Reddonquixote's Q1 Project

[muxcomee 35]

wowwee

 

this could be the next great sc4 BAT

[jdenm8 362]

I love that diffused glass, it's not something you see too often in SC4.

[Cheddar 119]

The glass looks amazing! The base overall looks fantastic.

[Darknono35 3,137]

With your talent to re-create the base and the plaza, this BAT will be one of famous building never done for SC4 , it's gorgeous !!!

Have you foreseen the plaza as props, or you will assemble the tower to the base and export them in one piece ?
 

Keep it up buddy

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

OMG!!!! :O

 

The base is huge, adn wonderful work as always. 

[__A 792]

Dayum, that base is very much like the actual one! Looking forward to improve my GC recreation I did a while back with this beauty.

[T Wrecks 10,209]

@ jdenm8: Thank you for the input! Good comment.

 

 If someone could remind me what LOD stands for (I know what it's referring to via deduction of your posts). I'm not sure I could simply go ahead and start batting stuff after having read this topic, but it at least explains how the RTMT queries work and why some building always get in the way when I'm trying to bulldoze stuff (the always annoying cursor slip that destroys the whole block instead of just the one building).

Here you can read a brief, but good explanation. You are absolutely right; the problem you face when bulldozing something is due to the LOD of another building getting in the way - the transparent part of the LOD, that is.

 

Imagine Eiffel Tower: If it was built with a box LOD, then the LOD would have to be pretty wide to accommodate for the wide base. However, at the tip of the tower, it would be almost empty. This would result in the kind of problem you experienced.

 

Btw, i's good to see that this entire thread is actually helpful.

[Reddonquixote 4,338]

I agree.. it generating some good discussion

 

Re LODs, if this helps to demonstrate - refer the two images below, these are LODs for the Spire BAT... the top one is an auto-generated LOD out of 3DS Max, and the bottom one is the custom LOD I made (for this very reason).

 

 

 

Have you foreseen the plaza as props, or you will assemble the tower to the base and export them in one piece ?

Not sure yet. I'm worried about the shadows, not sure what will yield the best results, but I think I want to try what Twrecks said about exporting the props into a DAT file, I hadn't thought of that, very sensible way to keep the plug ins folder tidy. I think I'll have a bit of a play see what works best

 

Thanks all for continued nice comments

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Well, in this case the tower's podium will occupy most of the lot anyway. I don't see any real gain by keeping the ancillary stuff separate. The only exception may be that one corner of the lot where the other building would be IRL. All the other stuff is very specific to this particular building and 'communicates' with the tower.

 

Rendering ancillary objects as props IMO makes most sense when these objects are rather isolated from the building. Let's say you have one of those International Style box towers, surrounded by a generic, flat plaza, and then a modern sculpture and some planters with trees some distance away. In such a case you may want to render the sculpture and the planters as separate objects, use simple LE textures to make the plaza, and assemble all individually rendered elements (tower [building] + sculpture [prop] + planters [props]) in the LE.

 

 

As for shading problems, there are two things you can do:

1. AFAIR, if the LOD of the prop is flat enough, it will receive shade automatically (Jason knows more about this, he did it for at least one of his BATs)
2. It is absolutely possible to make a placeholder of the actual BAT, but in a simple shape (without all the details). This placeholder can be set such that it is not rendered with the prop, but its shadow will be cast on the prop as if the building was there. (Of course, this means that the prop will only look perfect in that context because it has the shadow "baked into it")
   This is also a useful technique if you make a complex building, but your PC can't handle the render. For example, Plan9 has made his Aalesund Hospital using this technique. It's an L-shaped building whose wings have been exported separately. In order to make certain that the shadow of one wing will be cast onto the other, he made a simple box dummy of the respective missing wing and set it to invisible for the render. The result was an exported model with the correct shadows already on it.

[Reddonquixote 4,338]

Glass Canopy

 

Sorry its taken a while to get to this update... busy week! Lets get straight into it.

 

The whole building, as we know, is on an awkward angle. To make it easier to work with, we need to straighten it up.

 

Start by making a clone of the building's footprint object (The one right in the middle).

 

We select all the rings and only one of the footprint objects. Group them, and rotate 67 degrees so its upright. If yours isn't 67 degrees, take note of whatever rotation you use, because we need to move it back into its correct orientation later. The cloned footprint, in its original orientation and position will help us get it back where we need it to be

 

We already made the circular rings when we traced the aerial photograph. Before locking them in permanently, we just need to spend a bit of time smoothing out the beziers so they have a crisper finish. We do this in the top view, and toggle with Orthographic view to see how its looking. Basically, we don't want any obvious dints or kinks in our rings.

 

 

Once we're happy we have smoothed the rings out nicely, we need to make the ends pointy. We start by converting the splines to Editable Polys, and selecting the top two vertices at each end of the ring. In the top view, extend it out in the most linear way you can.

 

We build radial spokes by creating a single spline line set to radial, with one end in the central point, and the other end outside the widest circle's radius. Move the pivot so its at the central point as well.

 

 

We then use the array tool to make a radial pattern. We don't need to make this perfect, we just need a reasonable number of spokes we can use to work from. I've made 25.

 

 

We now need to make these the right lengths. Start by selecting all the spokes (probably group to make it easier), clone them, and freeze the clone - Rightclick>Freeze Selection

 

 

We then select the outer vertices on each of our spokes and move them inwards until they touch the inside of the nearest circular ring. Do this in the top view, and use the frozen objects as a guide to maintain their correct angles and spacing. Once we have completed this, we can unfreeze the cloned spokes and delete them.

 

The blue lines are our shortened spokes, the white lines are our frozen guides:

 

It should look something like this:

 

 

For the glass canopy, we make a cylinder that fits over the top of the circular structure. I'm going for effect here rather than precision. I want something that resembles the real thing, but isn't 100% precise. You can see from this how I made what I made, so if you want to put more effort into counting the right number of individual glass panels, go for it

 

I've made a rather large cylinder, and it is divided into 90 cap segments and 90 sides (and 1 height segment). The centre of the cylinder should be at the centre of where the spokes converge. We only want the top of the cylinder, so convert to an editable poly and delete the bottom row of vertices so we have a nice, many-segmented, disc.

 

Using the scale tool, we need to squeeze the disc so the circles that make up the cylinder mostly conform to the shape of our rings. I didn't get this perfect, but if you can, even better!

 

What we don't want is the circular lines cutting right across our rings at perpendicular angles. (Like in the prototype.. yuk!)

 

 

We make this a little more manageable by deleting the really obvious polygons we don't want. But: Don't delete any polygons that straddle our rings, even a tiny little bit, only the ones that sit wholly ouside the rings.

 

 

Two steps here:

1) We need to align our spokes with the radials on our disc so they all line up nicely. For the front and side of the building, I have aligned a spoke with each second radial on the disc. (At the rear, its every third radial).

Simply select the end vertex of the nearest spoke and position it so it lines up with the nearest radial. Probably about every third or fourth radial, we will need to add a new spoke.  Simply clone the nearest spoke, and position its end where we need it, and keep going with the next spoke.

 

2) Now we get more serious about deleting unwanted polygons. Use the references to work out the closest match to the thing we've built. Roughly speaking, the first two spokes between the first and second ring have no glass, the next spoke and a half between second and third ring also no glass. The next two spokes between the third and fourth ring are glassed, and the outer ring has no glass at all. When we get to the opposite corner of the building the glass disappears altogether, and at the front of the building there is a decorative stepped shape to the glass. You're going to have to use your judgement to produce the best result.

 

I strongly advise.. save... save... and save again. I guarantee, unless you're a miracle worker, you won't get this right on the first go, and you don't want to be doing it all again from the start! Save at key intervals so you have something to go back to when/if you need to. (Alternatively, and if you can be bothered, you could go to the trouble of drawing it all out and pasting it into the backround... but I think that's more effort than I think we need)

 

 

Now we still have these straggley, jaggeddy bits straddling our rings, we need to tidy those up. In the top view, select the overhanging vertices and move them so they are tucked inside the ring they currently straddle. It is important to keep the integrity of the radials in tact - don't move the vertices so the radials go off in odd directions, we need to keep them pointing in one direction. If need be, use Connect to split the polygons into two. You can delete one half of the poly and the other half will tuck away more easily.

 

 

It should look something like this:

 

 

One more step and its pretty much complete. I got this idea from Darn-the-genius.. if he hadn't told us about the Lattice Modifier I dread to think what we would have done here.

 

We basically need to create a framework for the glass panels, and to do this we use the Lattice Modifier . Start by making a clone of the glass canopy, and apply a Lattice Modifier to it. Set to Struts only from Edges and a really small radius, whatever you think suits your model. Whatever you decide, I recommend doing a test render to make sure it isn't so small that it disappears. As long as we don't collapse the object, we can always change it later if we need to.

 

 

Here's the result... its a little bit dissatisfying at the moment though...

 

 

Before we do anything else, lets not forget to reorientate the canopy back to its proper position. We use the cloned footprint in the top view if it doesn't go back the way we want it, and delete the clone afterwards.

 

Lets save it, and add a temporary glass material to it

 

Materials comes later... so without going into too much detail, open the material editor and make an Arch & Design frosted glass template. Make a nice bluish-greenish colour of your choosing and apply it to the canopy.

 

Next step, very important, enjoy your test render

 

[dubaidude303 1,119]

Looking amazing! Can't wait for it to be completed!!!

[Ace3 1,209]

Very insightful. I learned how to use the Lattice Modifier and Freezing. Thanks again for another great tutorial reddonquixote!

[Cheddar 119]

Very nice, this thread is turning out nicely. 

[darn42 1,268]

Great job, I really admire how well you are doing this reddon.

 

I do believe I know a way to make the canopy much more accurately in an efficient way, I'd be more than happy to make a post tutorial of the process if you'll let me.

[dubaidude303 1,119]

Q1 Tower looks just like the D1 tower in Dubai, very closely resembles each other lol I think D1 is a little shorter though. I like them both very much!

[Reddonquixote 4,338]

Hey Darn I just logged in with my phone so I'll keep this really brief, but yes please! That's what this thread is about after all. I would love to see another (better!) way to do this. Thanks

[__A 792]

Q1 Tower looks just like the D1 tower in Dubai, very closely resembles each other lol I think D1 is a little shorter though. I like them both very much!

[image]

D1 is based off Q1 from what I remember reading

[muxcomee 35]

Yep, D1 is based of Q1. They are 'sister' buildings. D1 is has a taller roof height, but is structurally shorter. And the glass facades are quite different as well. Other than that, Red, you're amazing. 

[dubaidude303 1,119]

 

Q1 Tower looks just like the D1 tower in Dubai, very closely resembles each other lol I think D1 is a little shorter though. I like them both very much!

[image]

D1 is based off Q1 from what I remember reading

 

 

Hahaha yeah, like their names don't give it away 

[urielgarcia 344]

Wonderful progress -   and a great answer to Darn's comment  !

 

Hey Darn I just logged in with my phone so I'll keep this really brief, but yes please! That's what this thread is about after all. I would love to see another (better!) way to do this. Thanks

[T Wrecks 10,209]

*continued drumroll until darn pops in and shows his method*

*audience waiting in silent awe and expectation*

*soft ripples in the curtain, but nothing revealed yet*

*anticipation mounts*

*nervous coughs*

.

.

.

.

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

Wonderful work!!!

[Darknono35 3,137]

Amazing BAT     , you're a chief

[darn42 1,268]

Ok, sorry for the wait, time is short and it turned out I didn't have my method concreted yet. There were some wrinkles I had to rollout to make it work right and I had to compromise on the canopy leading into the building itself, it ended up not working like I hoped the first time and looked pretty bad. But I got it worked out and though the last part isn't 100% true to the building. In the end this is a less efficient way but probably a much more accurate one.

 

without further ado....

 

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

 

 

I'm pulling a few references that reddon dug up earlier. This picture, and the aerial bing picture he grabbed.

 

First I put the outline of the building just because it would be there in the real thing.

 

 

Next I switch out my background picture for the aerial bing that will show me where to put my splines for the wings or whatever you'd call them. And I draw the widest one. Drawing the innermost one first might be the smarter thing to do but that's not what I did. If you do decide that, just do this process in reverse.

 

 

Now, using the outline function, located right above the boolean section, outline a new spline to fit the next curve.

 

 

Delete the end pieces, and using the create line tool, finish off that wing. Weld the open vertices and add clean beziers to them.

 

 

Rinse and repeat until everything is nice and good. I added an extra spline as you can see representing the portion of canopy with no wing next to it.

 

 

using the create line function again, draw lines along the window mullions from each far vertice. These will end up dictating how the windows look.

 

 

Move all other vertices to be along these lines, but remain on their curve.

 

 

Create a small, straight spline and loft everything along that. You will need to detach each individual spline within our big object to do that.

 

 

Open path parameters and deformations. Turn off adaptive path steps; this will add more segments in places we use deformations, screwing everything up. In deformations, open the twist box. This will give us the curve editor. It's very similar to a spline. You can add points along the curve with the red line with a yellow star, you can move them with the move tool, and you can right click and make the beziers. You might need to figure out which end goes where, but on opposite ends click on the point, and give it a value of either -x or +x. In my case I chose 7.5 = x. This will give us the banking we want for the wings.

 

 

On each additional curve, the dotted lines going up and down will represent vertices in the middle of the spline. These will correspond with the endpoints of the previous loft. If you are increasing the values at a non-constant rate (e.g. 7.5 -> 10 -> 15) make sure that you add a point on the dotted lines and give it the correct value for the previous line. The twist should match up between wings.

 

 

Keep on doing the same thing.

 

 

Until you are done.

 

 

Now select all of these and make a clone-a normal clone- just in case you make a mistake.

 

 

Create a new layer, the highlighted +, and that will automatically put the lofts you have selected in that layer. Hide the layer (it will be hidden when a blue lightbulb is in the hide slot for that layer, and check the checkbox for the default layer. The check means objects will be created in that layer.

 

 

Now go into side view and select all of the edges.

 

 

Connect them. This will dictate the angle of our windows. They slope toward the middle in steps but it's not that steep of an angle.

 

 

Now before we do any more editing, add first a shell modifier then an edit poly modifier on top of the stack. This will allow us to remove any mistakes we made, or in the case, any purposeful edits.

 

 

Now, the easiest way to select the middle section--since they aren't all one element-- is to click the box with a dotted rectangle around it. It is highlighted blue next to the transformation tools. This means that only polygons and edges you select entirely in a marquee will be selected. Select all the middle polygons.

 

 

Delete them, then select two of the end pieces from the shell. We want to make sure any loop selections we make will be entirely just one side. These caps will let the loop selection continue onto the other side. Using the select similar function in the graphite modeling toolset. In any version of max before 2014 it will look different, but it is still a tool in the same toolset. The select similar should be set to topology, face area, and edge count. Delete all of the caps that you just selected.

 

 

Now we have to flip the normals on the top element. This is because of how the bridge tool works. It cannot bridge edges from one facing normal to another without doing some funky stuff in between. This way we can do it no hassle.

 

 

Now, it helps to go into ghost mode (I forget the real name for it). Hit alt+x on the keyboard and it will make your selection translucent. Really useful here. Look closely at what I have selected. On the outside wing, it's the inside portion of the top half. On the next one in, it's the outside portion of the bottom half. Select one of the edges from those loops, and then alt+L will loop the selection all the way around. Deselect (alt+click) any of the edges on the inner wing that do not line up with the edges on the outer. We want this to be a 1:1 bridge. That's why we made the splines like we did.

 

 

Now hit bridge. You may notice that there aren't actually windows where this bridge is, but it will give us the directional edges we need for other parts of the canopy.

Also notice, how clean the topology looks. It's 1:1, and everything is facing inwards. That's why we were so careful when we made the splines with all of the guides and such.

 

 

Do that for everything. Rinse and repeat. Do not do the inner loop to the building. After you do that, detach all of the window parts, just what we bridged, and click the white lightbulb on the edit poly.

 

 

Now let's make those strut things. I just selected an edge on all of my windows down, then do a step ring selection. It is the darkened button in the graphite modeling tools box that is dropped down.

 

 

Now we hit the create shape button, and make it linear.

 

 

Select the newly created splines from the create shape and make them renderable; adjust their size and shape.

 

 

There they are. Ignore the gross inner section. I tried doing the same method but on the building shape and it didn't work out. If any of the struts are crooked, just adjust them in vertex spline mode.

 

 

Now let's do the middle section. I kinda skipped a step here cause I was figuring stuff out. Anyways. The step I skipped was I added an edit poly on the lofts (before the shell) and welded/connected the extra part I made and the inner ring. I deleted all the other rings but those.

Then I did the same process as I did before to delete the middle.

 

 

Now select the bottom half using element selection.

 

 

And scale it down to fit inside the footprint of the building. This is the shortcut cheating thing I did that isn't accurate but I couldn't think of anything else that would have the right flow.

 

 

Do the same process of bridging.

 

 

Detach the windows from that and attach them to the other window object.

 

 

Add some rings.

 

 

Using the step ring selection, add these i-beams to the bottom. --Step ring select, create shape, sweep, choose the I shape, and adjust parameters.

 

 

Here's what we have so far. But there's one problem. There is like a stepped part where there isn't a wing.

 

 

Let's fix that. Add a bunch of loops to the rings closest to the edge, and select edges where it starts, where the other wing loses contact with this one.

 

What we are going to do here is what is called a step selection. There are two ways to do this. With stepmode active beforehand, you can select one polygon, then ctrl+click another and it will select everything between them. Or you can have two polygons selected beforehand and steploop select and it will select everythign between them.

 

 

like that.

 

 

Delete those, then select the next section down, make it look stepped and keep deleting.

 

 

Now loop select all those extra loops we made to facilitate the steps. We have to deselect all of the edges that are on the border of the object, but that's it. Alt+ click them to deselect.

 

 

Make a clone of the window object and add a lattice.

 

 

That's it.

 

I hope it was worth the wait.

 

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

 

Something I forgot to add. To make the triangles at the end of the wings. Select the bottom vertice, then with the edge constraint on (it will only move along edges) just move it down. It will follow the curve.

[Reddonquixote 4,338]

Thanks Darn, some really great techniques and tips there, well worth it

 

Here's the next update, but its not really an update as such, I just finished off the modelling for the complex, or the part of the complex that I'm making at least. (Except for the foliage of course). I still have that whole corner section to fill in and I'm not really sure what to with it. Good news though, I've managed to shrink it down to 6x12 at least, still pretty big though.

 

 

 

 

[muxcomee 35]

its perfect.

but have you decided what you are going to put in the corner?

[Ace3 1,209]

This is looking great so far reddonquixote! Keep up the great work

I'm not sure about that corner area either. You've already got two pools, so a fountain or another pool may be a bit excessive. Maybe a parking, a plaza with a few planters and palm trees, or a tennis court? I wouldn't advise you to put the building that exists there in real life since that would narrow the city styles that this will fit into in SC4. 

[Reddonquixote 4,338]

Tennis courts! Exactly what I was thinking

[Bipin 3,402]

Needless to say, but your progress is legendary!

[Huston 5,798]

Wow, that's looking amazing! No doubt it look even better textured