Mushy's Random BATs

[Belfastsocrates 1,753]

For the tankers I think any of the major European oil companies (Shell, BP, Esso, Elf/Total) would work and be usable for most people. I think the small tankers would be excellent for milk or chemicals/liquid gases (BOC as an example)

[MushyMushy 3,617]

Thanks for the replies!

@Belfastsocrates: I went ahead and did the 5 companies you listed first. Upon further research I noticed that all of the retailers you mentioned actually do operate semi trucks branded wit their company logos so I made them all into semi trucks. I'll look at making them into straight trucks (since I got a lot of results with them as straight trucks) later. The tanker set is something I intend to do a little bit later so I'll look into the ones you mentioned for that once I get to that point.

@art128: Yeah, a full Japanese set is something I have planned. While Japan does mostly stick to straight trucks like you said (and as such straight trucks will make up the bulk of my set), semi trucks do exist in some areas. My guess would be they're much more common in port areas and the like and not very common anywhere else, especially in the cities since the roads in them are so tight. Example:

@Girafe: Done!

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There are now 8 more liveries for the normal length trailer:

Some of the livery designs I used are up-to-date, and some of them are not. I usually went with whichever version I liked the best. I think the most glaring of these choices is the Sainbury's one, which I based off several photos which were from the 90's. I'll probably add one more livery to the bunch myself (possibly some shameless self-advertising or something else, idk) to bring the grand total to 18 (if you include the blank white one). After that I'll proceed with texturing trucks to go with the trailers.

Before I forget, I should also mention that another set (for the EU group of sets) that I'll be making at some point is a tandem truck set. I've read that these are pretty common in Europe, and they really wouldn't be that challenging to make... so expect to see more on that later.

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While I was too lazy to actually finish & (test) export the building, I went ahead and Photoshopped it over an image that I had lying around. From my experience the test render views usually look very similar to the results in-game so I thought this would work for the time being. While I think it's obvious that I need to increase it's size vertically by 133% (it looks super squashed right now), it looks pretty decent otherwise imho. I might play around with brightness as was previously suggested (for the record I wasn't actually aiming for the walls to be as white as the original building, I was aiming more for a lightish gray color). Thoughts?

 

[gutterclub 2,729]

I would personally put it in a screenshot with mainly Maxis building for gauge the colour pallete, otherwise you are assuming that the BAT you are comparing it too is suitable to thr pallette.

However, it looks like it will fit in well and I wouldn't get too worried about changing it.

[art128 4,618]

I would personally put the building in a picture with similar buildings (Somy's Danchis etc) since this is probably what people are going to use it with, rather than maxis badly scaled buildings. 

[Belfastsocrates 1,753]

Those look excellent!!

Really looking forward to using these and building some custom and individual distribution hubs and warehouses. 

[JP Schriefer 5,590]

I didn't realize before it was not increased, I thought it was that size indeed. I like that grey texture you're using

[gutterclub 2,729]

I would personally put the building in a picture with similar buildings (Somy's Danchis etc) since this is probably what people are going to use it with, rather than maxis badly scaled buildings. 

I wasn't referring to the scale, if you model to relative RL proportions and scale up 133% you will be sweet. I was referring to the colour pallete used and the walls being a little too dark and grey. The best way to see if your BAT is the right colour for the game is against Maxis buildings..

[Huston 5,798]

I just have to add to your apartment blocks, you should definitely add a little grime to either the texture, or add an opacity map to lay the grunge over the surface of the building just because it's looking a little too sterile (for my tastes anyway, not sure about everyone else)

  Edited November 10, 2015 by Huston  

[philforhockey51 4,211]

Some of the best trailers I've seen since the latest Star Wars one  

[SimCoug 5,973]

Some of the best trailers...

*Badum tish* 
(for better effect: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcYppAs6ZdI )

(BTW, awesome liveries!)

 

[DavidDHetzel 1,816]

Hey Mushy, have you done any American style Tankers yet? I have two I'd like to request when/if you do them.

[Xander Dax 310]

Any chance of some Australian Trucks Mushy?, love see more Aussie content around.

[MushyMushy 3,617]

I've actually suspended any public releases for the time being since I've been getting errors with any attempted exports from 3DS. Until I figure out what I'm I'm doing wrong in that regard I won't be able to make any content, but I'll definitely address these requests once I can release stuff again! I'll probably go back to trying to find a solution a little ways down the road... the errors made me (very) irritated so I need to take a break from it and come back with a more open mind.

In the meantime I've been working on custom stuff to be Photoshopped into scenes from SC4, but more on that later (and on more appropriate threads than my BAT thread ).

  Edited November 23, 2015 by MushyMushy  

[airman15 4,111]

Ouch, sorry to hear about render issues. It's the same reason why the Sonic Cruisers have been frozen. 

For the scaling, they look a little short floor-per-floor. Perhaps you could get away with a uniform scale, or are you already at the maximum footprint size for the lots you would like to use? Depending on the building, they could have 8', sometimes 10' of clearance between floors. The scaling throughout the game is always off in one way or another. The sims themselves look to be double the height of what a real person is supposed to be.

[MushyMushy 3,617]

So this thread (as well as my account) has been pretty quiet lately. I've been given a suggestion on how to fix my issue by another user, and that's going to be the first thing I try once I boot up 3DS again.

The main reason for my silence has been something that I believe I've mentioned on this thread at least once - a new computer! I'm still copying over files and getting software installed, but I hope to try out modeling on my new machine pretty soon (I finished building it this past weekend). I suspect 3DS will run smoother and render things faster as my new machine has significantly more powerful hardware than the 4 year old low-end laptop I've been using.

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Congrats on your new rig! Here's to hoping that it'll turn out to be a good modelling and rendering machine.

[raynev1 1,886]

Best of luck with that new machine . You were doing a great job on those projects you were working on .

[MushyMushy 3,617]

Before I get back into my old stuff, I thought I'd get back into the groove of things with something simple. I decided to start modeling the fire station that's a few blocks from where I live, since I see it pretty frequently and there's nothing too hard about it. It also looks sort of interesting and I think could fill a gap in SC4 fire stations (I've noticed there really aren't a whole lot of them out there, especially not newer models). MFD Fire Station No. 21 (WIP):

I'll probably release 2 versions, a 4x3 that more or less features the full property and a 2x2 that's just the building (for tighter spaces). In real life the station only has 2 fire engines and an ambulance, but I feel like for it to be balanced in SC4 it should be considered to have 3 engines.

[Harry's Place 918]

big like for this  indeed there aren't may fire stations

[MushyMushy 3,617]

Most of the basic building structure is done. All that is left in that respect is the back wall.

Progress pic:

[T Wrecks 10,209]

It's funny how the real-world lot layout is actually pretty close to what you can do with LE textures. The building looks very good so far, and I agree that we can definitely use more fire departments. On the last picture, though, did you scale the height to 133% yet? The building looks somewhat stumpy to me, but maybe that's just the way it looks.

[raynev1 1,886]

Great , a new fire dept. It's coming along nicely . Glad to see you are getting back into the swing of things .

[SimCoug 5,973]

Awesome!  Civic buildings are always welcome, and it's  nice to be able to have some variety in each city to keep things original.  

[Jasoncw 11,840]

Looks good, especially with the fire trucks there.

[JP Schriefer 5,590]

The fire station is looking very nice, keep it up!

[MushyMushy 3,617]

So I cleaned up the OP of the thread. Now it's more useful and has links to the stuff I've finished.

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The fire station is coming along nicely. I'm pretty close to being able to slap some textures on it and then move on to the finer details. I didn't feel like enough has changed to warrant an image.

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Some people might remember that early on in this thread, I attempted to start modeling a large ship in gmax. Obviously that got scrapped, but making ship models is still something I have an interest in. As a result, I found myself doing it again, although this time I went even bigger. I'm quite certain this ship will be the largest oceangoing vessel BAT in SC4 once I finish it (which will take a while).

Current big changes to be made:

• Make the primary superstructure that holds up the bridge more bulky (and fill in the gaps in it)
• Add a secondary superstructure where the smokestack goes
• Make the smokestack a fair bit bigger
• Add a propeller and rudder
• Increase the height of the the supports that hold the container stacks
• Obviously, add lots more details here and there...

The containers do have some detail on them (they are 40ft long after all), so instead of filling in the middle parts where you can't really see (once I stack them up high) with the detailed-ish models, I'm going to make low-poly versions (read- a simple rectangular prism) to fill in the center to make the file manageable. Otherwise, as I've tried (with only the front part stacked up), the file becomes crash-prone.

As it stands, the ship is 370m (1,214ft) long and 50m (164ft) wide. This translates to approximately 23 tiles long and 3 tiles wide. This would place it in the upper ranks of the world's largest cargo ships. The model layout is primarily inspired by the MSC Oscar and the CSCL Globe. These are the 1st and 2nd largest container ships in the world, respectively (the Globe is actually longer).

A small sample of my reference pics:

[JP Schriefer 5,590]

Wow that's a big task! It's looking good so far

[T Wrecks 10,209]

Whoa, this will be spectacular! Both the model so far and your considerations concerning what to change/improve look very good to me, no suggestions at this time.

[MushyMushy 3,617]

I'm sure some people will be happy to see these Euro trucks as the most recent thing on my thread!

(For the two wide images, click them and then click full size to see the full sized images. Apparently, ST doesn't support images over 1,000 pixels wide anymore?)

Keep in mind that since the line of trucks were rendered at the same time in the same file, there are some minor reflections being seen that won't be there in the final release (this is most visible on the sides of light-colored trailers next to very brightly colored ones (red/orange/yellow)). The final release will feature 14 companies with 3 additional generic trucks, which brings the grand total to 17 combinations. I made the decision for what cab each trailer would get mostly off of what I saw on the internet. The DAF cab I have is based on a model that is a fair bit older than the Scania one I used. As a result, I usually made the choice based on how old and how nice the companies trucks were. The choice between single and double axle was based off of what I saw most often in images.

When I get around to releasing the pack of slightly longer box trailers (which were in the post where I originally introduced the set a while back), the cabs for those will always be double axle. That pack will also be slightly smaller since fewer European companies seem to buy the longer European trailers I've seen for sale (I guess because it would be harder to navigate cities). As a result, the longer set will only feature generic and trucking company liveries. The few retail brands that I did for this pack will not be included in that pack.

I'm hoping to make my next post about the fire station. I need to have a few projects in rotation to keep myself from getting burnt out.

[JP Schriefer 5,590]

Wow that will be an amazing truck pack!