Burj Khalifa

[Fantail 0]

Wow, that nightliting is looking great. Any updates?

[NintendoMaster128 30]

Holy shiite...

[sharkbait16 0]

Wow, it's good to see such a great project coming along so nicely.  I'll be following this along.

[MayorTim 16]

Anything new? I really love this building!

[AndisArt 2,066]

No news yet, have been moving from the US to Germany , now I'm moving from Frankfurt to Hamburg this week. Have been very busy with the SimMars project as well. No updates in the next weeks...

[mcarch 15]

Good luck with the move!

[Cypherus21 0]

Good luck on the move from Frankfurt.  SimCity 4's stage 8 buildings were based on that city's skyline which would be neat to see in real life. Well wished for the continuance on this grand epic.

[Fantail 0]

Is this project still alive?

[AndisArt 2,066]

Actually it is again.
I just started to work again, after tumultuous months of moving and moving and moving...

However, I'm experiencing serious problems with the project.
The BAT seems to reach it's limits. To soon, as I suppose. Something might be wrong, but let me tell you more.
I hope someone can help me.

First thing: It takes ages for the BAT to operate once I have a large scene open. I'm currently working on the completition of section 1 of 5, which consists of 1.3 milions of polygons.
BAT is really slow, but manageable. But then: When I click on file or group in the top task bar to save or merge a file, work on groups or whatever, it sometimes takes 1/2 an hour until it opens the menu!

What for Christ sake is that?

Another thing is, the BAT often tells me he wasn't able to save all the file properties. So what does that mean for me effectively?

It also tells me that the script memory wasn'T enough. I increased it from 7.5 to 20 MB now, but don'T have a clue if that was a good step.

The more drastic issue is the disappearance of textures in render!
It appears that once I merge all the files that build section 1 together, the BAT render shows no textures at all any longer. Of course I have heard of that problem and I tried the suggested solutions: Save file, re-open, render again. Doesn't work! Merge section, re-load maps. Doesn't work!

Now I discovered that the materials have the same names, I guess that happened because I merged textured parts together which had the same materials. Once I change the name so it doens't exist again, the render works again.

But,
does that mean now I have to rename all the materials once I put a scene together?

[AndisArt 2,066]

On this picture you see section 1a (lower) and section 1b (upper) that I merged into the scene. The textures are missing in the render.

[Lord_Bertrum 3]

Good to see some progress on this.

[simwario 95]

Nice update, keep it up like that.

[Glenni 1,444]

WHOA!!!!and thats just the base alone?!ooooo

[Mary Maurine Mayo 984]

hello andisart

 

I have had the same problem with textures disappearing I have had to del every texture and then replace them. for some reason it gets lost even if I don't do anything to it ... it seems to lose the textueres anyway...

 

your other problem may be not enough memory I have run into that and had to look for someone who could render stuff for me...

 

I am not sure how to fix this either I have now reinstalled everything from scratch so I hope this helps me out. not sure what to tell you to fix yours...

 

Looks to me like it might be a memory problem...

 

Lynks

 

[Fantail 0]

Cool, but that is just the base... What will you do to render the whole thing?

[timotheus4 39]

very nice!

[Hordijk 18]

It's looking very good... and cool to see some progress on this.

[bixel 1,223]

Wow. That's very detailed, I love it, that's quite a project you there, but it looks like good progress.

 

:Edit: I am a very inexperienced BATter, and until recently I did know about a lot of things that should be done while creating large projects such as this one,

 

1 examine your geometry and decide what parts are never going to be rendered, if that is so edit mesh and select polygons in the expanded submenu, select the faces and delete those that will never be rendered or textured.

 

2 If several items are to be clones but applied with exact texture and situation make it an Instance and not a clone. I was working on the Harbourside a HK residential 74 story tower, it was 49 megs big, after going through my arrays and making them instances I narrowed it down to 37.5 megs. BTW getting something to group when you have 4500 items selected took about 15 minutes so I know exactly what you are talking about.

 

3 If items or geometry are texture mapped and ready to go go ahead and if edit mesh is applied right click on the submenu and select Collapse All. This takes all that previous banal information that is kept onto the geometry and preserves only what is needed for the scene. This can greatly reduce the size of the file.

 

4 I noticed you went ahead and added tons of eye candy geometry like tables and chairs and decks and so forth. Select them, group them, and save selected into a new scene, merge later when you are ready to render. You might want to invest some time on some semi-official 3DS max forums and ask people questions about the most efficient way to do this.

[Woko 2]

It's incredible!!! Great work!!

[sharkbait16 0]

Good luck with it!

[Cypherus21 0]

This is such an amazing building. When it does get complete, andisart will become a household name around the Simcity world.

[AndisArt 2,066]

Thanks for your tips so far, guys. 

I didn't know about the collapsing thing. It does reduce the size greatly! I tried it.

And the tip with making instances instead of clones is great, thanks alot! This should help me reduce the problem with the textures.

 

I decided to go ahead and order a 1 Gig DDR-RAM stick.  I will have upgraded from 512 to 1280 MB then.  

 

 

[Fantail 0]

1280 is alot, that is about twice as much as i have.

[meister88 0]

Regarding the disappearing textures, I noticed that whenever I merge random textures are missing from the render. I could not figure out the relation yet.

However the solution I use is to switch the show in viewport in the material editor off/on for the textures/materials that are not appearing. this solves the problem for me usually.

greets

[AndisArt 2,066]

Thanks for the tip, I will check on that.

I'd like to get some feedback on the nightlights of the open piece:

 

 

 

 

Also I have a little extra for you:

Look at how high the Burj will be!

[Woko 2]

OOOOOOO!!! It's high!!!  So, in meters, what is the height of your tower? Great job on the nightlights.

[Fantail 0]

The nightlights are so real! Keep up the great work.

[mcarch 15]

I think the nightlights on the inside should be a little bit brighter, not too much, just a little bit.  IT just seems like a dull yellow at this point.

The rest of this project looks marvalous!

[Lord_Bertrum 3]

The nightlighting is fantastic, I agree with Fantail, very realistic, subdued and not over the top as seen on some other BATs.

[Cypherus21 0]

I love the nightlights, as they emit a warm, romantic, and cozy feel. As previously said, modesty is the key, since some relative BATs are too exuberant with the nightlighting.