nybt-forum-threads Darknono35's NYBT projects

[PBGV103 729]

Everyone one seems to be encouraging you to be "lazy" with your work and less exacting, which to me is VERY disappointing. If we are a team working on recreations, why wouldn't we be actually recreating the buildings? Sure it will never be absolutely perfect, but with things like scale you can come very close. Would you be more disappointed thinking back and saying "I did my best" or "I just threw something together that looked ok." Again it's all up to you, but from what I've seen you, like me, have been creating very accurate recreations. People asking you to make them less perfect is discouraging to the team as a whole in my opinion.

[Sgt Pepper 864]

Everyone one seems to be encouraging you to be "lazy" with your work and less exacting, which to me is VERY disappointing. If we are a team working on recreations, why wouldn't we be actually recreating the buildings? Sure it will never be absolutely perfect, but with things like scale you can come very close. Would you be more disappointed thinking back and saying "I did my best" or "I just threw something together that looked ok." Again it's all up to you, but from what I've seen you, like me, have been creating very accurate recreations. People asking you to make them less perfect is discouraging to the team as a whole in my opinion.

I'm not asking him to make things less accurate or less exact. I was just saying what I do and what I thought when comparing his buildings to some of mine. To me, I don't care about perfect exact to every pixel accuracy like most of you do. You guys can, I don't have to, but I'm not encouraging him to make things less perfect to all of you guy's standards which are pretty damn high. Nothing wrong with that of course, just my main point is I wasn't suggesting or encouraging anything. Also, if I'm discouraging the team in anyway, then you can take it up with me in a PM. If not, keep assumptions to yourself.

Back to the main topic, I do love what you've accomplished so far Darknono35. Be very proud, the staggering detail of that hotel so far will surpass many BATs in quality.

[gutterclub 2,729]

I would of thought the easiest way to make it would be to follow RL sizes, it's all there written down already so you don't have to make numbers up..then just scale it up 133%..that number wasn't plucked out the air, its exactly how much is needed to avoid the games squishing affect from the camera angle..that said, I have seen 125% work quite well.

Sure Maxis didn't have a sense of scale when they made building, but just because they got it wrong doesn't mean BATers have to follow suit..besides, Maxis aren't making New York recreations in a New York recreation team.

But from an outsiders point of view, I just love the fact you all make these buildings each and every one of you

[Parisian 556]

Everyone one seems to be encouraging you to be "lazy" with your work and less exacting, which to me is VERY disappointing. If we are a team working on recreations, why wouldn't we be actually recreating the buildings? Sure it will never be absolutely perfect, but with things like scale you can come very close. Would you be more disappointed thinking back and saying "I did my best" or "I just threw something together that looked ok." Again it's all up to you, but from what I've seen you, like me, have been creating very accurate recreations. People asking you to make them less perfect is discouraging to the team as a whole in my opinion.

It was not in this way things has been said but more into recreating BATs fitting with the SC4 scale too. As Gutterclub said and we all act like this : we use the 133% scale once the model done. The detailings is something which seems to me the most important thing, considering the scale "second" in the way that Maxis scale is unregular from a building to another one. I prefer to find a compromise btw Maxis and the Bating which sometimes create a very little difference with others buildings but make the game more realistic too for players. This was just my own opinion and in this way I followed Sgt pepper point of view. I don't pretend it better or worst. :}

[Darknono35 3,138]

About the scale of the building, it may also depend on the type and the design of the building, such as the tower of Sherry Netherland Hotel, I used a scale of 125% because it seemed too stretched with 133%, I do not think that will consequence in the game, but I would make a test with other buildings in the game to check.

Here an small picture of the texturing work. I've used the brick template of Aaron with the Arch&design and composite texture to add some dirt on the walls and the roof map

It's an very hard building, with the texturing the model more than the conception

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

I love the model, but there is one thing you need to fix and that's the textures. You have made so many modern buildings, that you will have to upgrade you texturing an idea on a building like this.

Okay, the bricks you need to make the uvw map Length 15.0m, the width 15.0m and the Height 60.0m. The brick texture need to be brown, unless your trying to do variations with this one building. The roof needs to be a little more like real life building, and the roof texture of the lower part of the building, not the tower, it need to be like a asphalt like texture. The base of the building need to be the same as the real building, of course you know you will need some roof junk. Another thing is the glass your glass is to reflective, this is not a modern glass building, what I do is texture the glass of the building and make the reflective between 0.3 to 0.6, and the gloss around 0.3 to 0.6.

For this building can you make the building a CS$$$ and R$$$, or you can just send me only the models and I will lot them when your finished.

I would love to have a looks of the other side of the building, the part that touches another building, just to see if it looks okay model wise.

Okay Edit:

I see something else I think you need to work on the model. The things I have in a red circle I think you need to fix.

The Sherry Netherland Hotel 18th floor

OMG!!!!!!!!!!! Look at the inside, it's like a luxury ocean liner like the titanic and lusitania. RIP

Here's where i have got the last two images from, there's more images.

http://www.bornrich.com/new-yorks-legendary-sherry-netherland-op-apartment-listed-95-million.html

[Darknono35 3,138]

Ok Aaron I've see that, thank you guy. And I love your picture particulary the living-room It's so beautiful.

It's the beginning of the texturing and, did you know an tutorial to use composite texture ?

[Sgt Pepper 864]

I think I have a green copper texture I got from CG Textures that will be perfect for that roof. The pattern is about exactly the same as the real building's roof, if you'd like to have it.

[Francis90b 748]

I'd fully and wholeheartedly subscribe with Gutterclub.

If you follow the real measures, you have less troubles later on with proportions, ratios and measurements -. you won't have to "edit" them every time in order to fit with whatever need you might have - you know something is "n" mtrs wide, you copy it as much as you can - simple as pie, and much more accurate.

If you follow the correct scaling factor (that appears to be 133%, someone did tests with a cube, i'd try to post them) things might not necessarily look as you expect, but they're going to look correct - personally, i think that you should honour the skills you've shown, the time you take and the architecture of the buildings you make by starting to think of doing things striving for what they are, or are likely to be, rather than according to your, or someone else's personal expectations about them.

You have two problems now, that are the direct consequence of the decisions you took earlier - something with unaccurate measurement, which are reflected when you use an appropriate scaling ratio - you're right, although not for the reasons you think, when you say that the building looks too stretched at 133% - it's quite obvious it does, as you decided to follow a generic standard for maxis buildings, rather than the building's real measures.

Hoping you'd bring your BATing decisions in line with the quality of the architectures you've decided to BAT, and to the amazing progresses you've done, i'd encourage you to think about what PGBV, Gutterclub, and I wrote.

[Sgt Pepper 864]

Actually, I think what I've been saying about what I do with scaling has been misconstrued. I was mainly talking about height. I follow real life proportions and dimensions, but due to the nature of SimCity 4 the height is left to some extent of free will to me, to make sure it looks right to the Sims.

I wouldn't encourage anything really at this point, everyone. I think it's up to Darknono35 to BAT how he pleases. With the quality he's achieved, it's still going to be a fantastic and nearly perfect BAT. Of course, he's more likely to lean on following your points anyway.

Honestly, it seems like all this altogether on both sides of whatever, is all about our collective personal expectations on BATs, rather than some actual rule of thumb that some of you try to stress so much. Same "difference" to me. But I'm just being analytical, so feel free to ignore me.

[Hanson784 165]

I think the building looks great IMO and fits in with the standard of other BATer's quality in game. The style of BATing is becoming similar for the NYBAT team from what I'm seeing which is a good thing. As for scaling it's up to you since it's your creation.

While improvements can be made to BAT's it's always good not to over think something or an aspect of a building. This has happened to me when I've been recreating real buildings I see as I go about my day in here in NYC. One day the light will change or it will be a different time than when my reference photo was taken and I'll think my texture is wrong. With my hyper realistic style this can sometimes be a problem which leads to a number of unreleased BAT's thinking they weren't good enough (I've dubbed this "analysis paralysis"). On the other hand though I've released rush BAT's and the community let me know it was indeed half baked (the Millennium Hilton for example) It's an art getting real life buildings to look right in the game's enviroment.

Anyway, I'm very pleased and impressed with your work and look forward to your future releases.

[gutterclub 2,729]

Actually, I think what I've been saying about what I do with scaling has been misconstrued. I was mainly talking about height. I follow real life proportions and dimensions, but due to the nature of SimCity 4 the height is left to some extent of free will to me, to make sure it looks right to the Sims.

.

The 2 problems with this sort of thinking is that

a) Maxis made Sims something like 3 meters tall, added to this they clearly didn't scale their buildings against them..or against anything for that matter. So scaling abuildings height by using a sim or to be precise some random generated pixels that appear on the sidewalk every now and then and at certain zooms are hardly noticeble seems silly to me.

b) if you follow a buildings proporations width and length ways but ignore scaling its height then you are going to get these scaling issues that we are discussing where the building 'doesn't look right' and then people start saying, scale it 120%, nah scale it 125%, nah scale it back down..its just silly when the building and floor height is all written down somewhere,

I thought the idea of the NYBT was to create buildings from New York, usually (not always, I dont recreate NYC but use most of your works) for people recreating the Big Apple in the Sim world? If so it seems silly to both base your scale on what Maxis were using and basing how it looks compared to Maxis bukdings...after all, if you crazy cats keep BAting the way you are you won't need any Maxis buildings in your recreations.

My point is, is you all stick to RL proporations when doing actual recreations (not based on, which is fine by the way, I'm all for 'basing on') then you will be in tune with each other.

[Darknono35 3,138]

About the main color of the brick, what's your preference the picture 1 or the 2 ?

[sten1700 102]

Oh my god. So pretty Darknono. I choose 1

[libellibicus 396]

No 2 does it for me

[weixc812 509]

I choose No.1 since it looks older

[Susaji 523]

I Choose 1

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

Looks great, I still think you need to change the roof texture, the gray one that is, It need to be darker.

You can try to find composite texture tutorials by scearching on google, and you may find some on youtube.

I choose one, it looks as close to the real building. I think the base of the facade color needs to be close to the molding objects.

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Sherry+Netherland+Hotel&hl=en&ll=40.764592,-73.972648&spn=0.002572,0.006539&hq=Sherry+Netherland+Hotel&t=m&z=18&layer=c&cbll=40.764405,-73.97324&panoid=AyqONWgRiSqP1q7R-TgNaw&cbp=12,93.66,,1,-11.17

[Parisian 556]

number 1 too

[Jasoncw 11,949]

I think the colors still need some work.

On the left is my suggestion on what direction the colors could head. It's not perfect but I think it's closer. On the right is how you currently have it.

Something you can do for the textures, is take the google street view link that Aaron posted, and take a screenshot of it, and then paste it into photoshop. Then you can use the color eye drop tool/color picker tool to pick out the colors from the image.

To automatically change the color of the bricks, you can open the brick texture in Photoshop, and make a new layer on top, and fill the layer with the color you selected from the google maps screenshot. Then set the layer's blending mode to "color" and it will make everything the same color as that layer. Then you can go to Layers>New Adjustment Layer and you can make a Hue/Saturation adjustment layer, and then you can make a Brightness/contrast adjustment layer.

Something else that is helpful, is when you put the screenshot of the google maps street view screenshot into photoshop, you can desaturate it, and then it is easy to see how dark or bright different materials are. Doing this, I found that your stone was too bright compared to your brick.

I also made your glass a little more blue. Right now your glass is actually brown and green.

And I made the roof darker, but that is just my personal preference.

I'm glad you're spending more time on your buildings.

[darn42 1,268]

Looks great, I still think you need to change the roof texture, the gray one that is, It need to be darker.

You can try to find composite texture tutorials by scearching on google, and you may find some on youtube.

I choose one, it looks as close to the real building. I think the base of the facade color needs to be close to the molding objects.

http://maps.google.c...93.66,,1,-11.17

I wrote a small tutorial on composite materials also located here:

I hope it helps. If not, there are lots of resources online like aaron said.

I really do love the effort you are putting into your BATs now. It is showing in a great way. Keep it up.

[dubaidude303 1,126]

Can't wait for it! I love your work! It's amazing!

[Darknono35 3,138]

Hi all !

It's probably my last post on my thread for this year 2012 . And I thanks for your vote, I prefer the number one too. I show you this picture with all the views of the Hotel.

A big thanks at Sgt Pepper and Aaron for the textures that has help me to recreated this difficult building

Thanks Darn42 for the link, it's an useful tuto

And for end, thanks at all, you've supported my progress for the BAT, and followed my thread. 2013 will be a year full of surprises;)

:party: HAPPY NEW YEAR !!!!! :party:

[sten1700 102]

Amazing Darknono!!! Seriously best BATer on the stex!! And you update and upload your buildings so fast to! You're amazing! Keep up the good work! Happy new year!!

[dubaidude303 1,126]

Great work on it! Your the best BATer iv'e seen! Amazingly good work, can't wait for more of your projects! Happy New Year

[PBGV103 729]

Looking beautiful!

[libellibicus 396]

Pure quality. The attention to detail is amazing, and so fast too

[Parisian 556]

Awsome. Just one thing : it seems you forgot the reflection glasses of the back tower (south side), The rest is very astonishing for the realism and the quality of your texture.

ps : Bonne Année 2013

[PBGV103 729]

Which area are you talking about Parisian? I don't see any unreflective glass.

[Darknono35 3,138]

Woow! You say, I'm the best, I don't know if I'm the best, but the NYBT is the best team, it's sure , your advices, have made my news buildings better than my oldest.

About my old buildings like the 40th Wall Street, AIG Tower and the others, they will be renovated soon, because, I've save them of my old computer. And the models are totaly compatible with my 3dsmax version . This is my first great news for the year 2013 !!

The conception of the Sherry Netherland Hotel is very difficult but fascinating, I think the most difficult will be the Jewelery of the ground lobby called " A la vieille Russie".

Thank you for the compliment, and I wish you all a good and exellent year 2013 !!!