Jason's BATs & Tutorials

[Barroco Hispano 26,671]

"For some reason the scene has become mega laggy, so it's been hard working on it but it's very close to being done."

1. Select all cars/trees

2. Rigth click -> Object properties -> Display as box-> ok

3. You can also activate backface cull to all objects in the scene.

[nofunk 1,933]

I'm a fangirl and download everything you release, so doesn't really matter to me!

[JP Schriefer 5,590]

I prefer individual BATs as well.

I really don't know about the openings, it could be both options, but regarding the parking area they definitely have lights at night.

 

[Jasoncw 11,840]

Thanks for the feedback everyone. I have to say I wasn't expecting support for individual uploads to be so overwhelming, but it definitely makes it very clear what I should do!

Here's the current progress on these Brazilian apartments. Other than a few small details added, the day is the same as it was on the last page.

If anyone notices anything that needs more work, please say so. Otherwise it's ready to export.

I've also gotten some work done on the other BATs but I haven't saved any preview renders, so I'll update those next time.

@Goldman SachsThat's what you would think, but that was how I always had it. The cars plants and even the roofs are displayed as boxes. It turned out that having snaps turned on was the problem. Luckily the building was far enough along that I could freehand the rest.

[Bastet69008 1,102]

Such an incredible job!

[Jasoncw 11,840]

2 hours ago, Bastet69008 said:

Such an incredible job!

That makes me glad!

 

Here's what I believe will be the final update on Hathaway Tower. It will be a 1x1 R$$ in the NY tileset. Again any input is welcome.

[Jasoncw 11,840]

It's up!!

[Jasoncw 11,840]

And another!!

 

Hopefully within the next week or so I can get Wellington Place and Great Lakes EMS finished and uploaded as well.

[Jasoncw 11,840]

@Tyberius06Posted a review on Residencial Rachel de Quieroz suggesting that I make wall to walls out of it. I interpreted that to mean the kind of plastered wall to wall buildings with red tile roofs that are most commonly found around the Mediterranean. In general I'd rather make new projects than variations of old projects, and right now I'm trying to get through my WIPs. I actually have my WIPs (the preview renders are outdated btw), along with some inspirational Westin Bonaventure photos as my desktop background.

I've done some work on Wellington Place (I didn't save a preview). Here's the skylight part of the Westin Bonaventure:

[gutterclub 2,729]

Love the little 1x2 building...well I love them all of course, but that one is very cute.

[Jasoncw 11,840]

Hey guys here's an update on the Westin Bonaventure.

[Jasoncw 11,840]

A small update today:

[ilikehotdogsalot 307]

Love to see you at it! Looking great

[Jasoncw 11,840]

I didn't work on the Westin Bonaventure today, but here's an old preview from the fall of Wellington Apartments that I hadn't posted. I had actually exported it, but the grey matting caused a bunch of problems with all the fencing this building has, so I'll have to reexport it with a darker background.

@ilikehotdogsalot It's nice to see you! You've made me nostalgic now!

[JP Schriefer 5,590]

I'm looking forward to seeing how the glasses at Westin Bonaventure will look like - especially knowing that you are amazing doing these effects, this mirrored and round building will be very interesting.

The Wellington Apartments building is very well done!

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

26 minutes ago, JP Schriefer said:

I'm looking forward to seeing how the glasses at Westin Bonaventure will look like -

Well, count me in. I'm still growing. I do need inspiration from the real masters!

[Jasoncw 11,840]

Some Westin Bonaventure progress. I managed to find a few floor plans that when combined told me the locations of the various features of this side of the building at the ground floor.

I also added some steps and BATed ground. In real life, this building is on hilly ground, which generally meets the ground level of the building at the main entrance here. The other side of the building is a floor lower. For SC4, it's getting flattened, and so the main entrance on this side is twice as tall as it is in real life, and so to try to keep the proportions low and horizontal, I added some height with the steps. I actually think this has worked out ok, because it still has the general horizontal appearance, but the extra height lets you see some of the details of the inner area, which would normally be completely hidden.

I had lost internet one day, so I opened up something I didn't need reference material from online to work on. I added the ground floor windows, but the main thing I did is go through and fix all of the terra cotta panel lines. Before I had the terra cotta as a Tiles map, lined up using uvw maps, which I thought at the time worked good enough? But when I opened it up nothing was lined up and it was a wreck, so I went through and manually made the panel lines by modeling them in and giving them a dark color, and then went through and randomized the terra cotta blocks. Maybe not the most efficient use of time but at least the terra cotta is (mostly) done now.

[elavery 1,013]

The Westin Bonaventure is really taking shape! I can't wait to see the finished product.

[Jasoncw 11,840]

More progress! This area was really hard to figure out, and I know it's not 100% right, but it's not too far off either. And like everywhere else, it's been modified to flatten the slope from real life.

With and without the canopy which covers everything up anyway. There are also two more canopies there that I haven't modeled yet which will probably cover up everything that remains. Oh well.

[JP Schriefer 5,590]

Looks great!

Actually I love buildings with canopies in game, this one is no exception

[Belfastsocrates 1,753]

On 12/04/2020 at 4:27 AM, Jasoncw said:

 

 

That is gorgeous. Looking forward to using that. Love the Art Deco detailing. 

[Jasoncw 11,840]

Tackling the stairs. There's still one large stair area left to do near the corner. After that there are still some doors, railings, and signs left to do around the ground floor, but after that I think I'm going to start doing some texturing.

[JP Schriefer 5,590]

I like to model everything first to start texturing later, but sometimes it gets so boring and monotonous that do some texturing is relieving. In models so detailed like yours I'd probably finish textures first

[Jasoncw 11,840]

Yeah I usually like to model things first. Although I always make preliminary materials as I go along, and I model things like panel lines while I'm modeling.

Small update but I've been dreading these stairs. They're harder than they look!

[Jasoncw 11,840]

Another small update. This time I did the signs.

Helvetica is the font used on many of the signs and it was easy to identify and I already have it. The other font that's used is the Westin hotel font, which turns out is called Friz Quadrata, which is the same font as the Law and Order logo, League of Legends, and the band Black Flag (@gutterclub).

And if you squint really hard you can actually see the letters!

[IDS2 3,346]

As a font snob, I appreciate your dedication 

Looking good!

[mattb325 28,880]

On 4/22/2020 at 1:55 PM, Jasoncw said:

Small update but I've been dreading these stairs. They're harder than they look

It's all looking great!

Now, I'm sure you know this already, but I'll just post it here in your thread as lots of folks come here for the tutorial section.

I hated doing stairs in GMAX days, too. Thankfully 3dsMax has an auto-stair function in the drop down under the 'create' tab (that is by default listed as 'standard primitives')

It has four nifty in-built stair types and lots of different looks are achievable by making various selections especially under the Carriage/railings/stringers settings. It sure does save hours of fiddly modelling and trying to array itty-bitty objects in the 3dspace.

 

[Raymond7cn 6,772]

3 hours ago, mattb325 said:

lots of folks come here for the tutorial section

Haha, Thank you matt, I'm that one, Still doing stairs manually even with 3ds max, Thank you for your tips, I will give it a try soon.

Sincerely,

-- Raymond

[Jasoncw 11,840]

@mattb325ugghh I actually did know that that existed and I forgot all about it. And you want to know what's worse? After you posted I was happy that making stairs would be easier and then a few days later I had to make more stairs and I had forgotten again and made them manually. I'm hopeless.

Thank you for sharing and hopefully you've saved me and everyone else some time in the future. These kinds of tips are helpful, you didn't become such a prolific BATer by sitting around modeling stairs.

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

Looking good Jason, I'm still around. I have not forgot about you guys.