The Portland & Oregon BAT Team, Chapter 1

[Sim shady 12]

i am impressed with how this is turning out curious as to how big it is in relation to other sc4 buildings. I remember when jasoncw was making that vinton buiding, a favorite of mine, i thought it was gonna be some pretty big high rise. it shocked me when i found out how small it was lol.

[josefmayor 8]

Beautiful man I love the balcany its gorgeous~

[Jasoncw 11,949]

lol!  yeah, a lot of people think my BATs are really big and then they find out they're not!   You can tell how big a building is by the size of its windows, if it's modeled properly (which this one definitely is).  Most of what you've been seeing here have been zoom 4 views, if that helps you get a sense of scale.

[Sim shady 12]

i am actually glad your bats are generally smaller. i mean they are really good. really really good. The smaller buildings fit much better/ realistically into a city than a towering skyscraper.

[sparkythepenguin 90]

@Jason: Wait no more, you're going to see this get all textured up in the next week or so.

@Krio: I like to think they hid the HVAC because of our infamous rain, but its all open-aired so I think its all just for looks.

@SimShady: This will be a 4x4 lot. I haven't really finalized the scale. To give you some idea of how big it will be, check out the ODS Tower model I made. BofA Center is shorter than ODS and sits right next to it in real life.

Portland is like the king of mid-rise buildings. Only here, we consider them high-rises thanks to the crappy height limits in place.

@Josefmayor: The balcony IS amazing in real life. I was amazed at how wonderfully landscaped it is when I went up to scope it out. It's like being in somebody's backyard!

The texturing process has begun!

Closer-in:

Yeah I know, the red roof still needs texturing.... I found a perfect texture for it on Turbosquid, but for some reason I always forget my password, so I have to wait until they email it to me again.

I'm hoping to just kick some butt this week on BofA because I return to college next Monday and who knows how much time I'll have.

[Sim shady 12]

Here's a metal boot. It should help you kick butt for the next week.

[sparkythepenguin 90]

Jason, I see that you're on here as I write this, I hope that you may be able to help with this!

Anyway, I've been messing around with the roof texture. A weird thing is going on that just doesn't make any sense. Here's an image because it's probably easier to show this than describe it:

As you can see, from the side angles, the texture tiles out fine. But from front angles, the slope facing away gets all distorted. No matter what I have done to UVW maps, the texture, or texture properties, this keeps going on. Even when I render out a high-quality model.

Any help on this would e appreciated!

[Glenni 1,447]

Weeeeird, sorry sparky, i don't much on this one maybe it's a bug with the model itself?

[Jasoncw 11,949]

I was on, but I missed it!

The German problem is from how the .FSH files are being mapped onto the .S3D files (the LODs).  Make new and slightly different LODs until the problem goes away.

I think the French problem is a Moiré pattern.  Remember that computer screens are pixelated grids, and between that and that certain angle of the roof (and thus the angle of your roof lines) this effect is created.  It's only on that one area because the angle viewed from the camera is the particular angle that creates that effect.  I think the easiest way to fix it is just to make the pattern bigger, so that the rendering resolution is no longer significant to that pattern.

btw, why are you rendering the roof?

[sparkythepenguin 90]

Jason: Just rendered it to see if the problem turned up in a full render. Thanks for the info! Looks like I'll be cranking out the custom LODs sooner than I thought...

[sparkythepenguin 90]

Sorry to bump, but I have a suprise for everyone....

The first-ever in-game look at the full Bank of America Center BAT!

I may bump the scale up a little on the z axis. It looks a tad bit short...

Also, I have been running tests on the roof parts, and have had some sucess limiting the moire effect. Thanks Jason!!!!!!!!!!!

[mightygoose 92]

geat work sparky and jason i think the problem was not so much french as Lot Editor lol

[Sim shady 12]

something seems a little off about the roof texture...cant put a finger on it...:/ oh well looks spectacular besides that, especially the garden!

[jacqulina 162]

wow thats awesome work guys the detail is excellent

[sparkythepenguin 90]

Don't worry about the roof, a solution for that has sorta been found, its just that I haven't gotten around to making the full custom LODs for the entire building yet. Tests using just the roof portion have shown some promise to at least minimize that "je ne sais quai" look that the roof has. The in-game shots were of a model exported on low settings, and I have found that effect lessens the higher the quality of rendering settings.

Today I was pretty busy, but had a bunch of stuff to keep me occupied while my PC cranked out full export after full export so I can scakle this thing. I think I have the scale fixed, but that means that my previous ODS Tower BAT is a bit taller than it ought to be. Perhaps a reworking of ODS Tower is in order?

[Jasoncw 11,949]

Your building should have custom LODs anyway, but for the roof pattern problem, you don't need full custom LODs, just something slightly different than the ones you exported with before.  If you do the exact same thing as before you're just recreating the problem, so you need to make it slightly different (that could just be adding .1 meters to each side of the LOD or something).

For the scale problems, just use something consistent when making them.  For example, if the building is 80 meters tall in real life, multiplied by 1.3 (or whatever number you used), then you do another building, do that one by around 1.3 (or whatever) too.  I think right now the one building is too short and the other is too tall.

[Krio 626]

Very SC2K looking!

[Gecko_2006 1]

Hmmm... maybe grey out the roof and neon border just a little. The building actually looks lovely as is- it would just make it more of a compliment to the surrounding buildings.

[sparkythepenguin 90]

Here's the latest scaling, compared with some Maxis LM's and some other Portland buildings that I have fretted about BofA being out of scale comparatively. Heck, it's shorter than 1000 Broadway in this shot, as it is in real life!

Jason, Thanks for the magic 1.3 multiplier! That helped out here a bit. I still haven't done the final LODs yet.

Krio, do you mean your last comment as a compliment of a criticism? No prob here either way. Just would like a little clarification so I can make this thing the best way possible.

Gecko, you've read my mind! I was thinking I still need to tweak that particular texture. From aerials, it is a sort of darkish-red. I just wanted to get the pattern right, which was mostly accomplished save the moire effect. Perhaps I ought to fix this problem by modeling out a tiled roof? Dunno yet...

Other than all that other stuff, how are the textures looking? There's a little mess with GMax "forgetting" all my applied textures in my newly scaled file, but everything texture-wise showed up correctly on the first in-game version. I really want texturing done within the next couple of days, but if it isn't that's OK.

[josefmayor 8]

Fantastic work!

[LivingInThePast 364]

@sparkythepenguin:

Although it's on another side of Portland, I would like the aforementioned Mall 205 to be added to the requests list. Renovated or 80s version, take your pick.

[Jasoncw 11,949]

Keep in mind that some (all?) of the landmarks are underscaled as well.  People from Seattle have been upset because both of their buildings (which are actually tall in real life) were made to be way to short.

I don't know the building from real life like you do, so you're the best judge.  Does it fit your mental perception of its height?  And of course it also needs to be in line with your other buildings.  To me it looks fine, but I don't know the building.

The building still looks like it's not textured.  I think it looks like it's from SC2K to Krio because its color palette seems limited.  I'd go into the game and find buildings that have the materials of your building (or something that looks close) and you can model your own textures off of those.  Then take screenshots (at zoom 5) of the buildings, paste them all into one big file.  Then when you do preview renders in the BAT, take a screenshot of that, and put it into the same file, and you can do a direct comparison without doing an entire export.  The preview render is exactly what the export will look like.

Here are some buildings you can take better screenshots of.  Judging from the photos on emporis, these are kind of close.  I'm sure there are others in the game that you'll have to look for that will help too.

[sparkythepenguin 90]

Ummm, Jason, some of those pics you posted aren't showing up.... I have some new pics to show and will post here. I finally got a high-quality export and found a workable roof fix.

LivingInthePast: OK will add Mall 205. If I were to BAT it, I'd do the '80's version! It was so cool when I was a kid. Especially with the A&W Rootbeer restruant! Man do I miss those.

Some notices I must inform everyone about:

I am now back in college, and BATing may get slower. This is dependent upon how much work my profs dump on me. At the worst, I still will be able advise those needing help and maybe do a little BATing...

Additionally, I will be helping out with CWLGAMER's  Walt Disney Theme Park project. I remain committed to finishing all the BATs that I have committed to. It may just take a long time to push them out at a rapid fire pace.

OK I have some BofA progress. I think this is now 98% complete. This assessment includes potential texturing and lighting issues that can be easily be changed.

Things I need imput on, please comment:

Neon "hat": I exported this as a seperate prop and fit it over the building thanks tro custom LODs.  Unfortuneately it doesn't look too hot at farther zooms.   I am thinking about just not including it, leaving it as-is, or trying to make a thicker  tube which may not look too good at closer zooms.

Red tiled roofs: I made a HUGE texture for this and set the scaling down. These screenshots show the best result of this tinkering. The Moire effect isn't bad, if not undetectable.

Lighting: There really are spots in real life where I put them on the BAT. Hope these look good for everyone!

Texturing: Here's a look at the building at Z4 and Z5:

Comment away, I really appreciate everyone's comments and do my best to meet everyone's expectations!

[ILL Tonkso 1,239]

Looking great, i love the garden on the lower roof. Also, on an off topic note, that pic really illustrates how underscaled St Stephens Tower (Big Ben) is in Sim City. it should be about twice that.

[josefmayor 8]

Sounds good to me buddy! Once I finish modeling it I will PM you for help on how to get it to work.

Thanks for all your help and support its much appreciated. For Real!

I kinda like the Neon Hat, its pretty cool!

[Jasoncw 11,949]

The night shot is looking good!

Yeah, some of those pictures aren't showing up.  The one does though, and I think that building is something that's good to base your colors off.  (try adding some slight blue to the windows and walls).

The real building has much whiter walls.  The red is really desaturated and pale.

Even though the grey roof is pretty clean in real life, I'd still make it messier for the game.

I just looked at Portland in local live, and it's really cool to see all of the buildings.

[sparkythepenguin 90]

Originally posted by: Jasoncw The night shot is looking good! quote>

Thanks! That means a lot coming from you!

The real building has much whiter walls.quote>

For some reason here, architects love to use color-changing stonework, esp. granite. The main parts of the wall are an off-grey, rose granite (this phraseology appears on official promotional material for the building) inlay, with a kinda crackly red-maroon granite of some vague sort.

 

The red is really desaturated and pale.quote>

Do you mean on the real building, or on my model of it?

I'll try to "dirty" up the roof. And you probably have guessed correctly that I was totally stoked when I found out that LiveLocal added the Portland-Vancouver area to the Bird's Eye! Now if they can only get it down to Salem... That alone has made my BATS waaaay better!

[Jasoncw 11,949]

naw, my nitelites aren't that special.  I just toss a few spotlights and omnis around.  Plus older buildings are easier to light up because there's the details that can catch the light.  There's not much to play off of on newer buildings.

lol, so the color change is from the building aging?  What's going to happen in 100 years!

I mean the real building's red is like that.  Yours needs a little adjusting.

I'd still add some color (pink or blue) to your textures though, since right now it will probably look drab compared to the game's other buildings.

[sparkythepenguin 90]

hahahah, only the copper-roofed buildings do that. I'm talking about how different amounts of light/darkness make, say Big Pink, not only look pink, but purple and orange, even black depending on the weather.

I figure that Sim City's perpetually beautiful summer weather is equivalent to a cloudless day  in Stumptown. Here's a link to a pic as I know BofA on Emporis:

The Red looks really vivid here:

http://www.emporis.com/en/il/im/?id=459850

Here it sorta desaturates a tad, a crosss between the pic above and below:

http://www.emporis.com/en/il/im/?id=279219

Faded even more:

http://www.emporis.com/en/il/im/?id=376386

Brownish tint. Looks more darker or dustier the closer you get to dusk:

http://www.emporis.com/en/il/im/?id=281806

Certain types of granite achieve this effect, and architects love it because it makes buildings so dynamic. Pietro Belluschi, especially did when he worked on the US Bancorp Tower, hence its nickname: "Big Pink"!

So any of one of those color states are theoretically correct.

The bird's eye photos on LiveLocal were taken during the Rose Festival at the begining of June. And it ALWAYS rains or is overcast during the first couple days. BTW< the Navy ships moored along Waterfront Park are there as part of the festival and aren't always there. It's been a tradition ever since they built the seawall.

[Jasoncw 11,949]

ooooooohhhhhhhhh I see

ok