Sunken Brick Canals

[Simaddict1000 1]

 so here is what they are supposed to look like

here is problem #1...where did the water go?

next problem...where did everything go?

HELP!!!!!!

[Edited Topic Tile to remove potentially offensive material- Xyloxadoria]

[Xyloxadoria 1,098]

It looks like  you have LOD problems. An LOD is the "box" that shows your model. Right now its at ground level, so your model is blending or dissapearing into the ground, you can fix that by making the LOD go above ground just a tiny bit, around .5 should work.

Press the Refit LODs button then chnage the thre LODs that appear to be above ground some they all have to be the same when you do this.

[Simaddict1000 1]

i tried doing that but it still looks like it did in those pics

any more suggestions?

[madhatter106 3,933]

Originally posted by: Simaddict1000

i tried doing that but it still looks like it did in those pics

any more suggestions?quote>

I'd change the title of the thread to something a bit less offensive.

[Francis90b 748]

^^

Yeah, i'd warmly suggest you to do so.

[GMT 389]

me too

apart from that, delete the sc4 model file and re-export it

[Lugnuts 3]

Mhm...you cant have a BAT under ground level I think.

[Xyloxadoria 1,098]

Originally posted by: Lugnuts

Mhm...you cant have a BAT under ground level I think.

quote>

You can and i have done it before with the model for this

My LOD for the undergorund part was orginally at .5 and the barriers had a seprate piece, it looked right but there were strage shadows where the barrier piece met the underground piece. What i did after that fixed it, i raised the entire LOD undergorund part included to 1.5 (height of the barriers) and it looked great. Try doing that with your model and it should work.

[Simaddict1000 1]

 ok i fixed it

its rendered in draft btw so its grainy 

its now 2 seperate peices- a water peice - and a wall peice that works the same way as buddybud's rural sunken highway walls

but how do i fix the shadows?????

also does anyone have any coments on how to improve these?

[SimFox 804]

The thing is you can't have LODs go underground. If they do they will be chopped off by the ground plane in game - that's why it is, apparently, impossible to make all those underpasses visually functional eg to get cars to go "underground" whenever anything goes below games ground plate it will disappear.

But if you simply what to show underground that isn't a problem at all. Keep you LODs hight above 0,3m if you don't want game to drop shadow on your model. Or below(but above 0,2m if you do. Making LODs lower than 0,2m will create combing effect - game will have difficulty to distinguish between the surface of eh LOD and the surface of ground plane. Actually, I believe, the dark stripes show you "shadow" of your own BAT, so it may be possible to get rid of them by selecting your bat not to cast any shadow (making it prop and selecting NO for ground model option). Although I don't really see any practical application for this. But back to topic. In this case you can "see" through the top plate of the LOD anything that is hectically "underground". But for the game it is just an image on the flat top of the LOD.

To avoid odd shadows - those are -90degree rotations Alpha Masks - you would have to insure that those are not generated for anything under the ground. Cause if you don't even if your LODs don't go below ground the Alpha Mask will non the less. In 3ds Max you this could be accomplished by covering your model above ground by totally transparent geometry and setting all of your model to be invisible to the camera and visible to reflections and refractions. Part under the transparent "cover" would be just that - refraction. but the parts that are underground - will be invisible to camera and hence will not produce any alpha masks either.

In GMAX, however, this is not possible, and the only option (at least that I'm aware of) is to manually edit all the FSHs to remove underground bits from alpha masks.

To fix the shadow, you would need your model to extend beyond your LODs for some distance, I'd say about a tile or so, but I don't quote me on that. You should just do some experimenting with that to get "enough" distance.

[Simaddict1000 1]

 im trying what u guys are telling me....but can you show me exactly how i would turn off the shadows?

ive tried lods changing

and i just dont know what to do i need like a step by step way to do it

btw these are not underground lots- they have to be dug out first and then plopped

i have made some progress tho with a newly designed wall and bridge peices 

NOTE THESE ARE ALL RENDERED IN LOW OR DRAFT QUAILITY

[io_bg 249]

Wow, great work, the bridges look fantastic!

[mattb325 28,899]

This is a really interesting concept.

The reason you are experiencing these strange shadows being cast on the water is that your model is not wide enough (the first preview render looks like the actual model is only 16m wide).

Your LODS, I take it, are centred 16x16 boxes and, following earlier advice they are above ground? If so leave them that way, and copy your model (walls/arches/water and all) so that it extends on both sides of the original model.

You should now have a much wider section. Because of your LODs being 16x16, that will still be the size of the ultimate piece, but these overhanging parts should stop that strange light and shade that you see on the left hand side in your picture above.

[Timmystwin 201]

This is just an amazing project, and i will be coming back here. ( after losing my attempts in a crash i need some decent projects like this to follow :,( )

[Lugnuts 3]

Originally posted by: Simaddict1000

 im trying what u guys are telling me....but can you show me exactly how i would turn off the shadows?

ive tried lods changing

and i just dont know what to do i need like a step by step way to do it

btw these are not underground lots- they have to be dug out first and then plopped

quote>

I believe turning "is ground model" to false in the plugin manager will turn off the shadows

Also, how can you make the bridges if the canals are not underground?

[Simaddict1000 1]

i tried all of those things you guys suggested however it did not work to fix the shadows

LUCKILY I FOUND A SOLUTION!!!!!!!!!!

i had to create a transparent wall that sat 8 meters to the right of the wall and it created a new shadow that covered the strange shadowing

to answer the question as to how you can make bridges if it isnt underground

first you have to use hole digging lots to dig a ditch and use NAM to build a bridge across the ditch

 

Then you use the canal peices the exact same way that you would use highway walls and you plop them on the slope

( note the canals are rendered in draft quality for testing purposes)

and tahdah u got a canal!!!!!!

a cannal with perfect shadows <3

now i have 2 problems

#1 the canals dont light up

they are used as props could that be the problem?

#2 i need inspiration!!!!!!

tell me what i need to change or what peices i can addd!!!!

if you see pictures or bridges or feautures or waterway you like......show me so i can try to recreate it please!!!!

thnx guys

[Timmystwin 201]

corners and end pieces will help.....