Operation Buffalo Wing: A Blizzard of BAT

[SimGoober 2,365]

Looking sharp there!

 

FYI, I updated the pics on the Wegmans and Tops, the Buffalo is there.

[Predator88 2]

Great looking buildings guys, I haven't even had a chance to practice my gradual learning of the BAT. Between the last week of classes and exams coming, plus work,I've been sort of busy. Looking good though.

[Sabretooth78 808]

I've reached the major modeling complete stage of the City Hall building, leaving only the little roof junk that there is in real life.  Things such as the dome, City Council skylight, stair handrails, and ground-level platforms with the Filmore and Cleveland statues are complete.  I was disappointed to find that the small mayor's statue in SC4 had a base of 4m square, because it looked almost identical to the statues on this building, but I needed 1m square.  I ended up finding a 3DS model on the web of a man standing however, and I have to say it came out rather well.  I'm now consolidating like textured elements into meshes to make texturing even possible, and may start working on the actual textures tomorrow (well today now). 

 

I've also begun work on the Niagara Square/McKinley Memorial lot to be included with this package, and it should come along reasonably quickly (hopefully my inability to model the sleeping lions on the fountain won't hurt, I couldn't find any on the web).  For anyone interested/concerned, the Niagara Square lot will be a completely independent, stand-alone lot;  I'm just packaging it with City Hall because A) I believe it belongs with City Hall given it's the true city center as well as accentuating the building, and B.) Few non-Buffalonians would probably download it as a separate upload anyways.  So as in the fine tradition of Micro$oft, you're getting it whether you want it or not, you just don't need to use it!

 

I also found a nice 3DS model of Lady Liberty, I thought that was going to be one of, if not, the biggest obstacle in my upcoming Liberty Building project (which I may run concurrent with ACC).  So it's all starting to come together, and hopefully those projects, or any future ones for that matter, won't take as long as this one has!

 

Providing I don't run into any major snags (or I decide to redo a bunch of detail), sometime mid-week I may be posting a textured render of the building that should essentially be a finished draft.  Then it'll be off to night lighting, I'm sure that'll be a pleasure...

 

I'm anticipating 2 more weeks left to release, so don't demolish your current city hall just yet!

 

Happy BATing!

-Chris

[Sabretooth78 808]

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[baldy 0]

I've been following this thread since it came about (copy cat) and this project is looking amazing!  It doesn't really look like a middle finger from the render angle!

 

  I agree that the dome looks perfect with that texture.  The only images I have seen were the ones posted on this thread, but I like it as is. 

 

I really like this 20's style art deco style, which is something Buffalo and Detroit have a lot of.  Both of you are doing a great job and I am looking forward to getting more of these into my cities!

 

Keep up the good work!

[drewz15 0]

 

that building is freaking amazing. the top has the best detail i've ever seen.

 

i assume the roof textures aren't final though, it looks like you were testing out a few of them.

[SimGoober 2,365]

Looking Sharp! 

 

I know you are going for realism, but that speckly roof really doesnn't fit.  You might try something darker, like this...

It will lighten up a little as well in a render.

 

[pepsi38 46]

i think the roof looks good as white

[Sabretooth78 808]

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[subedei 3]

Looks awsome. This will find a nice home in my city. Keep up the good work.

 

 

Subedei

[Predator88 2]

Yea I agree, this is probably your best BAT yet. I had a thought. The whitish color that you used for the upper flat roof on the side closest to us in the picture ( I think tha tmade sense) something like that, maybe a tad brighter, would have looked better on the Aud than the much disputed roof that was used. It doesn't looks as....cartoonish (couldn't think of a word).

[Ryan B 35]

Wow - good job w/ City Hall!

[drewz15 0]

i think that the detail on the walls is fine how it is. there's enough detail in the structure itself that the texture you use can never look repetitive, IMO. but if you want to change it, do as you like.

 

by the way, does Buffalo have any highrises?

[Sabretooth78 808]

Nope, I was planning on leaving the wall textures as you see them now.  Pretty much it's just the roofs that need work.

 

As for high-rises, I suppose it sort of depends on your definition of a high-rise.  Buffalo, in my opinion, has a fairly old and jagged skyline, indicative of the periods in which the majority of the buildings were constructed - mostly from the glory days of the 1880's to as late as the 1950's, although the tallest were built in the 60's and 70's.  Not many buildings that look too modern, and it sort of reflects the condition and economy of the city today.  But I can't imagine it can stay like that forever. There's too many things that are good: sitting right in the middle of what I believe is like the 4th largest market sector in North America (the so-called Golden Horseshoe ringing the west end of Lake Ontario); some of the best (most moderate) weather in the country, depending on who you ask, but Buffalo statistically is the (or one of the) sunniest major city in the northeast; some of the lowest costs-of-living and health care costs in the US.  My opinion is when they [the gifted so-called leaders who inhabit the building I'm currently modeling] stop dragging their feet about the whole waterfront thing, the Peace Bridge expansion, and put that damned Skyway underground, the city can go a long way towards reversing it's image.  Anyways, enough of my rant!  Here are some good skyline pics:  The tallest building is HSBC Center at 161m (528 ft) w/ 40 stories, and the second is City Hall at 115m (377 ft) w/ 32 stories.  Total of 5 buildings over 100 m and 14 at 50m or higher. 

The building in the middle of the downtown with the two peaks (with miniature Statues of Liberty) is the Liberty Building (5th tallest at 101m), my next Buffalo BAT project.

These pics are all from:  Skyscraperpage.com

More stuff at: http://www.emporis.com/en/wm/ci/?id=102063

-Chris

[Merkinball 0]

Being from near Buffalo, I have to say that this BAT is simply spectacular. Just like the rest of the Buffalo BAT's you've created.

Awesome.

Maybe you could do some of the Rochester buildings once you're finished with Buffalo?

Couple recommendations:

Roswell Cancer Institute?

If you're gonna do the Liberty Towers, try to make them with the green glow at night. Perhaps you could mod the Ni-Mo tower with the fancy colored lights as well some time.

[hogmeister 7]

Your city hall is a classic, as good as anything by O

[sblanc1087 0]

 

heres a pict of the liberty building............ that would be another great addition.

I have more picts of the city and its buildings around...........

[Sabretooth78 808]

Well I'm honored to have this compared to oneil, perhaps the best art deco BATer here at ST!

 

Merkinball - I may consider adding some Rochester and perhaps even some Syracuse stuff to the list eventually.  The only problem I can see is that eventually I'm going to get to a point where I want to actually play the game again (especially when the Network Addon Mod is finished and improved upon) so it would obviously take me a long time to get to the point where I get to those.  It would be nice if I could get a few more interested BATers to jump into this project and clean up the list a little.  And it doesn't have to be on the list either, in my opinion anything from Western NY (and Albany), and even Toronto is welcome here. 

 

As for NiMo, I stopped the lighting at the tower because I didn't have enough of an idea where the lights in the street were located, aimed, etc.; and I also think SC4 is too bright at night and it would have washed the colors out so much to the point I'd have to make them too bright, and they'd probably look totally ridiculous.  So rather than ruining what I had, I decided to stop.  Another related update I'm planning is to add the Christmas Tree lighting to the side of HSBC Center for the same time period I have NiMo change.

 

sblanc1087 - I'm looking forward to doing the Liberty Building as well.  After all these either massively complicated buildings (NiMo, City Hall) or humongous lots (HSBC Arena, City Hall, and soon to be Air Canada Centre), this looks like it'll be a rather typical job.  And I already found a copy the statue model, so my biggest concern is gone.  Also it'll signal my entrance into doing smaller buildings, at least until I tackle Albany's Corning Tower, if I'm the one who does it.

 

-Chris

[sblanc1087 0]

 

Albany being my hometown,  for some inspiration here are some picts of the plaza and surrounding area.........

 

 

(above)the plaza (left: 4 govt office buildings, center: 2 reflection pools with fountains, front, back: leg building with other govt buildings, right back: the egg, right forward: part of the corning tower.)

(below)legislature building

 

 

(above) sky view of part of the plaza (the egg, leg building and other govt buildings)

(below) the egg

 

(below) plaza state office buildings:

 

 

(Below) corning tower

 

 

 

(below)some sky views of the rest of the city: facing hudson river

 

 

 (below) corning tower

 

 

(below) sky view of entire plaza during its construction (not sure when maybe 60's or something) as facing opposite of the hudson

 

 

(below) state museum

 

all sky view pict taken from the corning tower..... i have more picts of the plaza and surrounding area if you'd like to see more, that would be great if you actually started the corning tower.....

 

sorry for so many pictures........Im interested in recreating albany in simcity, with hopefully some of the landmarks......it would be great if some of these could be made as seperate buildings or as one huge lot with all buildings like the plaza as a whole. Great work on the buffalo landmarks....awsome job.

[jsieczka 19]

Sorry for the delay, real like cought up with me.  The windows are in along the base, and i still have alot of work to do.  The hard part is going to be doing the modding.  Here is a pic of what is done.

 

Edit: newer pic ahead

[MayorTim 16]

I think that the wall textures are way to orangy. They look almost gray in the real life pic. Could u plz change em?

[Sabretooth78 808]

MayorTim - While the walls may look a bit too orangy, that color is a near-perfect match to every picture that I have of the building in somewhat direct sunlight (and I feel the SC4 render lighting simulates that), so I'm not planning much in the way of changing the wall textures.  If anything, while I may dull them a little, I'm thinking more along the lines of making the majority part of the walls a bit less brown.  Look at the picture posted on page 1 of this thread (the one of with the green, red, and yellow decorations) to see one of the examples.  Thanks for pointing it out though, it's only a couple minutes job to verify/change them.

 

sblanc1087 - Those are some nice Albany pics, hopefully I'll get around to doing some of them eventually.  I remember the first time I saw Albany and thinking how strange the skyline looked!  I'm not sure about the State House though, that looks pretty intimidating right about now!  I remember seeing that building when they had it all scaffolded up about 8 years ago, I was in a hotel room (can't remember the name, might have been Embassy) that looked directly onto that building, probably one of the best views I've ever had from a hotel, along with the Empire State Building from a room in NYC.

 

Made some more decent progess on the monument today, although I just noticed a screwed up a dimension and it's going to require about a half hour of rework.  So I'm quitting for the night and I'll do it tomorrow.  I may possibly get it done and textured tomorrow, we'll see!

 

BTW, I like the way Central Terminal is coming along.  My only question is (and I've noticed it before but never thought to ask), what is that gravelly-looking surface behind the tower supposed to be?  Parking lot or something?

 

-Chris

[hogmeister 7]

I like some of those Albany buildings, in particular the state museum, its got that star trek original series futurism about it that appeals to me, I think the whiteness of the building along with the modern pilaster effect on the walls helps overcome the poured concrete massiveness of its roof area.

[Ryan B 35]

I love the stuff that's coming out of this thread!

[backface 6]

This city hall will be a must in all my Sim cities!

[Sabretooth78 808]

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[Ryan B 35]

You THINK this came out reasonably well?  Don't doubt yourself - this looks AWESOME!

[sblanc1087 0]

looks great! If you need any more picts of the plaza or any albany buildings i can go through my own pictures or can just walk downtown and take some specific ones.If you need some picts just tell me and ill be more than happy to post them.Good plan for albany, cant wait till then.

[+Guest]

I must agree with Ryanb. Those lions turned out very well. It is a very pretty model of the monument.

Why not release 2 or 3 different lots? one large plaza, and one or 2 roundabout optiona?

just a thought

LL

[Sabretooth78 808]

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