Project Thread: The United Nations Building

[Cockatoo 2,257]

I've just fallen in love with all the aligned flags. Have you BATted them one by one? Congratulations for that massive and beautiful effort!

Originally the plan was to never do any flags other than the two UN ones just because it'd take too long. But then I found this. The technique works just as well with many flags and many flagpoles joined together as single objects, so after a little setup, it only took minutes to do all 134 flags. Texturing had to be done individually though which took a couple of hours. I found a pack which had more national flags than I needed though so I didn’t have to hunt for each country individually.

[pielover94 83]

this would be neat to see as a building!

[kellydale2003 2,276]

OMGsh!!!

How long is the day and night render on that behemoth!?

And are your hedges PArray? They look very nice! (:

MAGNIFICENT job, I really love this!

[emperordaniel 1,281]

The fountain's nightlighting looks AWESOME

[art128 4,622]

BAT of the century, just sayin'

[Evillions 552]

Behemoth model. (jaw drops)

O_____O

1 1

1 1

1 1

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[Cockatoo 2,257]

After what feels like over 9000 man hours, this project is finally coming to a close.

The night lighting was completed yesterday, which means as soon as I get the driveway the complex can be exported.

Here's the completed night lighting.

[Jazzmaster 716]

Ah, wow. I'vent been terribly active on here lately, but it was really pleasant to pop in and see this. I do hope you plan on treating yourself to a nice adult beverage after this one has been released. And that goes for all who contributed to the completion of this behemoth. Hats off to all of you!

[Amthaak 1,501]

Best bat ever made! the nitelites are absolutly amazing! (Glad you are my coach! )

[skyscraper 216]

woow, very realistic BAT, i love it

[Girafe 1,729]

Well done Cockatoo

[art128 4,622]

Can't wait to use it!

[Delecto 941]

[SimFox 804]

You've made great progress on the project. Sorry for being absent for such a long while, but RL've got me...

I should have more free time now.

Here are few points I see that may need to be addressed in terms of night lighting:

1. 
   
   
2. wall is way to reflective
   
3. perhaps windows could be made a bit more greenish?
   
4. there light sources alright, but where is the light they're suppose to emit?
   
5. the light/shadow is way to harsh and, perhaps, too saturated...
   
6. there is something wrong imho with the material
   
7. I understand the lighting so many flags is huge resource drain.. but those 7 clearly visible light spots aren't really the way to go
   
8. here is placement direction and color/saturation are bit odd...
   
9. the entrance to the tower is wrong. I've modeled more accurate one, I'll upload it shortly
   
10. this light is strange in terms of source spread and color
    

I'm also not sure about "?" marked bit as well...

btw here is render of the Tower Entrance:

[T Wrecks 10,210]

I do hope you plan on treating yourself to a nice adult beverage after this one has been released. And that goes for all who contributed to the completion of this behemoth. Hats off to all of you!

Good comment. If they don't want, I'd sure be willing to raise a glass of a nice adult beverage for them.

[Cockatoo 2,257]

Great to see you back! Only 9 red "SimFox" points for a model of this size is, IMO, a pretty good result!

I'll see what I can do about a few of them. Others I believe are correct. Your entrance looks nice, we'll use that for sure. Post it in the private thread.

1. Not actually sure what the reflectivity settings for that material are (never checked them) but I think it kinda looks nice the way it is. We'll see what Jason thinks - it's his material.

2. I'll give it a shot and see how it looks. Again, I kinda think they look nice with a more orange hue though. I do realise that IRL they are quite green.

3. This is where Sim City vs. RL comes into play. I could create little cones for all of those lights individually like you would normally see in SC, but in real life, I'm sure they would cast a much broader illumination. I hate the cones so I decided to leave them out. But then, if I add say an area light to brighten up the whole area, the complex starts to lose its 'darkNite' appeal and begins to look a bit like a strange day scene with lights. My solution was to add some very faint area lighting to those areas (you will notice it when it's contrasting against a fully darkened city) to give the impression of some illumination but not to ruin the darkNite effect. It’s not totally right, but it’s the best I could come up with for the situation.

4. Again, you'll have to forgive me, but I think it looks cool like that. I know it’s not realistic.

5. Yep, there is.

6. Spots aren't illuminating the flags at all, that's done by area lights. Spots are there because they seem to be on the complex. To cope with the limitations of bringing the slope into the game, that area was modified (as you already know) but the spots appear in roughly the same place.

7. Mine are much more orange and positioned slightly differently, but they are there. Put it down to a little artistic licence.

8. Thanks!

9. That's being done by another area light. On the complex in real life, that area seems to be receiving a lot of illumination from something (not totally sure what though). I thought it was worth putting it in.

?. You’ll have to elaborate more. It’s on the complex IRL.

And to everyone else, thanks for your feedback, I appreciate it. I'll definitely he having a few drinks when this is all over.

[nathanthemayor 1,263]

Oh man!You guys are working very hard on this!Keep it up!

[Jasoncw 11,949]

This was the first time seeing my marble material at night, and this really shows how reflective the material is. I think it looks cool too, but shiny stuff always does, doesn't it? lol So I think the reflectivity should be reduced, but it is polished so I think there should still be reflections like that, just a lot more subtle.

I still think the concrete texture around the driveway needs to be more defined. The rest of the pavers look great.

It's great to see this coming together.

[Cockatoo 2,257]

Nice one guys, you've managed to use my entire 5GB of monthly bandwidth at fileden. Stop viewing this thread damnit!

I think the pictures'll be back on the 2nd of December.

And yep, Jason, I'm going to add the bump map you wanted.

[shinkansen1 84]

Should we call the big wig executives at Maxis and get them to see this? Or do we not want to be held liable for any heart attacks? This is easily one of the best recreations I have ever seen. I truly love it! (oh, and Cockatoo, sorry about using your bandwidth for my own selfish pleasurly viewing)

[Cockatoo 2,257]

And here's your day view.

[io_bg 249]

I'm pretty much speechless right now...

[art128 4,622]

that's pretty much the face I had when looking the picture.

[gutterclub 2,729]

I pulled a Tom Jones kinda face

[Jazzmaster 716]

Bill Cosby is pleased.

  Edited November 30, 2011 by Yoshiisland  

[_marsh_ 1,118]

I'll go against the reaction faces for now and just say this; This is one of the most amazing BAT's I've ever seen. It's amazing what the Sim City community accomplished. Work on this site that I've seen is beyond the skills of many professional architect's renderings I've seen. It just shows the dedication so many people in the community strive for. Great work, seriously I, nor no one else, can express this enough.

[spa 970]

That looks really great. Must have been painful to model all of that, or at least really, really time consuming.

[harishna 847]

Really nice indeed, a couple of things that may bwe worth looking at:

Sidewalk textures in front of the main building.

Roof texture for the two circular roof access on the conference roof.

[simfarmer89 1]

when will this be complete?

[Cockatoo 2,257]

Here's some last minute tweaking...