Chicago BAT Project

[darn42 1,268]

Yea, I figured that out, there was something going on weird. I think something was casting a shadow onto it from somewhere else, I just moved it like 2 meters to the right and it was fixed :S

here it is fixed for you

  Edited July 18, 2012 by darn42  

[darn42 1,268]

Here's an update on the library. I did a couple hours of zbrush tutorials today.

This is one of the vertical lines of detail and windows running up the facade of the building. This is still just in zbrush. I am going to learn how to bake this down to a normal map, then I'm going to see how it looks in the render.

[Toothless Stitch 2,901]

I'm having big problems with the proportions I have told you of in my last update. And now I hope one of you guys can help me.

This is the problem I was talking about in the last update. As you can see in the ifrst pic, there is a gap between the outer windows of the slanted roof of the annex and its left wall. If you take a look at my preview you'll see that the gap between these two parts is wider than the one you can see at the Google Earth pic. The question is how I can reduce the gap. The only problem is that the scales of the walls are correct

Länge = length

  Edited July 18, 2012 by skyscraper241  

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Are you sure about the window widths? On the main tower, I see a combination of narrower and wider windows. Counting from the left on the half that's closer to the annex you're having problems with, the windows are:

narrow - wide - wide - narrow - narrow - wide - wide - narrow... or like this: []-[_]-[_]-[]-[]-[_]-[_]-[]

On the annex all windows seem to be wide. It's hard to see on your untextured "clay" model if you have these details right.

[darn42 1,268]

From what I can tell, he paid attention to the wide narrow pattern you described. You can see it on the vertical windows on the main building. On the annex there are 6 rows of windows that get greater in number from the start of it, and the count starts at 11. On the model I only see 5 rows. That's it for my limited observation ability

Great work so far sky.

[darn42 1,268]

Just made a new decoration for it. It's the toppers for the vertical thingies. I'm starting to finally get the hang of zbrush

edit: didn't want to add another post in a row so instead I'm just editing this post...

Here's the details in context of the building. I still have yet to learn how to bake normals so I'm just doing this preview thing. I would have done more of the details, but I'm not sure if my comp can handle it, combined they are 2.4 million polys...

  Edited July 18, 2012 by darn42  

[Cockatoo 2,256]

And that's why there's one thing I disagree with you on, and that's converting it to an editable poly to make it 3d geometry. I try and stay away from high count ngons 100% because they are impossible to model stuff on.

I think we're just gonna have to agree to disagree on that one. I find that by using tools such as cut and slice, large ngons become very easy to model with. I also not a fan of the arbitrary way in which the surface modifier divides things up into quads. Architectural modelling is very 'horizontal and vertical', and I just don't see that coming through in any of the wireframe/ edged face pics you've posted.

Say for instance, if you wanted to make those decorative elements you've added to the side purely horizontal (as they'd most likely be in the real world) you would almost certainly need to do some extra work to correct the edges spouting out at bizarre angles. In this situation, it might only be a 10 second fix, but in other situations this sort of stuff can lead to real headaches.

The ease of editing to your method is a nice advantage though. I tend to collapse things as I go, just a bad habit really. Not sure if going back and editing the spline (in my method) would have flow-on effects down the stack, but most things I’d want to edit with a piece of geometry like that could probably be done with an edit poly modifier. The biggest advantage to your method, as you say, is the ability to easily select rings. I generally use the front/ top viewports and standard selection tools for that sort of stuff, unless I'm working with an element purely made of quads.

But all that's just theory really. If you can both get the results in the render and feel comfortable working in the viewport, then at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter how you get there. Each for their own I guess, whatever works for you. On top of that, different skillsets will inevitably cater to different methods. There’s a million ways to do just about everything in Max, so what you know and the methods you feel comfortable working with are of course going to influence how you do things.

Really enjoying this convo btw, you've brought some really interesting ideas/ discussion to this forum!

[darn42 1,268]

I'm glad you enjoyed it as much as I did. And you summed everything up really nicely in the end. I think we can agree that both methods are valid for certain things. I'm starting to rethink my adamant stance on always keeping quads for everything, I'll tell you that. Another thing, I think posing alternate ideas and explaining them well (arguing ) in a good setting is one of the most productive things anyone can do. I'd love to have more of this kind of conversation more often

Also, what does slice do and what mode is it used in? I've never heard of it. I can infer that it creates lines and stuff on existing geometry, but I'm not exactly sure what it is

[Toothless Stitch 2,901]

Are you sure about the window widths? On the main tower, I see a combination of narrower and wider windows. Counting from the left on the half that's closer to the annex you're having problems with, the windows are:

narrow - wide - wide - narrow - narrow - wide - wide - narrow... or like this: []-[_]-[_]-[]-[]-[_]-[_]-[]

On the annex all windows seem to be wide. It's hard to see on your untextured "clay" model if you have these details right.

From what I can tell, I did exactly what you were talking of. The outer row of sindows can be seen becsause it is hidden like some others are.

From what I can tell, he paid attention to the wide narrow pattern you described. You can see it on the vertical windows on the main building. On the annex there are 6 rows of windows that get greater in number from the start of it, and the count starts at 11. On the model I only see 5 rows. That's it for my limited observation ability

Great work so far sky.

I know about the missing row of sindows. That was my fault. I forgot extruding them before doing the preview. Anyways, this isn't the reason why the windows seem not to be wide enough-

[Ion_Cannon 677]

Onterie center is coming along nicely

The level of detail on that building is mental Darn, probably tesselation levels.

[darn42 1,268]

Here is the most recent preview of tribune. I changed the parapets at the base to be taller and moved parts in to show the balconies

[paulvmontfort 616]

@ skyscraper: 2 things could be happening here. First thing that could be wrong is that the width of the windows on the east and west facing walls is off. After some examination of the real building I noticed them to probably be the same width as the narrow windows on the north and south facing walls.

Second thing that could have happened is that the angle of the diagonal wall is wrong. I took a closer look and did some measurements on the lower triangular glass part. I believe that the distance between vertical mullions on this part is exactly 3 feet (I know you work in meters but this building is most likely designed in feet..). The lower part of this triangle is exactly 15 mullions wide (45 feet). The upper part however, is approximately 3 1/3 mullion wide (10 feet). Your version appears to me to be just 3 mullions wide at the top. However, the slight increase of the length of the top, probably doesn't really have any noticeable effect . Here are pictures to illustrate what i mean:

I'm not sure whether this really is the problem though. Hope it helps

  Edited July 19, 2012 by paulvmontfort  

[Toothless Stitch 2,901]

@ skyscraper: 2 things could be happening here. First thing that could be wrong is that the width of the windows on the east and west facing walls is off. After some examination of the real building I noticed them to probably be the same width as the narrow windows on the north and south facing walls.

Second thing that could have happened is that the angle of the diagonal wall is wrong. I took a closer look and did some measurements on the lower triangular glass part. I believe that the distance between vertical mullions on this part is exactly 3 feet (I know you work in meters but this building is most likely designed in feet..). The lower part of this triangle is exactly 15 mullions wide (45 feet). The upper part however, is approximately 3 1/3 mullion wide (10 feet). Your version appears to me to be just 3 mullions wide at the top. However, the slight increase of the length of the top, probably doesn't really have any noticeable effect . Here are pictures to illustrate what i mean:

I'm not sure whether this really is the problem though. Hope it helps

Thank you, paul.

Today I experimented with lenght and width of the windows and with the angle of that side wall. I ended up with something in between. The angle of the side wall was raised and i needed to raise the width of one gap, only of ONE. I made a test preview and in my opinion it's not visible. It looks good now. I just need to recreate the diagonal wall and the glass entrance

But thanks for your efforts.

[darn42 1,268]

Everybody welcome the newest member of the CBT, Bipin.

[Toothless Stitch 2,901]

Welcome Bipin! Hope to have a lot of fun with you!

[darn42 1,268]

I've started on the gargoyles. I finished one part of it so far lol Needless to say this part took a while, but it was fun Anyways, there's gonna be more of this on the way.

About tribune tower, I'm not sure what I should do with the glass. People have said it looks plasticy. I am fine with the glass as it is atm, but I want some more opinions on it. Also, is there anything else that needs to be changed on it or is it safe to do a test export on it soon?

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Concerning Tribune Tower, I remember that the topmost platform was octogonal, not circular, and that it sat deeper inside the spires.

The glass... well, how did you make it? AFAIK, "best practice" these days is to make the glass reflect an invisible gorund plane and to add a bump map to the individual glass panes so that the reflections will be slightly distorted - just like in real life.

So far the windows inside the darker strips running up the walls look ok(ish), but the ones on the "gothic cathedral" part on top as well as those in the base look like solid light blue plastics. Seeing how much you rock 3dsmax otherwise, I refuse to believe that this is the end of the line.

[Bipin 3,402]

Hello all,

I'v been enlisted to help with content creation for the Chicago BAT Team, and am excited to start BATing for the team as soon as I can! I will begin with a street aesthetics mod (will likely be in the form of a T21 mod) to make our suburban streets more recognizably American. I figure in tribute to Chicago; an all-American city, why not make an all-American mod that changes the details of something we see so much in Sim City; streets:

Essentially, the road surface, which will soon include sidewalks as well, is a 3D overhanging model placed above the normal street to mask it. This will be revised so the road/sidewalk overlay is only a bit wider than a normal tile (at the moment the road is one tile wide, the sidewalks on the adjacent tiles). Once I regain access to my computer used for 3D modelling/rendering, which should be soon, I can finish the most basic of 3D models required (for instance, the intersection has no overlaying road model, only the straight sections, as seen in the image.If you have any suggestions, let me know!

[darn42 1,268]

Ok, I will fix that T wrecks. And thanks for reminding me on the octagonal part I had meant to change that already. I haven't done any bump maps to the glass yet because I thought that was usually reserved for all glass buildings. But right now they are semi transparent fully reflective planes reflecting an invisible ground plane.

[darn42 1,268]

Here it is. I fixed octagonal part and changed some of the glass. At this stage it's mostly feedback that I need on all my changes to see if I'm doing the stuff right. I would like to get a test export out by the end of the week and start working on nightlights btw.

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Could we see a picture of the ground plane you are using? It may also help the BAT cracks here if you mentioned the key setting you used for your windows.

[whitesox130 50]

Hello fellow Chicagoan! It seems you are missing a small, 5-6 story annex on the east side of the building. It is the same color as the rest of the building, and has the white letters spelling out "Chicago Tribune" in their old English font on the upper part of the south wall.

http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/0xSAVff0VOJ6QVm30Or7cw

[darn42 1,268]

I'm actually missing most of the building. There's a large complex all connected to it that takes up a very large area. I decided I would only BAT the iconic tower rather than spend a very very long time doing the entire rest of the building.

[darn42 1,268]

Here's the ground plane, I just took an image from google maps and scaled it appropriately lol. My glass settings are on the left. That's one of the glass materials, I have 2, the other one is slightly less transparent and darker.

[darn42 1,268]

Here is just a test export pic I did to see if everything's all good in terms of scale and fitting with the game. I still have to get the windows right, and apparently it was above the ground in 3ds max lol. I deleted that weird green thing that appeared btw. What do you guys think about the scale and such. Also, I need feedback on the glass especially and how I can improve it. Glass is definitely my weakest thing.

Thanks go to jazzmaster for taking the ingame pics and such btw.

  Edited July 21, 2012 by darn42  

[Amthaak 1,501]

Hi Darn! Just to tell that if you use le material 209 for the glass windows, you should put black color (which is no colour) for the "diffuse", I think you should also increase slightly the transparancy and degrease also the reflection! For the rest , well it is just exceptional!

[darn42 1,268]

Ok, thanks for the advice. I will implement it next time I work on tribune. I'm still doing the gargoyle for harold washington library lol.

[Sgt Pepper 864]

Looking good as always.

I'm wondering about that area at the bottom of the building on the very last in game picture you posted. Those windows in the base area, are they all modeled out completely? Are the windows there actually reflecting something?

It almost looks like there isn't a glass pane in each of those windows.

But I'm glad to see an ingame shot now. It's looking more than nice.

And don't worry about BATing the whole complex or rest of the building. My BAT for NYBT a while back, Home Insurance Plaza, was connected to a few other buildings, but I only made the tower.

  Edited July 22, 2012 by Sgt Pepper  

[Ion_Cannon 677]

It looks a bit underscaled to me, it should be a tad taller than the cadillac tower w/o spire, granted I cannot see the entire cadillac tower in those pictures, but from what I can it looks smaller. The glass does need some work, though I couldn't say how exactly, I'll let one of the glass maestros do that. Otherwise, great work

[darn42 1,268]

Thanks for more feedback. Each of the windows has glass in it except the one on the left... which shouldn't be there... Hmm. Oh well, I'll fix it later. The ground plane I'm using might not be so great for the glass at the bottom. I might model just some sort of base plane and put a sidewalk texture on it or something so the bottom glass isn't reflecting map.

In other news, I modeled for quite a while today and finished the first gargoyle

Here it is closeup,

And here it is in the context of the building. I also found this thing in zbrush called decimation master that basically gets rid of almost all of the polys in your mesh without harming it at all The owl was 1 million and now it's 30k. Similar stories with the rest. Now I can have them modeled instead of textured realistically.

Anyways, I'm proud of that gargoyle