T123 Industrial buildings and utility centers.

[tornado123 73]

Right now im going to start making alot of w2w manufacturing buildings and of course the utility centers like powerplants and recycling buildings. The buildings im currently working on right now is a powerplant and 2 w2w factories. The 2 factories are still being developed but on the other hand the powerplant is about 80% complete. Here's a picture of how it looks right now and please let me know what needs to be improved, what to add on it or just rate it thanks. oh and where the grey smokestacks is and the roof, that area is still not completed but ideas are welcome still.

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Thanks for opening a BAT thread! This is the first step (I think) in really improving as a BATer.

Reminds me of an old project of mine, thequiltedlama, and several others (none of which have actually finished it), Battersea Power Station (cick for z5)

The model isn't perfect (I only modeled about 10% of what you see) and the textures aren't my best work either, but this is the scale, modeling, and texturing that needs to go into a power station.

There is room for creativity in industrial buildings, however there is not as much aesthetic leeway as if you were making an office or house. Industrials are built to fulfill a specific function, if they don't look like they could perform that function, then the message you are trying to convey will not be understood. Right now, what you have only vaguely says "factory" just because of the smoke stacks; if you take those away it could be an office or a supermarket for all I know. You have a lot of the elements that one would like to see in a BAT, but they are out of proportion with eachother, out of sync, and not acting like a unified building. Texturing needs a good deal of work as well, but we can save that for when you get your modeling in order.

If you read nothing else, read this. Start with something smaller. Pick a reference factory / workshop from reality and recreate each and every detail you see so that the final product is a believable structure. That means, take your time to focus on all the little details and the proportions (how big elements are relative to eachother). Once you have gone that far, you can begin crating textures to fit the building.

Feel free to ask any questions, we are all here to help you grow and learn (which also goes for anything we may say). I am really excited to see someone else who is interested in BATing industrial buildings, I wish you the best of luck in your progress,

-Todd

[tornado123 73]

I got to say that your model has alot much more details and higher quility textures. I guess your right that I should start something much more smaller from the reality since I was just making industrial buildings that doesnt even exist. Thanks alot for your help and I appreciate it but the problem is that I have a hard time trying to find industrial type buildings.

[thingfishs 416]

I would take a look in here: www.flickr.com/groups/industry/pool/

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Take a look in Bing maps' bird's eye view in conjunction with Google Earth's streetview and you should be able to see most of any building you are interested in making. Your older American cities generally have a large quantity of industry around (look along rail lines). New York City, Detroit, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Minneapolis, and Los Angeles I have spent quite a long time looking at, you could probably find some neat buildings in damn near any other city as well.

I'll share some of my favorite areas if you like, however I suggest you get the Silverlight controlled Bing Maps Beta so that all my links work

[tornado123 73]

I didn't even know that bing maps had a birds eye view! That definitely will help out alot! I decided to do pittsburg due to the fact you mention it and they do have alot of industrial buildings there and I would have alot of options but of course I will pick different places in the future. Oh and I already started working on a model right now. Here's the google earth streetview screenshots and what im working on right now=

The name of this building is Traffic Division Department of Public Works or paint division and is located on 26th st liberty ave pittsburg.

It's still not completed of course and most of the roof junk has not been textured. The only part of the building that is fully completed is the front. I do know that the roof texture and the smokestack is not the best but I'm just letting you get the idea of it. (Sorry about how large the image is but how do I make that when you click on the image it zooms into full size? I got it to do it with the first one by accident)

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Wow! I'm impressed. For your first shot at a recreation, this is pretty good.

You can use Google Earth (not google maps) to measure your wall length and even the roof junk. This is very useful for making everything accurate. When trying to eyeball things from streetview, there are some very important proportions that I use to get the desired look in SC4's perspective. I assume all doors are 1m wide by 3m tall (unless obviously larger), the 3m includes the 133% vertical scale necessary to get the right proportions, so you don't have to scale it up again later. What this means is you can compare objects in the picture to your door and figure out how big they are. That, along with knowing how long walls are, fills in a lot of the gaps that one usually has when making something from a picture.

As for your model, I think  you are doing a good job, but the proportions don't seem quite right in the render. See how the windows on the front are taller then they are wide in the real picture? You want your render to look like that. You will need to implement that exaggerated vertical scale like I mentioned with the door, but it will give much better results.

Just a quick eye ball measurement of that picture tells me that the bottom of the windows are 1.5m off the ground, the windows themselves are about 4.5m tall, the top of the windows (and the big door )are therefore at 6m, then from the top of the window to the top of the parapet wall is another 1.5m plus another .3m of capping, flashing etc. All of that I gathered assuming that the height of the small door is 3m tall (see how easy that is?). My method is probably a little different then some, but Jasoncw has made a nice little tutorial about this topic here.

We will talk more about textures later. Yours are not a bad start, however they need  some work to make this building look fantastic.

Edit: To resize an image, there are 2 boxes in the "image properties" window when you are adding a picture. Put in a nice size, like 300, in one box and it will automatically scale the other dimension. After you have that, click on your image again (highlight it like you would text), and hit the "insert/edit link" button. Instead of a website, paste the same image link you pasted in "image properties". This will link the smaller image to a full size version of itself.

[tornado123 73]

Well before I start resizing anything these two pictures shows the windows more of a square rather than rectangle. The first pictures I put up was in a corner view which can cause certain things to disort out of place but the new picture I put up now for the front view would show things more clearly. So should I resize the windows still?

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Good point, perspective can do that.

But to your question, yes because you want them to appear square in your renders. SC4 has a bad habit of squishing everything vertically. In order to make it look correct, we have to either model things scaled up, or scale everything up at the end.

From Jasoncw's BAT mega FAQ:

If you model your building using realistic dimensions, your building will look too short in the game, because SimCity 4's view is a parallel projection, and will distort the appearance of your building.  Vertically scaling your model by 133% will overcome this squashing effect.

Modeling with realistic dimensions, and then vertically scaling by 133% (or modeling with the scaled up dimensions as you go along) will make your buildings visually proportional.  It will also keep your building's scale consistent with other buildings you do. 

quote>

Depending on how your numbers compare to my little guestimate (more importantly that a door should be 1x3m), you may want to just scale up the entire thing.

[tornado123 73]

Ok I just did like you said by scaling it up to 133% Here's the results.

So I should keep it like this?

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Much better

Edit: Is that a HD zoom6 or a regular zoom5 render? After looking at it in photoshop against some other models, it looks like it is a little over sized (unless that is a HD zoom 6, not a zoom 5). As long as your door is scaled to 1x3m everything should look good in game.

[tornado123 73]

That was actually a zoom5 render on medium quality and the door was 1x3m but after the resize it went up to 1x5 so I guess I should only scale the door down to the way it was before and leave everything else the same?

Edit: I think this one looks better now. (before it was a 3x8 now I resized it to 2x6 and have compared it with the other buildings and I have to say it fits in pretty good. Oh and the door is now 1x3m.

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Now you're talkin' Proportions seem correct this time.

As you go along finishing off the bits and pieces left to model, try bringing out the small details, specifically things like your window sills and the brick work around the top of the windows, the signs you added, and anything else that is difficult to see after the rescale. Now you don't want to make them look obnoxious and scary, you want them to be just big enough to be able to tell they are there and appreciate the time you put into putting them there.

For example, here is a building similar to yours in Google street view. Note the details above the small windows, the window sills, and the details on the "columns". Here is how I modeled them:

Not only did I exagerate the size a little bit, but I changed the paint around to fit that purpose because keeping everythig the same color made all my work blend in with the walls. Also, we all know that they are not that big in reality, but I made them big enough not to look flat and make the building look alive. See what I mean?

I'm really excited to see how quickly you are applying the advice I give. I think you have a bright future ahead of you if you keep up the good work

[tornado123 73]

I also noticed that the windows you made are not 100% all glass tiles but instead have a frame but in the picture you provided of the real building It's 100% glass tiles. The building im working have the same windows but I never did model out the windows and have left them flat without a frame. Should I do the samething what you have done?

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

I was going to bring up this topic later when we got to texturing, but I suppose now is a good time.

It is a matter of taste, whether you want to present the building in its current state, or the way it would have been when it was built. Personally I prefer making industrials look like they would have been before they had all of their beautiful sash windows removed and intricate brick work painted over. When I did Detroit Elevator Co, it was actually easier to make the windows look believable with mullions then keeping them as big block glass (not a fan of it to begin with).

If you try putting frames, mullions, and actual panes of glass and it looks better, I'd say keep it (I'd encourage you to try actually).

As far as texturing goes, and this is a continuation of my previous post, I like to see brick, not painted brick, for a number of reasons. For one, I just like brick . More importantly, it is easier to make a convincing "raw" brick texture then it is to make a convincing painted brick texture (in my experience). As I was saying above, the details around your window can actually look like the material they are made of (like limestone, or in your case, probably concrete) which adds both contrast, and interest in the facade.

And to give you more examples, isn't this workshop far more interesting than this one which has had its original facade plastered and painted? My point exactly. You will notice that these are right next to each other, probably built around the same time in the exact same style. If I were going to make the second one, it definitely wouldn't have painted plaster covering every inch of it.

I hope that answeres your question

[tornado123 73]

Thanks for your help again! Here's some more images below on my progress.

Ok I have now added the new windows which are not glass tiles oh and how do you make seems as if there was boxes and other stuff threw the window? It is a texture right?. I also understand that the unpainted bricks was much better than the painted ones so I improved the texture of the bricks to make it seem like it's not painted anymore and inhancing it bit. I also made another version (The brown buidling in the screenshot) which was suppose to show how it use to look before it was painted white and I have improved the roof since the old one was just not looking to good.

I have added details to at the top of the windows and the ledge (On the front and sides of the building) but it still doesn't show. I guess I should have made it a darker color but do you think I should make two seperate buildings showing the one how it used to look before it was painted?

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Good! Self critiquing and picking out weak points in your work on your own is a good sign. You manage to surprise me every time

I only just realized this, but the perfect example of what your pre-painted building should look like is literally across the street! Note the square concrete blocks (you can make them pretty light, they are only dark from age and car smog) at the window corners. The masonry directly above the window is simply brick. For the windows, I would go with something like this for the larger windows (look where there are 4 "holes" or vents in the unpainted building across the street (those are actually parts of the window you could open).

You don't need to go to the lengths I do to make windows (I think its fun to model) but here's my dementions on this: The thickest parts are about .15m, most of it is .1m, and the really thin stuff is .05m thick. I'm not sure how it will turn out in gmax, but you might have to experiment a little bit to get a good effect.

The small windows at the top could be similar, but with only one "hole" (or make them all like the front left one on your model, that's kinda neat). The shorter ones on the end might look something like these, either that or they will be the more commercial/ office type. If you are going to make one window have frames/ mullions, all of the others should be as well (because they would not have made space for the window if the were just going to brick it up). Take a look at that unpainted building for an insight on how to layout the mullions for  your window. Generally there is only one pane between the "holes" and the sides and bottom of the window frame.

For textures, your brick needs to be a pale reddish brown, not so dark and deep brown. The "texture" itself could use some work too, but I might slip you one of my bitmaps if push comes to shove . The concrete bits should be a beige color, perhaps with a subtle hint of pink, but relatively light compared to the brick. To make objects appear to be inside the glass, you need to add them in on the glass bitmap. You will need a pretty good image editor with layers to make it worth your time (photoshop is what I use, but GIMP is free and works well).

You can easily make two versions, just make some subtle variations in the roof junk, roof material and other things to make them unique.

[tornado123 73]

Here's how things look now in 3dsmax rendered version. There are some texture's that's not showing properly and some not showing at all but I will try to get things all fixed up soon and post another image later.

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Its in MAX

I would advise remaking all of your materials rather than trying to rely on the transferred versions.

(I'm not sure how much you know about the material editor in 3dsmax so I'll be brief and basic. If you know what it is like in there, pay no mind))

In the material editor, click on a new-blank material, click on the box that say standard, in the new window select "Arch &Design" it should be the first thing on the list (if not, hit "DAY" from the let there be light tab and try again). The box next to "color" acts as your diffuse slot where you can add the bitmap you want. The default reflection settings are very high relative to most of the materials you will want to emulate, turn both numbers down to .2 or so, this will give a nice ambient glow rather then a mirror like reflection.

Something you do need to do is turn on is gamma correction. If you haven't already, hit the "Day" button, then go to Rendering>environment> Gamma / LUT settings> setup... and check the box. If it is already checked, simply cycle it and see if it works. You will need to adjust bitmaps to get them to fit back in with the environment, but it is worth it in the end.

You might want to hear from simfox about a number of your issues you mentioned in the other thread, he knows a lot more about this stuff then I do.

~~~

Moving on to actual model stuff, I would like to see a SC4 render of it when you are done. For the small er windows, try to use the same size panes as the other windows. Only change the number of them to fit the size of the window. Obviously, they don't have to be exactly the same size, but the tiny ones you have in the small windows are pretty unrealistic. The large spherical vent needs to be scaled down a little bit, it seems much too large (like 5 feet wide large), but nothing else jumps out at me for the moment.

Looking forward to your progress.

[ANDYOUARE 0]

I have a suggestion. I dont know if this is the proper place for it, anyway.

Ive wanted to make large manufacturing centers like automotive plants. Take the two links as examples:

maps.google.com/

maps.google.com/

Ive highlighted two auto plants where the buildings have rail lines entering the buildings. I would like to see something similar, as well as massive manufacturing buildings seen at those two French auto plants.

Here are a few other examples, not all of them are huge industrial buildings:

http://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&ll=48.761896,1.986519&spn=0.00621,0.018218&t=h&z=17

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Originally posted by: ANDYOUARE

I have a suggestion. I dont know if this is the proper place for it, anyway.

quote>

If T123 is not up for it, try asking here (it is the proper place after all).

The main problem with making huge factories, is that they are huge. It requires lots of time and lots of computing power to model/render/ export the whole thing. I know this first hand from trying to make Battersea (above) and Fisher Body 21.

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

Nice, its great to see some more people making industrial building.

[madhatter106 3,905]

Originally posted by: Aaron Graham

Nice, its great to see some more people making industrial building.quote>

Indeed, this makes me want to BAT a factory....!