dline's bating progress

[dline 20]

Hi guys and girls im new to bating so be kind ill see were it takes me.

 

I stated in a post i made on the modding thread that i plan on making this

It will be a bit off a challenge but i do enjoy doing this kind of stuff.

Here ^ is a bit that i have started. still a long way to go yet lol. the columns are 3m spaced. the real building does narrow in the middle but im trying to keep it simple at the moment. im allready choosing to run before i can walk. i dont want to destroy my brain lol.

[libellibicus 396]

That's a good start. 

[dline 20]

well here is my day's work and already i have problems grrr
 
this is what ive made in gmax

but this is how it exports

dont mention the textures (i know ther crap at the moment). as you can see the exported preview does not show the roof supports. i do plan on a complet overhaul of the roof.

[dline 20]

After spending some time looking at other baters work in forum's and there brilliant btw. i think it would be best if i went back to walking. therefore i have decided to halt the progress of the bus station and concentrate on smaller things.im not even close to good enough to attemp that lvl of detail. ill work on getting the ingame scale, texutes, and eyecandy right. a nice simple box house is a good start i think. 1 game tile square.

 

I would idealy like to be using 3ds max but i'm not a student and i dont have the money it would cost to buy.

[darn42 1,268]

You can always attempt to get it without being a student, no harm trying. I know that some people have gotten it with just a hotmail account and no student email.

[libellibicus 396]

I got it without being a student.  Just fill in the form stating you are being educated at home.  Simples!

[Toothless Stitch 2,901]

well here is my day's work and already i have problems grrr

 

this is what ive made in gmax

but this is how it exports

dont mention the textures (i know ther crap at the moment). as you can see the exported preview does not show the roof supports. i do plan on a complet overhaul of the roof.

 

I wonder what you consider as a problem. I would say, gmax does exactly what it is supposed to do. The preview you get is exactly what it would look like if it was seen from the perspective. 

[dline 20]

Well here is a shed (literaly) that i made today and put ingame. the scale is a bit low, and the colour is to light.plus there is a dirty black line on the bottem of the front face of the building which i dont know how it got there. must be from the lot editor.unless i need to raise the building in gmax a little. im learning a little more each hour for instance i i previewed it in gmax then realised i forgot to apply a mesh to windowframes. you live and learn

im going to continue tweeking it but i would like to hear you thoughts and suggestions.

ps it wont be available for download who would want it anyway lol

skyscraper241 i understand that but my aim was to be able to see roof supports. i believe the scale would have to be taller.

libellibicus i will be looking it to it at some point thx

[dline 20]

now i have a shed v1.5. i think the brick work is a bit to dark now and the skylight is a bit to thick. but im enjoying the tweeking.

[libellibicus 396]

The skylight frame on Shed V1.5 is a bit thick, but overall it's not too bad.  A good start overall.  Don't worry too much about the Textures at the moment, just concentrate on the modelling, and get all that correct and in order first.  Well done.

[Jasoncw 11,839]

Eventually for texturing you're going to need to get either photoshop or gimp (gimp is a free image editor), so you might as well get one of those now if you haven't already.  And then once you have it, go take screenshots from the game at zoom 5, of mainly Maxis buildings.  Then you can simply copy and paste your preview renders into the screenshots and you get to see what your building would look like in the game without exporting it. 

[dline 20]

Jasoncw thank you mate. thats a good idea and i have already  dl'ed gimp and used that it.   libellibicus i have a pic of the improved skylight

[libellibicus 396]

The skylight looks far better now. You are progressing well, and are obviously a fast learner. Textures are what will make or break a BAT. There are plenty of tutorials available, and there is a vast wealth of knowledge in this forum. Take your time and have a play about with the textures. Also, don't be afraid to ask anybody about any probs/ideas etc. Keep up the good work.

[jason leo 485]

Nice job, it has a good model and good texture, and it looks cute. What about the nightlights?

[dline 20]

The lights are on and someone is in.

It took me a little bit of time to figger out how to do basic night lights.Here is the result.

However the lights are still showing in the day.Its probably somthing silly im doing wrong any suggestions ?

[jason leo 485]

Are you sure that you have do it right? Make sure that the letter "n" in the word "nitelite" is not capitalized.

[dline 20]

Are you sure that you have do it right? Make sure that the letter "n" in the word "nitelite" is not capitalized.

well it wasent caped but i had labed it nitelight1 instead of nitelite1. big thx mate that solved the problem

[dline 20]

Here is an art deco style idea ive have rolling round my head all day so i spent an hour making it to see what it would look like and i think it could look good. There will be 3m pillers below it for the bottom. ill do a progress update later tomorrow.

[dline 20]

Hi for the those that have a small intrest in my progress. I did say i was going to post yesterday but i was busy looking at other baters work to get a feel of what is considered good quality and i must say the bar is set very high. However i do plan to rise to the challenge. I have noted that experienced baters will take a long time to make sure every detail is right and having got to know how much work can be involved i can understand why. I now have an a4 grided pad which can be a great help.

 

I have decided that my first project to complet will be The Schermerhorn Building in newyork. A similer version has already been made for sc4 but i cant find it now.

 

Anyway here is what ive spend a few hours on tonight.It is only 1 of the pillers at the bottom. The 3rd from the left in the photo. I may be going in to a little to much detail but i do think the end result still shows well when rendered.The rendered image is as it would be if you were in max zoom in sc4. So i think the scale is perfect. please exuse the colour. Textures are not even remotely on my mind yet .

Sooooooo please give me your feedback.

 

ps i will hopefully be getting 3ds max soon (fingers x'd)

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Ah, yes. It is called the "Audubon Building" and was an effort started by donmiguel and finished by Jasoncw, IIRC.

[Jasoncw 11,839]

It is similar but not the same building as the Audubon Building.  Coincidentally though, this was the building that the Audubon Society studied for some kind of green building initiative.

 

There is a learning curve to this but you're getting the hang of things. 

[Reddonquixote 4,338]

Hi dline, I think thats a very good start. Not sure how accurate you want to be, and for something this size it may not be necessary, but if you want to make accurate models you will need to train your eyes to really spot the details. I find its good for practice, even if the end model doesn't show the detail.

 

So, to that end, here's some initial observations for you. Please feel free to disregard, what you have made is great. Please accept these as developing eyes for detail, but in no way criticism of your model

 

1) I can't identify where on the photo you are seeing the deep indent you have modeled on the yellow section of the base - is it at the bottom of the pillar base, or at the top? Either way, there are no grooves that deep on the pillar, it should be much shallower (if you need to model this at all.. something this small should probably be textured).

2) My guess is you intended the deep groove to be where the pillar base starts to taper inwards just below those triangle shapes? If thats the case, you should check the distance from the ground to the groove, then the groove to the triangles. The groove is much higher off the ground and much closer to the triangles. If you intended the groove to be the one thats right at the base, its too far from the ground, it should be almost, if not completely, at ground level.

3) The part of groove where it goes inwards should actually taper upwards more, rather than plane away flat.

4) The tops of the trianges don't go all the way to the top of the where the circular torus shape starts. They stop just below the rim.

5) The circular torus shape is slightly too thick. Its only a fraction of the height of the triangles, yours is nearly half.

6) The rounded section of the pillar appears too short, but that may just be the viewing angle. Suggest check its proportions against the rest of the model and make sure the distances are right.

7) Great job making that scalloped shape at the top, but for accuracy, your scallop is inverted to the scallop in the photo. Yours start low at the corners and dip in the middle, whereas on the photo, they are raised at the corners with two dips. Also, the scallop goes all the way around, yours is only modeled on the front.

 

Oh, one last thing, you said this is third pillar from the left? Wondering why you picked out that one specifically, aren't there four that are identical to eachother? I only ask because I wanted to check you know about cloning objects? If you make one pillar, you can clone it as many times as you need to, you don't need to make each one from scratch.. assume you do know this but just in case!

 

Again, this is all provided in the spirit of practicing details, none of these are needed for you to make your BAT model

[mntoes 270]

^^Quote 7) Great job making that scalloped shape at the top, but for accuracy, your scallop is inverted to the scallop in the photo.

 

 Ah, I must be thick, that is why I couldn't see this column on the real building. Doh... 

 

That said some very good advice given above. I spend ages looking at the detail on some buildings.  It's all part of the fun in batting and in many respects improves the enjoyment when it can get a bit boring on the odd occasion.  Overall very good progress in your work.

 

Geez, I sound like a teacher...

 

Just a note on the "cloning" be sure you now the difference between "copy" or "instance".

 

Copy - exactly that, an exact copy of the first object but you can change the first object later and the second object is un-affected.

 

Instance - a clone of the first object. however any changes you make to the first object will be duplicated on all other objects made via an "Instance" clone.

[dline 20]

hi guys. let me start by saying thank you for your input.

 

i will do my best to answer your points reddonquixote

 

first ill show you a picture of what i'm looking at. ive accualy started on the right face of the photo i showed earlyer but becouse you cant see it  i said it was the 3rd piller from the left becouse you can see that 1

 

1) I can't identify where on the photo you are seeing the deep indent you have modeled on the yellow section of the base - is it at the bottom of the pillar base, or at the top? Either way, there are no grooves that deep on the pillar, it should be much shallower (if you need to model this at all.. something this small should probably be textured).

A) i have put that there becouse on arrow 3 it does look like it dips in a little. however becouse you would never see something that small ingame i made it larger. i however like the texture idea.

 

2) My guess is you intended the deep groove to be where the pillar base starts to taper inwards just below those triangle shapes? If thats the case, you should check the distance from the ground to the groove, then the groove to the triangles. The groove is much higher off the ground and much closer to the triangles. If you intended the groove to be the one thats right at the base, its too far from the ground, it should be almost, if not completely, at ground level.

A) i believe my answer to to your first point covers this athough becouse the pillers on the left side of the photo i show earlyer do have an higher gray base. i will be taking that in to account when i make them.

 

3) The part of groove where it goes inwards should actually taper upwards more, rather than plane away flat.

A) i like that idea and will use it. but im not sure it will be seen when ingame.

 

4) The tops of the trianges don't go all the way to the top of the where the circular torus shape starts. They stop just below the rim.

5) The circular torus shape is slightly too thick. Its only a fraction of the height of the triangles, yours is nearly half.

6) The rounded section of the pillar appears too short, but that may just be the viewing angle. Suggest check its proportions against the rest of the model and make sure the distances are right.

A) as you can see on arrow 2 my idea was to get the effect as close as i could with the circular torus. the round section of the piller is to the right scale for the rest of the area.

 

7) Great job making that scalloped shape at the top, but for accuracy, your scallop is inverted to the scallop in the photo. Yours start low at the corners and dip in the middle, whereas on the photo, they are raised at the corners with two dips. Also, the scallop goes all the way around, yours is only modeled on the front.

A) as you can see with arrow 1 my plan is only to get a general effect becouse again it is hard to se ingame. as for it going all the way around the wall will cover most of that.

 

Oh, one last thing, you said this is third pillar from the left? Wondering why you picked out that one specifically, aren't there four that are identical to eachother? I only ask because I wanted to check you know about cloning objects? If you make one pillar, you can clone it as many times as you need to, you don't need to make each one from scratch.. assume you do know this but just in case!

i will admit i do work in a wierd way. yes when i get to the larger gray pillers i will be cloning them exept for the 1 that sits on the corner of the building becouse it is bigger.

 

i do hope i have given you guys a better understanding of why ive done it this way and now i will spend the weekend working on more. ill be sure to upload a pic for ppl to look over. sunday at the latest.

 

 

[Reddonquixote 4,338]

Maybe just ignore my comments, the picture you posted and the model you created weren't really showing the same thing. I thought you were making the grey pillars because thats what was in the photo

[dline 20]

np mate i do value expert advice. i have the 4 pillers in the new pic completed now and some of the wall above the right 3 pillers inc the doorways. im leaving the doors and window untill ive got the 2 main walls complet so there are just holes at the mo.

[dline 20]

here is a progress update.

ill be adding the windows later.

 

and here is a pic of the area on the real building.

 

[T Wrecks 10,209]

That's looking good so far, but also somewhat stumpy. I suppose the screenshot of your progress shows the height scaled at 100%, right?

[Gn_leugim 853]

your modelling skills are improving good. As I am not familiar with such styles can't much but once you get into textures, I may help out

[dline 20]

T Wrecks

yes its 100% scale

 

Gn_leugim

thank you

 

on a new note i have 3ds max now but i'm not sure i have it set up right.!!! ive got bat4max installed but every time i do a preview render it takes ages or freezes

then this took about 2 mins to preview then i could not use 3ds max for a few mins after it rendered

ups sorry its 2012 version