scenes(and not downloading altogether) and vice-versa. Ill-Tonkso, glenni, mattb325, colyn(CSX), Krio had CJs, it isn't like BATters can't CJ. And ofcourse, in the right circumstances can you mix 3ds and gmax in one setting/

Just go out there in the CJ area and see that certain 3dsmax BATs are rarely used by CJers. Bipin's homes are an example, saw it on his CJ and didn't turn out as well as it did on the renderer. You'll also be hard-pressed to find MR BATs within the BSC/NDEX and Euro tilesets as they are mostly rendered in 3dsMax.

The most recent Ben's Top 10 list and I'll try to figure out how many BATs are Mental Ray, scanline, and Maxis (scanline).

Illium

In urban areas it's a mix of MR BATs, scanline BATs, and Maxis buildings. Suburban areas are almost entirely scanline BATs and Maxis (but looking at the areas he was making I don't think there are many MR BATs available).

Vancouver

The typical mix of Jasoncw, Nofunk, Spa, JBSimio, etc. North American prewar BATs. So there's a lot of MR, a lot of scanline (and a few Maxis buildings very tastefully mixed in). There are a lot of scanline and mental ray bats mixed in pretty evenly with each other, and I think they all look pretty good next to each other.

United Kingdom of Cattala

Almost entirely scanline BATs, but it's worth noting that this CJ uses very specific regional architecture that MR BATers have never made anything for. The parts of the cities with less region specific BATs used a mix of MR and scanline. I don't think I saw any Maxis buildings.

Heimen

He seems to only use Maxis buildings.

The Commonwealth of Paradise

I went through several pages and literally did not see a single MR BAT. He also has an urban area where, architecturally, there are plenty of MR BATs he could have chosen. So he might actually be avoiding mixing scanline and MR together.

The Nation of Cape Barren

He uses almost entirely Maxis buildings. It seems like the non-Maxis buildings are either plot related, or chosen by readers to be HQs for their companies.

Star Trek Outpost Beta 6

This one is by Schulmania which means there aren't actually any images from SC4 in it.

Nyhaven

Mostly scanline but plenty of MR mixed in as well.

YouTubia

Only Maxis buildings (it's a "Let's Play" video series)

Cityquest

A mix of Scanline BATs and Maxis buildings. This is a rural CJ though, and rural MR don't exist.

So:

3 essentially only use Maxis buildings, and 1 is made by schulmania (he is a class of his own). I don't think these ones really count for what we're trying to figure out.

1 could have used MR BATs but didn't.

5 mixed MR BATs in when they existed for the types of areas they were building. Out of these, one was rural, so for that maybe we can't tell if he would use MR BATs if they were available for his purposes.

Even if you just casually look through the CJs, CJers use MR BATs when they're available for what they're making. Not only that, but in my case, when people use my pre-war w2w north american BATs, they almost always mix my scanline and MR BATs together, and most of the time if they're using my north american BATs, they're also using spa's and JBSimio's, which are all scanline. And they're all mixed together.

So no, CJers are not segregating scanline and Mental Ray.

Also, while during different times there have been a few more or a few less people who both BAT and run a CJ, the overwhelming majority of people doing either do not do both. They are different hobbies, with different formats/mediums, that are appealing for different reasons, and attract different people who have different goals and desires. Both forums have different cultures and attract different personalities. Not only that, but they both take a lot of time, and most people don't have enough time to do both. So no, even if you can list a few exceptions, historically, CJers and BATers have not overlapped very much.

gMax seems to be slightly better for me in smaller/more repetitive BATs(suburban stuff, small offices, euro tileset, etc), while 3dsmax is better for large buildings, especially those with lots of glass. It explains why houses modeled in 3dsmax look slightly odd while gmax modeled skyscrapers look too bland and novice.

If 3ds Max is better for big buildings it's also better for small buildings. The tools in 3ds Max don't magically get worse when you're making something smaller. Gmax gets worse with bigger buildings because it starts to lag and because it doesn't have some of the tools to manage a scene with lots of stuff in it (for example, 3ds max has Layers (like in photoshop) to help you organize things). So are you trying to say that gmax's only flaw is that it can't handle big buildings? And do you realise that gmax is just a stripped down version of 3ds Max 4 (released in 2000). I would hope that over a decade later the program would have improved somewhat.

And for Mental Ray vs. Scanline... I think the most significant difference between MR BATs and Scanline BATs is that the shadows on the MR BATs are richer, sharper, and a little bluer. If anything I think suburban and rural environments make it HARDER to notice the difference between the MR and scanline BATs, because the buildings are usually spread apart, and there's usually a ton of extra props on the lots, so everything looks more chaotic and I would think it would be harder to notice that the shadows are a little different on one roof from the rest. Urban BATs it should be easier to notice the difference because the BATs are right next to each other so it's easier to compare them. Paris BATs it's easiest to tell the difference because the buildings are all the same size and massing and material and share the same architectural vocabulary. With the buildings being so similar, and being right next to each other, the differences stand out more. Between 1234018723840138401329828323701 and 1111111112111111111211111111111 it's easier to spot the 2s in the second one.

Anyway, my point isn't to debate MR vs scanline (debussey's request is reasonable and if harishina is wiling to do it there are people out there that will appreciate it (and I don't even know what the point of debating would be if he's going to do both)). My point is that there doesn't seem to be any logic behind your reasoning.

That said, there are gMax users who could emulate 3dsmax(madhatter106, most of BSC, NDEX) and there are 3dsmax users who emulate gmax by using BAT's renderer(scanline) to fit in tilesets dominated by gmax stuff(Parisian set, SFBT set, Scandinavian set and the BSC set). ...The Mental Ray renderer in BAT4MAX is a bit tacky on the mentioned tilesets.

Yes, there are a few BATers who use 3ds Max but not MR, and most of them do so for that reason. But I don't think any of those gmax BATers are trying to emulate Mental Ray. I only know of a few BATers who use gmax but try to figure out workarounds to do things that you normally need max for (night windows for example).

Anyway though, 3dsmax is also easier to use than gmax once you know all the techniques.

This is true!

Maybe animated cartoons are the reason MR has a cartoony look(modern cartoons use MR), thats why...

Animated cartoons almost never use MR. MR Is usually used for realistic stuff like star wars or the matrix because cartoons use renderers specifically made for cartoons. Not only that, but cartoon animators generally prefer using Maya instead of 3ds Max.

[gutterclub 2,729]

Well here's a comparison of the same building with different renderer. As you can see, the Mray looks more detailed but also more "plastic", The shadows are too sharp and their hue is different. All the colors in general are different. To me it is a bad trade-off, aestheticly it doesn't fit with the current parisian set, even though it looks better by itself, as opposed to the scanline, which might not look so good, but won't stand out at all among its peers. Some might say the difference is too subtle, but at least to me it is extremely irritating.

As for marczar, I'm not sure what he'll be using. His early works were scanline, but recently I've seen previews with both renderers. I don't know what he'll use eventually.

PS. Sorrry for hijacking your thread, Harishna

Again, sorry for Hijacking my friend. I thought about Debussymans valid points regarding shadows, however the colour/hue issue wasn't really a great deal as all you have to do is adjust the textures.

I had a play around with some of Xannepans amazing models, and excuse the textures as i';m not too great in photoshop but have adjusted a few and I think it gives a better result than the washed out version you gave..

My point is that BAT4MAX can fit in with anything, so long as the textures are adjusted accordingly..

don't get me wrong, each to their own and I love Debussymans BATs and Xannepans..and I mean love.

[Sgt Pepper 864]

I guess I'm one of those persistent Gmax Users.

So Scanline is what is used with Gmax correct? I never really thought of the terms for it. I just called BATs based on their renderings Gmax BATs and MAX BATs. But then again I'm not keen or adept on terminology with these programs. I wouldn't even say I'm adept with Gmax either, even with how long I've used it.

Back to the topic. I like the work you've put in these recent creations Harishna. I'd love to see that last UNAM building with the other two I have as well.

[darn42 1,268]

It might have something to do with the gamma settings maybe?

textured a box with that texture and compared it with 4 gamma level, in order, 3.0, 2.2, 2.0, 1.0

Idk. 2.2 is the real life setting for realistic textures. I really don't know much about this stuff, just putting it out there in case someone who knows more wants to shed some more light on it.

What I think is that the gmax renders might have a higher gamma level so maybe increasing that will make the buildings that require similar looks like parisian w2w might be better off rendered just with higher gamma settings.

  Edited July 11, 2012 by darn42  

[gutterclub 2,729]

I guess I'm one of those persistent Gmax Users.

So Scanline is what is used with Gmax correct? I never really thought of the terms for it. I just called BATs based on their renderings Gmax BATs and MAX BATs. But then again I'm not keen or adept on terminology with these programs. I wouldn't even say I'm adept with Gmax either, even with how long I've used it.

Back to the topic. I like the work you've put in these recent creations Harishna. I'd love to see that last UNAM building with the other two I have as well.

I people are getting confused with what GMAX is, it is basically a stripped down version of 3DS max, so when people talk about Max vs Gmax BATs it isn't entirely true. GMAX was used by Maxis as the software for its users to create BATs, they simply added their own rendering engine on to it and distributed as the program we know as B.A.T. Later down the line it was discovered that 3DS max could be used to render bats for the game and 2 versions were made. Basically Chris Adams made a version using Scanline, which is a version of rendering software within Max, he felt that using this produced the best results for the game. Simfox developed a version using a more powerful renderer called Mental Ray, this allows real reflections etc, he setup a rig to try and produce the same lighting etc that the game supplies. So when we talk about Max vs Gmax there is no real truth in it, as mentioned before gmax is just a free stripped down version of max..what we discuss are the benefits of a scanline render vs a MR render vs the maxis BAT render. People also seem to forget that Maxis never actually used BAT\gmax for their buildings, we assume an old version of MAX. Obviously the rendering engine is important but I think it also hides behind whart is really important and that is making sure your model fits in with the games pallete, the buildngs don't have to look the same as maxis buildings, all buildings are different and rightly so, but they have to fit the games colour pallette..

Anyway, its all pretty irrlevant, we all have our preferences and that's that.

Back on topic we shall go

[IL. 1,043]

I like the one on the left better

The pillars and the arches looks better and smoother in there.

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Well, I guess this is the case of a BAT that was first optimised to look great with renderer A (Scanline in this case), and then the same BAT was taken and run through renderer B (Mental Ray in this case).

I guess if we took e.g. one of SimFox' BATs (optimised for Mental Ray) and ran it through a Scanline render, it would look worse as well.

[gutterclub 2,729]

Exactly, which was my point. If textures are edited accordingly then renderer, rig, setup shouldn't be the main thing.

Which brings us full circle to Harishnas models and how they both look great and fit the game