The Portland & Oregon BAT Team, Chapter 1

[bixel 1,228]

Hrmm..either my building is too tall or the Portland Medical Building is too short- not sure. The Portland Medical Building looks brilliant at zoom 5 levels but looks very dwarfish at outer zooms. I think a revisit to some of the olde P-Town buildings is a good idea, particularly the electric razor residential building. I was thinking if redoing the Portland Convention Center, and perhaps its newer add-on.

[ricb 19]

Sparky, in real life the entrance to the Hilton is right up against 6th Ave. With a slight indentation for the loading area (The only Hotel loading area I have ever seen where the passengers get out on the driver's side.). It's a lot tighter than your BAT.

[Andreas Roth 629]

I think the Commonwealth Building is fine; if you count the floors, the height is somewhat in line with the other buldings. The PMC is way too short indeed, though. Looking at the massive Federal Building, I'd say you should either scale up the PMC quite a bit, so it fits on a 5x5 lot, or get rid of the odd "double line parking" by making the parking garage a bit more narrow. The attached building on the left (with the dark red frame) looks a lot larger than the PMC, scale-wise. If you look closer, almost two entire floors of the PMC are needed to get a ceiling height that suits the second floor of the attached building. That said, there's some great progress you made, esp. texture-wise, and I'm glad to hear that you plan to revisit your older models - even if some of them got corrupted. But with your improved modelling and texturing skills, I'm sure they'll turn out better than ever in the end.

[Jasoncw 11,949]

The buildings are proportional to each other, and both are too short.

http://skyscraperpage.com/diagrams/?34238062.50

^ Has the roof heights. I guess on the Commonwealth building the mechanical floors don't count in the roof height.

The windows should have similar proportions to http://www.emporis.com/en/il/im/?id=459859

[Interchange 0]

I have a suggestion, how about making the Kaiser Pernamente tower into a hospital on Sim City 4?

[autoVino 26]

wow, those look absolutely beautiful!  Love 'em already.

[sparkythepenguin 90]

A lot to address today, sorry it is so late. I'm working as fast as I can to get these ready, but I am not going to sacrifice quality. Please everyone be patient with Bixel and I. The biggest barrier to final exporting for everything (as of this morning) is lighting. Today, I managed to get two of these lit up, and if everyone likes the lighting job, I'll fast-track those BATs. Hopefully enough people chime in so I can get at least one of them started tonite. Patience, patience people.

Norcat: Not planning on Kaiser being a hospital, but the 511 Building will have a clinic version.

Ric: Don't mind the messed up Hilton lot. The building is't centered right and it is a weird programming thing. I know that drive-up area well. I hate how the sidewalk narrows right there. If there's a good crowd there, everyone just gets crammed together. And don't even try to go in the oposite direction. No wonder I like walking past on the Broadway side!

Andreas: The little building (actually a carpet store) is accurate. Why it looks weird is that in real life, it is just a tad uphill from the 511 Building. The lot slopes upward from the corner the 511 faces. (the corner of 10th and Washington, the awning corner). Also, the first floor of the carpet store is higher than a normal floor, even in real life. It lets a ton of natural light into the retail space. That's why the windows don't line up. And trust me, I photographed, counted windows and patterns, and drew this out many times before I believed it! And I used to visit the building almost every week! a 5x5 lot would not work. The real building is exactly about a 1/4 block, and the garage IS like that... Weird, but adds variety...

Jason: I don't think the mechanical housing is counted on the 511 Building either... I haven't been that far up in the building, but the 14th floor is the highest "inhabited" floor. I think the Commonwealth ought to be bumped up a little on the Z scale.... Bixel has the model, I just mod his Portland stuff. He'll have to decide whether or not to scale it, and then send the exported file on to me.

OK I scaled it up, looks a little better.

And now to get into lighting. The Federal Building (I fixed the problems that I was having by digging out the Standard Plaza BAT and taking a look at what I did), and Kaiser Permanente Tower are now lit. Lloyd 700 needs some work, but work has been started on lights.

/\ I don't like the intensities, but when I add Omnis in, they'll probably get flooded out... Oh and the windows on the side don't show up! They're set back too far from the edge at this angle to show up. Should I push the glass curtain wall out? The real building looks so cool at 3/4 angles due to the lights peeking out from the sides.

Took me half the day so far to get the bule just right... The top floor is an open-aired balcony around a service floor. It was simply floodlit before Kaiser started to floodlight it blue. On the 4th of July, it is red-white-blue, and on Christmas, it is red and green.

And it took the other half of the day to g

[Sim shady 12]

Everything looks top-notch but I noticed that on one of your buildings with the parking garage you have consecutive cars parked in one long line so that the first one cant get out. Is it valet parking or something?

[ricb 19]

That's cool, I agree the sidewalk there is too narrow. I once had to chase a guy who assaulted a woman at Pioneer Square up sixth. He was getting away but ran into a bottleneck outside the Hilton. Police Bureau was coming from other direction tho.

[Jasoncw 11,949]

hmmm, I think it should still be scaled up more.

[spa 970]

Everything looks great except, well I agree with Jason. PMC still looks wrong compared to the others.

[bixel 1,228]

GORGEOUS NIGHTLIGHTING!! ooooh. PMC looks great now.

[Andreas Roth 629]

@sparky: Well, you obviously know those buildings a lot better than me, and it's great that you're trying to recreate them as accurate as possible. With my suggestions, I'm usually referring to the in-game scale and overall appearance, that means that sometimes it might be better to sacrifice some details for the "in-game reality". The upscaled PMC looks better, and as said above, it could be scaled up a little more. The nightlighting looks great so far, though!

[nofunk 1,933]

The thing I notice (and I'm not trying to beat this into the ground, so please forgive me if it seems I'm jumping on the bandwagon) is that the entrance to the carpet store is about 1.5 times the size of the entrance to PMC. If you were to scale PMC up vertically even 105-110% (or even better, scaled the carpet store down 5-10%), I think it would make a world of difference.

That said, I love all of these buildings. The mural on the carpet store is fantastic!

[sparkythepenguin 90]

To start off, I didn't do anything further last night. But I did get to lighting up the Hilton and fixing the lloyd 700's lights this morning (I got up late, and yes 4 am is later than I usually wake up lately).

Regarding the PMC: I am suprised at how much the parking garage and scale are getting attention. This sort of reaction is exactly what I want, and I am now aiming to please.

I will try to figure out a better parking configuration, and keep tweaking with the scale. Nofunk's suggestion seems solid, so that's the first thing to do.

I'll throw together some new parking spot configurations and show everyone. Then you can choose the best. Why they had to stripe the garage that way, who knows?

OK latest lighting stuff:

A bit better...

I will start now on fixing the PMC. Later (5pm or so) I shall do the final export of the Federal Building and Kaiser Permenente Tower.

[Sim shady 12]

Something still seems kinky with the first buildings nitelites but I understand if you just want that part to be done with The Hilton on the otherhand, looks completely down and absolutely topnotch!

[sparkythepenguin 90]

Well, then, if no one else objects, the Hilton goes to final exporting. Got the Kaiser Permenente Tower done, today it is the Federal Building's turn.

Yesterday I toyed around with the parking garage of the PMC. I gridded it out, tested configurations, and found one that made sense. Also I scaled the buildings up, and I adjusted the carpet store so that the floors lined up with the main tower. Just had to shrink down the spandrel above the door and move the doorway and ground level window up. When I looked at it closely, and used Sim Ruler, I noticed that while a sim would fit through the tower's doors, one would have to walk sideways and on their knees through the carpet store door! That's fixed now!

And yes, there ought to be cars on the lower level. Will add some later today. I have a headache and need to go back to sleep. Hopefully it will go away in a couple of hours...

[Andreas Roth 629]

I think the proportions are much better now - also, the parking lot layout makes much more sense.

[brtim2 11]

^ I agree. But one thing bothers me with the parking garage. It's the lines. They look very bright, white and thick. But then I see the lotted parking lines next to it and I can't see that discernible of a difference. It might be they are thicker and whiter than the in game parking lines, or it could be my eyes are playing tricks on me cause most of the in-game parking lines are behind shadows.

[T Wrecks 10,210]

Oh my, I'm really looking forward to these buildings! Finally some more great mid-rise stuff from Makesudrool, Inc. led by CEO sparkythepenguin!

[ky72x 13]

Very nice work on all of these mid-rises! That's a building category that's vastly underrepresented, but creators like you continue to keep it alive!

I really like the car models that you've created for the parking garage of the PMC. Nice Vipers! You're very skilled at making them, I know Waddle's had similar vehicles in the parking lot. Any chance that they could be made into props? Using them on any custom lot would be awesome.

- Kyle

[bixel 1,228]

Yeh Sparky really outdone himself this time. PMC garage looks great!

[nofunk 1,933]

Great improvements, Sparky! I CAN'T WAIT to see all of these released!

[jayo 44]

Nice ones sparky-I would love to lot these If thats alright???

[sparkythepenguin 90]

Update for 2/6/08:

Sorry for not posting this morning. Last night was a long night as I was out at a Super Tuesday party. Funner for us Poli-sci wonks than the Superbowl! Don't get me started on all that stuff though. I'm here to BAT not debate.

brtim2: Those lines suprisingly came out a lot better than I expected. I do think they're a little bigger, but it's not too much of a problem.

ky72x: The cars are just some free models that I found in various places online and the only thing that I have done is to scale and modify them. They were originally really detailed and high poly. Still sort of are even after I consolidated them.

jayo: I'm happy that you would be willing to lot these monsters, but I have that under control at this time. If, after the release people don't like my lotting job, is it OK to call upon you? BTW, You are always free to lot these BATs any way you wish foryour own use anytime.

Bixel: Right after finishing up this update, I am emailing you the PMC shell so you can scale the Commonwealth Building.

Sim shady: is this better for 700 Lloyd?

And the big tamale:

The PMC is now lit. Spent all day since I woke up on this!

Also yesterday, I exported the (so far) record number of BATs in a single day: 3 in a row. Providing there are no errors, Kaiser Permanente, The Federal Building, and the Hilton are ready for modding. Checking those is high on my to-do list right now.

Lemme know what you think! Hopefully tomorrow, I can export these last two.

[Jasoncw 11,949]

You've been extremely productive.

[WeekendCityPlanner 19]

I'm liking your parking lot, too bad you can simulate a light cone. I also like that mural of a town or whatever it is. This is my personal opinion, but I think the windows at the base of 700 Llyod should be actual lites instead of a nitemap. But don't mind that, it's yours and it appears that it is ready.

[sparkythepenguin 90]

Well, it is coming right down to the wire. I now have everything exported, functional, and assembled for minimum release. Bixel sent me an updated, scaled-up Commonwealth (Equitable) Building last night, and I went right to modding it this morning. I am planning tomorrow to polish these up with Spanish and German menu descriptions, custom menu icons, and the custom queries for the Jackson Tower and the Commonwealth Building. I'm awaiting some translation work from Andreas and Astrianu for the German and Spanish versions of the custom queries.

Now that that is all done, I would like to take the time to reorganize this project. This thread is now too long, and I need to retire it and all the old screenshots. It really puts a strain on my Photobucket bandwidth.

One definite thing that will be done is moving this project into a new thread. Hopefully everyone will follow us over there when I start it. I will ask Jason to officially close this pretty soon. If anything, it may serve as an archive of the past few years.

Also I would like to see if anyone would be willing to join an expanded NW/BC BAT team, I'm thinking about threads for Seattle, Vancouver (BC), Portland, and wherever else around here pops up (the scope could ultimately include Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, British Columbia, Alberta, and Alaska). I certainly can't cover all this myself, but would love to see things from all these places BATed. So if anyone in the NW or even outside it wants to collaborate, I'm all ears!

One more thing about the future. A couple months ago, I thought the BofA would be my last BAT. Far from it! But time will get scarce again, and I find myself asking, "how much longer will I be BATing?" I still have a lot that I want to do, so don't despair. I kind of am figuring that my last Portland BAT would likely be Union Station, probably the crowning achievement of such a sucessful city project. Still, I may just feel like doing it anyway and keep going. I'm sure a lot of BATers out there know the feeling.

Anyways, I just wanted to think out loud and see what people thought about that.

If things move fast enough, I plan on releasing a torrent of BATs sometime next week. Keep your fingers crossed!

[Jasoncw 11,949]

If I've counted everything right, this project has 33 BATs, and will be at 40 at the release of the upcoming BATs.  The BSP has only released 14 BATs, and it is the only thread in this forum that has more replies than this thread (and obviously so much less productivity, lol).  And all of these are accurate recreations of specific buildings in a specific city.

When you're ready, just say so, and I'll lock this thread, and I'll set it not to archive.  I think in the meantime though, people should flip through this thread, and look back on the several years this project has been going on for.

I'd personally like to see Around the Roses continue how it is.  But you could also create a larger "organization" that would help coordinate individual BATers and new teams for other places around the region.

[T Wrecks 10,210]

The most important thing I have to add right now is that no matter what you're up to in terms of BATting, you can trust that I will be following your progress even if I don't post much, and since I have been enjoying almost every single building you made, I guess I can also predict that I will follow any future developments with equal enthusiasm and provide some feedback if and whenever I can.