nybt-forum-threads PBGV's BAT Thread

[PBGV103 729]

No, I didn't delete them and they're polys, not planes. You can clearly see them in the preview above, and nothing changed between the preview and the export. I did another zoom5 render just to make sure and everything looks normal, and it does. Hopefully it's just a one time thing. I'll export it again to see.

Edit:  As you can see those errors went away after I exported it again.

[halo1dragon 11]

are you going to release it today?

[PBGV103 729]

Nope, still haven't done the night scene or fixed the LOD issues, and I'm not sure if I like all of the textures on there now.  Where do you guys get textures for trunite?  Are they clippings from photos?

[PBGV103 729]

1 or 2?

Maybe somewhere between the two?

Btw 3ds max REALLY slowed down in the night scene and I haven't changed much yet.  What will happen when I add all of the window lighting materials?   o_O

[SimFox 804]

Neither, not even as a starting point. Looking at these two I wouldn't pick either of them. Well, the second is just dark - there isn't really anything to talk there about, apart from radioactive/nucilar Bush, pardon, tree. Same trees are unhealthily glow in first one as well, which is well very odd indeed. It all somehow illuminated yet the strength source, direction are all unclear.

If you just switch to night scene it has to speed up - by quite a bit since you have removed Sun from your setup and with it all the ray-traced shadows.

But that assuming you haven't messed up your materials. And what I saw about your explaining your glass it is a bit messed up.

All in all, I think you need to go back to the drawing board with your material setup. Forget about all that Ray-traced nonsense - it is stone age, just take Arch&Design and modify it to your needs. You can also select one of numerous templates as a starting point.

From what I saw about UI of your Max you've got normal version. I should have said earlier that it is better to get Design version. There isn't much difference at all, just some UI and most notably the fact that it has Arch&Design as well as ProMaterials (not nearly as flexible and useful for BAT as Arch&Design) set as a default type. Anyway Your Max has all the same features (apart from Light analysis tool) it's just the matter of selecting them from the list.

With LODs I would strongly recommend not to make them skin tight with the very bottom of your modle - that would cause dark edge around the base in game view.

[PBGV103 729]

So should I get Arch&Design or not? I only gave 60Gb to the win7 side of my hard drive partition, of which 11Gb is left so I really don't have room for both the standard max and the design version.

[SimFox 804]

Arch&Design is a type of Material, you ave it in your version as well. You just have to select it. But general rule of thumb night view prior to turning all the lights (especially proper lights) on should be significantly faster than a day one. If it's not there is something wrong in you setup/materials etc...

[PBGV103 729]

Ok, well I moved the regular version to an external HDD and downloaded the design version before your last post, so it's whatever now. I think it slowed down because I added a noise displacement to my window material, the setting was like 1 or 2.

Edit: and I have no idea how to work with arch & design.  Any suggestions as to where to start?

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Arch and design is rather straight forward, there are even little prompts that pop up and explain what the modifier does (when you hover over it). The main ones that I worry about are (obviously) diffuse slot labeled "color", reflectivity, glossiness, self illumination tab (for night scenes), and occasionally special purpose maps like bump. There are even presets which are nice when you don't know where to start on a new material. If you have come this far in MAX in such a short amount of time, you should have no problem figuring out Arch & design.

[PBGV103 729]

I checked out arch & design a little, but I'm not sure that I want to reassign textures on 2000+ objects, so I think I'll stick with what I have for now. I'm happy enough with it the way it is, and I'm afraid that I'll bring up a ton of vray/fg errors if I mess too much. I was thinking that I'd do the next BAT totally your way from the start, if you'd be willing to walk me through it. I'd really love to start on the right track. I think a smaler scene would be great for learning materials and learning how to model better. What about the LVMH building or the Austrian Cultural Forum? It's small, but complex enough to give me an opportunity to really learn max. What do you guys think? SimFox, SimHoTToDDy, would you be willing to take on a BATing apprentice? I would love to learn to make BATs that look even a fraction as professional as yours do.

In the meantime, what is the general strategy for assigning materials for trunite? I can easily see myself using 100+ night window textures, so is there a way to have max randomize bitmaps for windows so I don't have an overwhelming amount of materials? Or do you guys just use that many materials?

Heres what it looks like now, and I got rid of the "nuclear bushes."  hahaha

[SimHoTToDDy 2,939]

Use "select objects by material", group them or isolate them to a new layer, create new material and apply. Repeat for as many materials as necessary. It doesn't matter how many objects there are if you treat them as one entity.

If you want variety, it is much easier to create and manage it in your bitmap, rather than in max (at least for what I do). If you create your night windows as a 1:1 bitmap with respect to the building (every part of the bitmap corresponds to a unique spot on the building), then it is as simple as applying and setting your UVW map. I really don't deal with large uninterrupted glass walls, so I'm not the best person to ask, but for buildings I make it is just as simple as flicking a few switches in "self illumination", the rest comes down to the bitmap.

Nothing I do is very complicated, but then again the buildings I make don't need a lot of special effects to express. Most of my work is just the basics done in a comically grand way aided by my knack with photoshop (which can bypass some of the "special effects" in some cases), my eye for mistakes, and my own stubbornness

Simfox can fly in and slap me if I'm wrong, but I think vray causes more trouble than it is worth these days. Of course, I have no idea what I'm talking about when it comes to that.

[SimFox 804]

Well I guess it is my cue, the point when I jump in and say "Told you so!" I mean 2000+ objects. Particularly when there is No good reason what so ever to have them. Now it makes fixing any problem virtual impossibility. Be it materials or geometry...

Of course there is a solution that Todd suggested, but that is basically half way to simple reduction of the object count. And (keeping layered structure of scene) basic good housekeeping - so no ***** slapping for you Todd, sorry to disappoint you, may be the next time. I strongly believe there is never too late to reduce object count! Just be logical about it.

Anyway there is this nifty little tool that does automatic material conversion to Arch&Design: http://mentalraytips.blogspot.com/2007/02/max-9-converting-other-materials-to.html It takes all the pain out of the Material Conversion. Of course what you'll get is just conversion, not a good looking material - depending on how badly you've messed your original ones you would need to get into each of them (I hope you don't have 2000+ materials in your scene) and tune them.

And, please, stop saying "vray/fg" - it is a nonsense and not an innocent one. You'll simply get lost in these imaginary terms. And you wouldn't be able to see reality between them.

As for the windows... Setting aside madness of what you suggest (hundreds of maps! -anyway it's your time) you can create multiMaterial, but that would mean you would need to go and set the property for each of sub materials plus it needs to be applied to a single object, not your thousands of them and as such it would defeat the point. There is another option - you ca use Multi/Sub Map in the slot you need. It is virtually same like MultiMaterial but you set basic material properties only once and later this material could be applied to any selection of objects and it would then assign just those Multi/Sub Maps to randomly picked objects. It could also work with single object and individual material ID (there is a selection for the effect).

About that night view... again it is very small, but the way it look now it more like if the glass plane itself would be emitting light and not just showing illuminated space behind it - I'm speaking about the effect and not the mechanics of how it is achieved, hope that is clear... It is also very unnatural in the way how it cause NO illumination what so ever in the immediately adjacent areas.

[PBGV103 729]

Theres not 2000+ materials, there are 2000+ objects with the window material.  I think theres about 20 materials, counting all the different night window materials, and 4 or 5 textures.

[SimFox 804]

you've said:

Originally posted by: PBGV103

I can easily see myself using 100+ night window textures, quote>

[Sgt Pepper 864]

He said "CAN easily see myself using 100+ night window textures," not I'm going too...

[PBGV103 729]

I need better pictures for night window textures.  I see what you're talking about with the windows not giving off light.  They do give off a little light, as you can see below, be maybe not enough.

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

The night lights are starting to look great.

[PBGV103 729]

I've been slowly switching over all of the lights to arch & design and it's looking more realistic now.

[PBGV103 729]

Just a teaser:

Now we just need 450 Lexington, the Lincoln Building, the Chanin Building, 101 Park Avenue, 270 Park Avenue, 277 Park Avenue, 245 Park Avenue, 299 Park Avenue, the Socony-Mobil Building, 2 Grand Central Tower, and a more realistic, transit enabled Helmsley Building, Metlife Building, and Grand Central.  Wouldn't that be nice?  xD

[mben92 9]

ZOMG! Now that's a spicy meatball! XD great job on this BAT. can't wait to see it on the STEX.

[Sgt Pepper 864]

My my my... absolutely love it. And yes, all that WOULD be nice. XD

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

Looks Great. You are taking it to different level.

[PBGV103 729]

Comparison time:

I'm fine with the way the night scene looks, but not so much with the day scene.  I know SimFox said I should switch over to Arch & Design for the window material, but how do I use that to get the same effect of the glass material on these two BATs?

[T Wrecks 10,210]

Whoa, a lot has been going on here since I last visited!

First of all, the building looks great at night when zoomed out, and it's also pretty good up close - with one exception: I think the windows at the ground floor are lit too brigthly. This is especially confusing to look at since they don't shed any light on the surroundings although they look like high-energy lamps. Have you switched them over to A&D yet?

As for the day windows, you will need a bump map to recreate the effect that no glass pane in a building is perfectly plane.

Finally, I have the impression that your building has a noticeable blue tint. Shifting the overall colour hue a tad more towards red/yellow might help. See SimFox' post in Sgt Pepper's thread for a few reference images.

[PBGV103 729]

Just tried using a bump map with noise and falloff from intensities of 30 to 100 with no noticeable difference. All of the lit windows are A&D. I only turned on self-illumination and illumination of the surrounding area, I didn't change any of the settings.

Edit:  I thought that maybe it would work right on A&D so I switched all 4200 windows over to A&D but it looks the exact same...  Do I need to do something in addition to the bump map?  should I try something other than noise and gradients?

[SimFox 804]

I get ever stronger feeling that you are drowning in the obsession with "buttons", "trick" and techniques, technobabble. To the point you really loosing the sight on the goal. You've probably lost it already. For instance could you rignt not tell what you are trying to achieve without using all the "bump", "displacement" self-illumination" "vray/fg". That technobabble may sound impressive like one character in StarTreck saying that temperature outside is -300 (something) Celsius, but for those knowing a bit about it it often as nonsensical as that temperature (absolute zero, beyond which temperature can't fall is -273 Celsius). Would you care to for instance elaborate why to put "noise displacement" on the glass? Or why do you need Fall-Off in Bump? What those suppose to achieve?

All this drags your attention from real problems. Look at the night view. Why does your building so uniformly glow? Actually it seems that those marble/granite panes that are glowing. Why? Just because it's cool? What is that green/blue pattern that suddenly appeared on it at night. None is visible during the day.

Night windows are either drown in that odd ever present glow of the marble or glow like stadium lamps. Yet hey actually don't. I'm talking about the shops, the entrance and other similar. I mean they are just flat white patches, like white holes. There is nothing at them and, particularly at the revolving doors area, it is very obvious that it is just those planes of glass that emit all that light, not anything behind them. you really need to reign them in. And sort out (get rig of) that marble glow...

[PBGV103 729]

SimFox - If you read the end of my last post with pictures and T Wrecks's response, you would see why I'm asking about bump maps. The point was that T Wrecks suggested that I use a bump map to achieve the same distortion effect that kryptowhite has in the glass on his buildings. As of now the glass in my day view is extremely flat.  It looks nothing like glass.  I'm not exactly sure what you mean when you're talking about marble/granite.  If you are referring to the white panes, those are glass, not stone.  They are "glowing" because they are reflecting the map I used in a failed attempt to reproduce the look of kryptowhite's glass using reflections.  Thus, I will most likely get rid of it once I find out how to use bump maps or whatever it may be that allows me to get those realistic distortions.  As far as the extremely bright ground floor windows go, they are that bright because I'm using the original self-illumination intensity settings, and unlike the majority of the other illuminated windows, I used a plain white bitmap for the diffuse and self-illumination maps of the material.  I turned on the option to illuminate the surrounding objects, so I'm not sure why it's just barely working. 

I'm sorry if I sound ignorant, but truth be told, when it comes to this stuff, I don't know what I'm talking about.  If I did I'm sure I wouldn't be posting so many questions here.  I've never taken a class on this stuff or read any books or anything like that.  All I've learned is through experimenting with the program and what I've read online. 

I'd like to finish this BAT soon.  I've been working on it for quite some time now and I go back to school in about a week. 

These are my goals that I would like to achieve before classes begin:

1. realistic glass material (that means convincing reflections and distortions)

2. fix the ground floor lights

3. fix the LODs (the custom ones that I'm currently using only appear to work from some angles)

If I get those issues fixed I will feel content and anything else is just icing on the cake.

P.S.  every glass material HAS been converted to A&D but it seems to have made no difference except when it comes to lit windows in the night scene.

[PBGV103 729]

What do you think?

[SimFox 804]

Well, I personally don't like the effect Kriptonwhite had been using, although it has some basis in reality. Yet it is, imho, a perfect example of a situation where one little thing is taken out of context and out of scale and the whole point of the entire exercise is forgotten in a techno frenzy. My problem with it is that it it way over the top, glass doesn't look like flat glass anymore, more like it is sort of special one used in bathrooms and such to block the view. Never mind tha it has nothing good to reflect in the first place. All that trickery is no substitute to well though /chosen map to reflect.

In a way it is, actually, opposite of what it should be, as it is very uniformed - same bump map is used over and over and over mapped on per Polygon basis. Rather that that it is much easier, and pleasing to the eye to use2-pack glass material different from one another only by the phase of noise map in the bump slot. The key here is to select appropriate size of noise. I'd say that 2-3m is a good starting value. And that noise MUST be in World coordinates The reason why there should be at least 2 materials is that such parametric noise flows through the entire virtual space, so if you have two planes of glass right next to each other, with same very material applied to them then this noise pattern will seamlessly flow from one "window" to another - utterly unrealistic. There MUST be the brake of such flow at the edge of EACH plate of glass. So 2 materials is a minimum for side by side glass curtain wall. Is you have more elaborate setup with more then 2 plates meaning at the very small space, then you would need more materials, The key is to avoid visual continuity of noise pattern and hence distortion of the reflection.

[PBGV103 729]

The reason why I'm going for that effect is that in RL there is a very slight difference in air pressuse between inside and outside the building causing the windows to bow. You can see the effect here: www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-3446021-office-building-reflections-sails-in-windows.php  I agree with you that there is nothing good to reflect, but in order to create realistic reflections you would have to model the surrounding buildings, and even if you went through all that trouble, it would look very strange in the game when it is reflecting building that don't exist. Thats why I'm leaning toward this "trickery." If the Chrysler building isn't plopped next to it but the reflection of the Chrysler is there it would look very strange. Is there any good way around that problem?