Farms North of Grasmere () My SC4 MD Scrapbook

compdude787 · April 23, 2016, 04:18:05 PM

That is looking amazing so far!!! I especially like the Fallingwater house.

Kergelen · April 23, 2016, 10:46:05 PM

Nice city overview and great use of such quantity of diferent lots.

Quote from: Vizoria on April 23, 2016, 12:52:58 PM
I am coming to realise that if more great filler sets such as KingOfSimCity's car parks, or SFBT's prefab filler lots, come along, then I may never have to consider lotting ever again. I am coming to the point where with the right fillers and MMPs I can integrate just about any building or lot I come across to the area it resides in.

I agree. Filler lots like parkings, plazas, and parks makes a substantial difference giving life to the city and help to create your own style.

Themistokles · April 24, 2016, 11:37:16 AM

I can see that inspiration has just not been trickling

Despite me not finding LA that awesome, Erinsberg looks great! In particular, I think you've found a very good place for the Vienna library and also the Muscovite area looks simply great! (eh realism-wise, I mean

)

vortext · April 25, 2016, 10:44:01 AM

Hm. . I was under the impression you were on hiatus but here I see pretty pictures once more! Not that I'm complaining though!

Far from it, really. As per usual it's a real pleasure to see so much great content put into well considered use. I think many people will benefit if you make a 'lets play/tutorial' kinda update because you really have a knack for taking all different kinds of content and putting it together in cohesive fashion. Great work!

kbieniu7 · April 28, 2016, 02:56:17 AM

Wow, you got back so quickly! The block quartier looks beautifuly tasty, one of my favourite photos there. As well as your nature work

Vizoria · April 30, 2016, 05:55:17 AM

Replies:

compdude787: Thank you! I want to create other rather tranquil spots in the hills north of Erinsberg.

Kergelen: Thanks! With Erinsberg I am continuing to explore even further into my plugins folder and mixing up all kinds of content.

Themistokles: I have had a lot of fun creating Erinsberg. Also I am a bit cheeky when it comes to placing certain buildings, in particular that Vienna library right in the middle of the city centre. But if it works, it works.

vortext: The next let's play/tutorial update will be a week from now- it will consist of filling in a rather awkward diagonal area of Erinsberg.

kbieniu7: I may get burnt out but I also bounce back rather quickly. Those European blocks were a pleasant surprise, I had forgotten they existed in my plugins folder.

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Entry 53: Working on the Suburbs

I have been doing extensive work to the north of Erinsberg finishing off the suburbs. It was a bit tricky as I had to integrate the suburbs with the foothills, but I think I have pulled off a reasonable transition. But that is for later entries. For now here are some highlights of newly completed areas.

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1.

My next focus will be the south of Erinsberg, I need to work on the downtown area and the suburbs below it.

2.

3.

Some of the wide 2x1 bungalows and small apartments seemed particularly appropriate for an LA-themed city.

4.

For the eastern suburbs I extensively used CP 19th Century $$ Houses. A link for those interested- http://sc4devotion.com/csxlex/lex_filedesc.php?lotGET=686. Additionally check out Simcoug's files on Simtropolis for the diagonal version of these houses.

5.

I did sneak in the odd industrial building in the more denser areas of the suburbs.

6.

And here are some inner-city pictures to vary things.

7.

The only way I could offset the Palais Theatre was if I plopped in a TE lot adjacent to it. (http://community.simtropolis.com/files/file/29067-palais-theatre-melbourne-australia/)

8.

Originally I had used PEG's lake set for this aquatic area, however the corner pieces did not carry the shadows of the trees and it looked awful. So I had to find a compromise and instead I used a more urban canal set to get the job done. Less natural but at least the shadows are not messed up.

9.

10.

A little bit of diagonal hokery-pokery.

11.

Full-diagonal. Never go full-diagonal, unless you have a lot of time and patience. Here I used Simcoug's R$$ Diagonal Homes- http://community.simtropolis.com/files/file/28630-simcougs-r-diagonal-homes/.

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For next week I will be posting another update, this time around the south of Erinsberg. In particular there is a corridor between the inner-city highway and the railway lines which I want to complete; this includes a rather nasty diagonal section.

Mandarin(a) · April 30, 2016, 10:07:26 AM

That first picture ... sleepy suburbs, downtown area, forest, apartment blocks, that mega factory, everything is connected like a well-made cocktail.

kbieniu7 · May 01, 2016, 02:40:10 AM

Love the small island on this embanked pond, as well as your diagonal work in the last pictures

Akallan · May 01, 2016, 09:13:03 AM

Very nice, I like!

eggman121 · May 01, 2016, 02:42:09 PM

It is always a pleasure reading your pictures and stories Vizoria

So realistic and natural at the same time

You really have a masterful touch when it comes to design and layout.

This gives me inspiration to work on the current projects I have under my belt as well as progressing in my own MD when I have time.

Keep up the good work

-eggman121

Simmer2 · May 01, 2016, 08:50:09 PM

Well done

Vizoria · May 07, 2016, 05:22:28 PM

Replies:

Mandarin(a): Thank you! The city will become better connected when it is complete.

kbieniu7: Thanks! I have done a lot more diagonal work as I seek to tame the non-orthogonal parts of Erinsberg.

Akallan: Thank you!

eggman121: I just love making the most of what I have in my plugins folder.

Simmer2: Cheers! In truth a good chunk of Erinsberg is inspired because of yours lots. Especially the power station. And talking about inspiration... You're a lot meistro, so do you have any spare time to knock up a series of overhanging textures? Grass, concrete, etc... ? Maybe even a bunch of say 1x1 right-angled triangle textures (the half ones with a transparent part). Pretty please?

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Entry 54: Suburbs, Industrial Estates, Diagonals and other Stuff

Two-thirds of this entry consist of pictures of recently completed areas, plus a smattering of overviews as well. The last third is a mini-tutorial concerning diagonal city building. So sit down, strap in and enjoy!

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1.

Nearly all of the work I have done this week has been in the south of Erinsberg.

2.

The downtown area.

3.

W2W FTW.

4.

5

Using a mixture of pedmalls and SFBT diagonal fillers, I can extend the pavement and create simple diagonal parks.

6.

7.

I recently rediscovered some R$ 3x3 C.P. Nineteenth Century Homes, they fitted in perfectly for this somewhat run-down, rustic area.

8.

Paeng's Gridbuster Warehouses (found on the STEX) are invaluable for situations like this.

9.

MOAR suburbs!

10.

I have been experimenting with diagonal T-junctions and filling in the area with residential.

11.

One of the industrial estates. I usually lay down the railways first then I fill in the areas. This helps to remind me about making sure the railway actually cuts through an area. Walls, trees and other barriers make sure that the railway is not something to easily access on foot in urban areas. Obvious I know, but in the middle of city building it is realistic details like this which can be forgotten about.

12.

13.

Slope-friendly homes for a sloping area...

14.

Making the most of C.P.'s BATs.

15.

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A brief introduction to diagonal city building

So from time to time I will post some walkthroughs/explanations about creating realistic/beautiful/interesting cities. It's nothing lengthy, just simple tips and ideas. The first one is a rather nasty area of the game- diagonals.

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16.

Every player wants to gridbust- build in directions other than up, down, left and right. Vanilla SC4 only has orthogonal buildings, parks and fillers. Now the game has diagonal roads and the Network Addon Mod (NAM) has enabled players to go into FA (Fractionally Angled) territory, but the diagonal BATs and LOTs have not kept up with the various orthogonal options SC4 presents. It is possible to create several diagonal areas in a large city tile without it becoming repetitive. Ideally a city should feel like it is going in eight directions, not just the usual four.

What about FA? I have only seen a few dozen FA BATs and LOTs. If you think incorporating realistic diagonals in a city is hard, then try exploring the dark art of FA design. It's something only the most skilled SC4 players use and very sparingly because the FA options are tiny.

For now though let's focus on this rather nasty diagonal area. Adding in orthogonal buildings when there are diagonal roads and wide curves would look ridiculous. It's all very well laying down diagonal roads but without the means to incorporate them into the city, and masking the jagged diagonals (see the top left of the picture), then one should may as well stick to the grid in urban areas. Fear not though, there is a way to make diagonal areas look smooth, flowing AND connect with the orthogonal areas of the city.

Note: I keep saying orthogonal, it just means right angles, or for SC4: up, down, left and right directions.

17.

For starters clear the area, get out the grid and start counting the width of the diagonal area- number of squares. I've found that a diagonal building on its own, complete with a back-door filler, takes up two squares/tiles of width. The thinnest diagonal city block is three squares in width. Finally, to bound a diagonal building between a road and some kind of barrier takes between two or three squares width. Note: technically two rows of diagonal buildings, which don't connect, could be considered a city block. However, I've found it usually looks pretty weird.

18.

This is really important because to complete a diagonal area one must know how much space there is available. There is nothing worse than demolishing the diagonal buildings because there was not enough space; it means many lost minutes as many inner-city diagonal buildings are scattered throughout the landmarks menu.

19.

Having laid out a street template I have gone ahead and plopped in most of the Wall-to-Wall (W2W) buildings for this area. Fuse orthogonal with diagonal buildings, this really does give the impression that the city extends in eight directions/angles. I have compiled a small list of diagonal buildings, one link for each diagonal BATter. But that's all fine and dandy; what will stop the buildings not connected to a road from becoming abandoned?

20.

The answer to this is pedmalls. Just one pedmall next to a building and it will never become abandoned. I don't believe this will work for residential buildings though, the Sims need to access the road network to find a job. Connected pedmalls though will ensure a connection. In the middle left you can see the pedmalls in action. For the player just starting to use these pedmalls I will say this- you will see that Maxis white pavement texture. I use a sidewalk mod and Paeng's pedmall parks to bring the sidewalks to life. A word of warning about pedmalls- when you plop them next to streets/roads the sidewalks will not appear. Plop any lot or building, on the other side, to make the sidewalks appear.

Another consideration is the jagged texture tiles of the street. Do you want grass or pavement? Pavement works best for inner-city areas. But plopped buildings always cause the street to show jagged grass textures. Worse still, if you want to expand the pavement with pedmalls or diagonal pavements, it will only reinforce the jagged appearance. Here I will let you in on a little secret- the NAM has the SAM (Street Addon Mod). The SAM contains two streets which will always have jagged pavement textures: SAM 6 (cobbled streets) and SAM 10 (Japanese Moonlight textured streets). I use these streets often for diagonal inner-city areas. In this picture I used SAM 6. But a word of caution- use SAM 6 sparingly because cobbled streets imply old areas; pre-20th century and older. Think of the Old World and Europe, think of narrow streets and pre-modern architecture. I am building an American-styled city and I have used the SAM 6 sparingly because cobbled streets in American cities are, I believe, rare to see.

21.

Fillers are important for making the area behind these diagonal buildings look convincing. Diagonal buildings often come with 1x1 lots which have a variety of textures. SFBT's diagonal pavements and pedmalls can make the appearance of these back areas more uniform and consistent. I will be applying two layers of diagonal fillers: 1. a half pavement/half grass lot and 2. a half forest/half transparent texture with a fence running through the middle. This will give the appearance of the area being closed off and mark a clear separation between building, road and whatever else borders the area.

22.

In the bottom middle of the picture I improvised together a park since I was running out of space. I even snuck in some FA! I would say that this area has been reasonably filled in, fits in smoothly with the bordering roads and looks like another part of the city. But a special part because it is a diagonal area. Additionally the FA pavement, the numerous diagonal roads/rails and the curving highway all create the impression of grid-busting. In the area I filled can you see any jagged diagonal edges? THIS is an example of a seamless diagonal area.

This was a small area about two hundred squares worth. This took me roughly 45 minutes to complete. For someone starting on diagonals for the first time it will take a couple of hours. Diagonals are rather tricky to get right, it does not help that the selection of diagonal fillers and BATs is far smaller than the selection of orthogonal fillers and BATs. Finally, to conclude, I recommend the following method for constructing diagonal areas:

1. Work out the width of the area.
2. Place in the necessary streets.
3. Plop in the buildings; be that diagonal, orthogonal and diagonal/orthogonal transitions (BATs which are as rare as gold dust).
4. Add in pedmalls and consider using SAM 6 or SAM 10.
5. Infill diagonal blocks with trees/pedmalls/fillers/concrete/paths/parks/car parks. The fillers can be a mixture of orthogonal and diagonal.
6. Extend the back area of a diagonal row of buildings with diagonal fillers, lay in at least ONE diagonal layer and then choose between further diagonal layers or extending the back with orthogonal fillers such as trees, grass tiles, etc...
7. Fill in spare space with either more buildings or parks or something unique. Be creative with how you fill in empty squares.

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Additional content (edit- 08/05/2016)

Rivit's RUM-http://community.simtropolis.com/files/file/29279-rum-for-rrw/.
--This is for transparent railway textures.

MGB - Terrain Grass NAM (TGN) for Gobias Berner Oberland- http://community.simtropolis.com/files/file/30159-mgb-terrain-grass-nam-tgn-for-gobias-berner-oberland/
--Replaces all the road network grass textures with the Berner Oberland styled grass. There is also a Sudden Valley, Appalachian and Pyrenean version of this mod to.

Selecting the base texture replacement option for the Berner Oberland, Sudden Valley and Appalachian terrain mod installers. This goes hand-in-hand with the TGN. For Berner Oberland and Sudden Valley, Gobias, the creator of these terrains, removed the files from the LEX. So you will have to ask around to see if anyone would send a copy of these files.

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And now here is one more overview of Erinsberg, this emphasises the urban area. Is this a city of four directions or eight? You be the judge of that.

23.

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I will post another update next weekend.

It wouldn't hurt searching for "overhanging" either...

compdude787 · May 07, 2016, 10:24:19 PM

Wow, the last two updates are really nice! I like the diagonal buildings tutorial. This city sure is coming along quite nicely. Can't wait to see more!

Kergelen · May 07, 2016, 11:53:25 PM

Eight direction city.

Great work on the industrial area as always. The city overview and layout are very realistic.

Good tutorial about diagonal. I have never used SFBT Diagonal Fillers, and Zero7 Diagonals so I should download it.
Thanks for the links

To expand your list for newbie players, others important diagonal creators are motokloss, redonquixote and Darknono35.

kbieniu7 · May 08, 2016, 01:39:15 AM

A good collection of tips and how-to's. I didn't know about those two types of SAM textures that always have the sidewalk. Huh, wish there was a SAM variation with maxis' texture but with sidewalk/grass only mode.

About diagonal tenements, we have two at SimCityPolska
The picture of this one is unfortunately gone, but those are some of Ferox's W2W turned 45 degrees and extended (LM version only, of course). They look weird, but might fit the bill.
http://www.simcitypolska.pl/index.php?action=downloads;sa=view;down=145

There is also a similiar modification of odd from sweden's "ananas haus"
http://www.simcitypolska.pl/index.php?action=downloads;sa=view;down=83

By the way, may I ask - do I see correctly, or have you managed to get rid of grass/dirt texture under RealRailway? When I tried to install it with NAM, I got ugly brown dirt texture when I lay down a rail line by a zone or a building.

And of course, according to the "regular" part of update - great shots. The city indeed looks like moving in each direction. Putting the warehouse in a small free space by a road curve looks like an excellent part of "sc4 hiding engineering"

art128 · May 08, 2016, 01:53:22 AM

Quote from: kbieniu7 on May 08, 2016, 01:39:15 AM
do I see correctly, or have you managed to get rid of grass/dirt texture under RealRailway?

I do believe that's the effect of Rivit's RUM.

Fantastic update. Love the mix of everything.

I have a question though, where did you get the cabin like houses on picture 13 on the bottom left?

metarvo · May 09, 2016, 11:27:29 AM

This is a splendid diagonal building tutorial, Vizoria!

I already use the SFBT diagonal fillers addictively, and I'm always looking for ways to fit diagonal portions into cities. Of course, one of the major cities in my state has a strictly diagonal downtown, so I'm sure I've been influenced a little. Of course, those diagonal houses along that AVE-2 from the last update are a rare example of zoned diagonals — it's too bad there aren't really any zoned diagonal commercial or industrial buildings out there, although the landmark buildings do fill the gap just a bit. I find myself using the SAM-10 streets a lot, for diagonals and orthogonals alike, because they transition to parking lots a little better.

That warehouse district in pic #11 is quite appealing. W2W warehouses have a certain modularity to them, and the parking lots behind them add to this modularity.

Nice update!

Themistokles · May 10, 2016, 10:14:22 AM

Great update as always!

And thanks for the informative list, some of them I've never seen before.

Akallan · May 14, 2016, 01:58:09 PM

It's really well done! The tutorial is well, thank you very much for the links!

Vizoria · May 16, 2016, 01:51:16 PM

Replies:

compdude787: Thank you! I reckon I have used diagonal buildings for about ten percent of Erinsberg.

Kergelen: I have added your recommendations to the list. Also I can't believe you have not used SFBT's diagonal fillers before!

kbieniu7: It's about time I shared what I have discovered with the community, especially on Simtropolis. Thanks for your suggestions, they have been added to the tutorial mod list. In Erinsberg I have used an extensive amount of urban gridbusting which is a first for me.

art128: Yep, Rivit's RUM with transparent textures chosen. Those cabins are one of barbyw's lots- http://sc4devotion.com/csxlex/lex_filedesc.php?lotGET=866.

metarvo: I believe only Simcoug has posted files for diagonal zoneable residential. So they are, as you correctly said, rare indeed. Adding those W2W warehouses is a favourite industrial filler method of mine, it is quick, fills in a lot of space and looks good all at the same time.

Themistokles: Cheers! A good list should always have untouched goodies.

Akallan: Thank you! There will be other tutorials in the future. The next one I have in mind is for MMP farming.

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Entry 55: One Final Teaser of Erinsberg

The core city of Erinsberg is almost finished. I need to work on a couple more city blocks and then it is done. Over the next seven to ten days I will be working on the hills creating small villages and other interesting stuff. I will be winding down Erinsberg's development as I rotate into a bit of story writing, something which I have seriously neglected over these past several weeks as I focused on Erinsberg.

For now though enjoy one final teaser before I start cranking out proper entries.

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1.

I worked extensively on the south side of Erinsberg. It was the hardest area to fill in but it has become one of my favourite areas; there are some fabulous details which are somewhat revealed in this entry and will be fully shown in future updates.

2.

Erinsberg's downtown at night.

3.

Whilst looking for more W2W buildings, I made a list of every W2W building made by jasoncw and nofunk (of Simtropolis). The result was a few hours of fun plopping in their buildings with the building plop cheat.

4.

Trailer homes for the poor fill in this dead space between the small woodland and the highway. The actual dead space is a nightmare to fill in with normal lots, then inspiration came and I realised the answer was simple- MMPs.

5.

More diagonals.

6.

I just love W2W. Here I mix up East Coast USA buildings with British ones.

7.

One of the completed intersection areas in the south side of Erinsberg.

8.

I used Ferox's Polish W2W BATs to create an old city feel- pre 20th century.

9.

Even more diagonals.

10.

Mixed suburban residential/(industrial estates). This is deceptively hard to build right.

11.

I spent some time focusing on this small area. I tried to create a feeling of the old city modernized- with newer buildings sprouting through the old blocks and buildings.

12.

And MOAR diagonals.

13.

By restricting the NYBT buildings by picking only dull grey and red façades, the effect created worked nicely with the SAM 10.

14.

My facsimile of the LA city centre.

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Give it seven to ten days and I will be posting full-sized entries from Erinsberg which delve into the cities numerous, and diverse, areas. So stay tuned, the next eight weeks will see a lot of activity!