Jason's BATs & Tutorials

[Jasoncw 11,840]

Got some flag poles, light fixtures, and some other minor things. 

But I also successfully got it exported after having some trouble. I've updated the BAT Mega FAQ with what I learned. Which is that when your BAT appears to be rendering offset even though your LODs are centered, what I discovered was happening was that in gmax for some reason my imported LODs were named things like LOD4.LOD5 instead of just LOD4. This tripped things up and caused an automatic box LOD to be generated, and the renderings from max don't line up properly with the box, so it appears offset. The way to solve the problem is to correct the LOD names in gmax.

I've plopped the building around in the game and found that it actually works really well with other wall to wall buildings. I have a lot in my cities that are about the height of the lowrise section which makes the tower stand out in a desirable way. And then for the taller wall to wall buildings the tower does a good job of transitioning.

 

[matias93 7,535]

Got some flag poles, light fixtures, and some other minor things. 

But I also successfully got it exported after having some trouble. I've updated the BAT Mega FAQ with what I learned. Which is that when your BAT appears to be rendering offset even though your LODs are centered, what I discovered was happening was that in gmax for some reason my imported LODs were named things like LOD4.LOD5 instead of just LOD4. This tripped things up and caused an automatic box LOD to be generated, and the renderings from max don't line up properly with the box, so it appears offset. The way to solve the problem is to correct the LOD names in gmax.

I've plopped the building around in the game and found that it actually works really well with other wall to wall buildings. I have a lot in my cities that are about the height of the lowrise section which makes the tower stand out in a desirable way. And then for the taller wall to wall buildings the tower does a good job of transitioning.

 

It looks fantastical to be the focal point of a begginings-of-the-20th-century themed city centre. I can already see it in front of my central plaza.

  Edited July 26, 2015 by matias93  

[city89 147]

Got some flag poles, light fixtures, and some other minor things. 

But I also successfully got it exported after having some trouble. I've updated the BAT Mega FAQ with what I learned. Which is that when your BAT appears to be rendering offset even though your LODs are centered, what I discovered was happening was that in gmax for some reason my imported LODs were named things like LOD4.LOD5 instead of just LOD4. This tripped things up and caused an automatic box LOD to be generated, and the renderings from max don't line up properly with the box, so it appears offset. The way to solve the problem is to correct the LOD names in gmax.

I've plopped the building around in the game and found that it actually works really well with other wall to wall buildings. I have a lot in my cities that are about the height of the lowrise section which makes the tower stand out in a desirable way. And then for the taller wall to wall buildings the tower does a good job of transitioning.

 

It looks fantastical to be the focal point of a begginings-of-the-20th-century themed city centre. I can already see it in front of my central plaza.

OMG LINK PLZ

[city89 147]

Thanks, I'm eager to do more BATing.

 

http://www.ramyhanna.com/2013/06/simple-way-to-speed-up-viewport-speed.html

 

Another helpful link, this one if you're experiencing a lot of viewport lag.

 

 

I posted this in the "The ones that never made it to the STEX" thread but I figured I'd post it here too since it shows a bunch of my earliest projects, which some people might find interesting.

 

I WANT THEM ALLLL SUM 1 PLZ MAKE THEM

[JP Schriefer 5,590]

Looks amazing in-game Jason! Can't wait to see it on STEx *_*

[SimCoug 5,972]

Yep, this is a really great focal point to compliment some of your (and Nofunk's) similar looking W2W buildings.  I'm really excited about this gem.  Great work Jason!

[MushyMushy 3,617]

It looks very nice! It's nice that it's a good transition piece between taller and shorter W2W buildings, as such things seem hard to find. It also adds a nice bit of variety to a row of rectangular box buildings with it's tower and tall (copper?) roof.

[Jack_wilds 550]

well done... great addition to any downtown...

[Jasoncw 11,840]

Thanks guys! Oakland Tribune is done. I just need to get the screenshots for the STEX. I have to figure out what to do though, because in the past I've made the main screenshot the same dimensions as how the image will display on the STEX. And every time the STEX changes all of my images are the wrong size. And now with the latest conversion they're all the wrong size, and there are multiple sizes/aspect ratios. So I guess I'll just do a tightly cropped zoom 5 screenshot and let the STEX deal with it, even though most of the time you're just going to see the middle of the building?

In the meantime though is a project that I think people will be excited about. It's a set of London terrace housing. There will be a few variation of mid-block terraces, plus corner terraces. Here's a current preview render: 

  

Still quite WIP.

[JP Schriefer 5,590]

Yay! We need more London buildings *_*
Looks great

[MushyMushy 3,617]

Very exciting! The corner terraces are particularly exciting.

[SimCoug 5,972]

Jasoncw+London = a whole new world of awesomeness 

[Toothless Stitch 2,901]

I like how people are going crazy about such a small glimpse

[Belfastsocrates 1,753]

In the meantime though is a project that I think people will be excited about. It's a set of London terrace housing. There will be a few variation of mid-block terraces, plus corner terraces. Here's a current preview render:   

Still quite WIP.

Thank you!!!!

I'm particularly thrilled about the corner terraces! You've no idea how excited I am about this  

 

[citycowboy 183]

this guy and no funk need to make their own game if they were ever interested in being bazillionares. High-Quality.

[Harry's Place 918]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When will it be released ?

 

[Bombardiere 591]

Oh Dear! Me very Happy.

 

That London Terrace is very similar to one I have picked up for a possible Project. It was from somewhere Knightbridge / Sloane Square area.

 

Interesting thing is that while back then these were built as luxury aparments, today many are low wealth hostels.

 

[edwardjeria 503]

wao is beutifull great work, pd i am back

 

[Jasoncw 11,840]

Thanks everyone.

Bombardiere: These ones in particular were built as luxury apartments and have become even more luxury. I don't dare look at real estate listings.

Here it is in google streetview https://goo.gl/maps/n37lp . The two I've been showing at 15/16 Warwick. There will be a few other sets from that block, and the end rowhouse is the building on the left (west) end of the block. The facades occasionally bump out, and this aspect will not be recreated in order to maintain a flat streetwall at the standard 1.6 m setback. Sadly this means that the front porches will be significantly squashed in. Right now the porches extend 3 m out from the facade. Part of this will be done by shifting pieces over, and some of it will be done by scaling the entire porch in the one dimension. 

[edwardjeria 503]

woa , very well detailed, and want to see the other sides and roof, good job ;)

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[citycowboy 183]

This says London. I spent all morning driving around google Detroit. Where's my First National Building? I'm just kidding, good job bro.

[Belfastsocrates 1,753]

Very excited! I'm been waiting for such buildings for a long time. I'm already thinking of settings and neighbourhoods 

Will this is a one-off project or do you plan to hopefully create other British influenced row houses? 

[madhatter106 3,903]

So beautifully done.  Can't wait to see the further results.  I love rowhouses.

[Seraf 1,238]

Looks very good, nice work on the details. (It might be just me but aren't the friezes above first and second floor a bit too flat?) It's a pity though that the alternate depth in facades won't be recreated. You can see on the real row that those "bumps" do a great deal in fighting the monotony of the street.

[Fantozzi 4,067]

May I ask: would it be possible to do a mirrored version of 220 West Congress? - for gaming purpose. This is such a handy building with it's 1x3 tiles and it's so good looking in my middle sized euopean cities, i'd like to use it as left and right corner filler. So I simply can't resist to ask. Thank you for your patience.

[Girafe 1,729]

Hi,
According to tribune building I have few questions regarding the materials you used.

Close to the edges, roof textures are darker, is it done manually under PS? Many of your texture have slight glossiness especially the roofs, what are the settings you used for that effect.

Do you use layering under 3dsmax or just maps you have done under PS? and what are the maps you use (diffuse and bump, or more?).

Regarding AO, you advice to turn it on, but at what value (4m?)

Thanks, keep the amazing work

 

[Jasoncw 11,840]

Thanks guys  In the next few days I should have an update for the terraces. 

citycowboy: If it wasn't for the angle it probably would have been BATed by now!

belfastsocrates: More of the same style from nearby may come later. So it's semi-one off. I might also make some different ones but they'd be more likely to be more working class.

Seraf: They might be too small, but the buildings are so small (for SC4 anyway) that details like this are smaller in the render than their impressions in real life. I'll take another look at them. And I agree about the bumps, you wouldn't notice them casually, but they have a big effect. Sadly, between the bumps being flattened and the porches being flattened, these won't have quite the same feel as the real ones, but there's not much to do about it.

fantozzi: Exporting and modding things is a big hassle, but doesn't take much time. I should set aside a day to export the variations people have asked for, since I still need to export diagonals for SimCoug. 

Girafe: I'm happy to answer.

The "eyeliner" is done in Photoshop. For most BATs all of the different roof levels (except, obviously, the metal roofs) are one texture made in photoshop. I attach them all together and take a screenshot from the top viewport, and that's how I know where the edges of the roof and the roof junk are. The roof junk also has eyeliner. It's not realistic at all, but it looks good for a video game. 

The roof material is .2 reflectivity and .2 glossiness (I'd guess that all the roofs are between .1 and .2), and has the Highlights + FG Only checkbox checked. Sometimes I notice the roofs are reflecting too much of the blue sky, and since the Highlights+FG Only option prevents actual reflections from happening, it cuts down on the blueness of the roof without completely removing a sense of glossiness. But a lot of the time I don't check that checkbox. Sometimes I copy the roof texture into the glossiness slot and use a color correction map to adjust it. I do like to have a little bit of glossiness, although this is also not realistic because tiny pebbles is probably one of the least glossy surfaces that a building can have. But it looks nice.

For roofs because I'm already making the texture in photoshop, I do all of the adjustments in photoshop. 

The flags on top I used flag images from the internet and adjusted them in max.

The orange and white paint are both a bunch of images layered in max. The orange paint is 5 layers in a composite map, some of them noise, some of them bitmaps, and some of them inside of color correction maps. The entire composite map is inside of a color correction map. It would have been easier to make it in photoshop, and doing so much in max isn't good for performance. The diffuse is copied into the glossiness slot and adjusted with color correction. Adding the variation into glossiness instead of diffuse is a good way of adding some visual richness while keeping diffuse itself nearly a flat color. Also, the white paint is grey, and much darker than you'd expect.

For the ground floor restaurant, there are wooden planks, and brown walls with horizontal lines, and those are both tiles maps. The striped awning is a gradient ramp.

The bricks are a tiles map with a grime (concrete) texture layered on top in a composite map. The concrete texture is inside of a color correction map. A surprisingly simple material and the bricks tiling isn't noticeable. 

The copper material is multi/sub-map, with each variation being adjusted with a color correction map. The copper itself is a composite map with a layer of big noise of two different copper colors, and a small black and white noise to give it some finer texture. There is no uvw mapping, all the panels are modeled (nothing fancy) and the material IDs are randomized. 

Everything except for glass, and maybe things like railings, have ambient occlusion on at 4 meters. 4 meters seems to be a good distance for BATing. For materials that have finer details sometimes I make it smaller but I don't think it's an improvement over 4, but sometimes I do it anyway. But it's important to reduce that distance if you have a "canyon" type area that is narrow. For example, I have the distance set to 4 m, and the distance between the parallel roof penthouses is slightly more than 4 meters. If the penthouses were closer together, they would be within each other's AO radius, and so you'll have AO showing up when you wouldn't expect it. In that situation, lower the radius. 

For metal materials I check the "Metal Material" checkbox, and change the reflection color to a medium grey. And I change the IOR, etc.

I use bump maps for waviness on reflective surfaces like glass and metal. For something like ornament and other fine details it's better to paint the shadows into the texture. I'm not 100% sure but I think bump maps work in screen space, so if you have a low resolution render like SC4, there aren't enough pixels for the bump map to work. Like I said I'm not sure. But either way, when I've done tests I've never been able to get good results from bump maps. Normal maps would presumably be much much better, but are rare in a BATing context. But if you have a bump map you can use it as a displacement map, which would give the best possible results.

[Girafe 1,729]

Thanks a lot for your reply

It was I thought, your textures are amazing but behind that there is lot of work. I will try the different tips you gave.

Thanks again  

[sencillo1 47]

great release