Request : green buildings

[evarburg]

(Is there a dedicated thread about requests here ? If there is, apologies.)

Green buildings are beginning to sprout here and there in RL, but I don't see any currently being batted for SC4 (if I am mistaken, please enlighten me ! ) Isn't it time that we got a bit of prospective thinking into the game, instead of duplicating (however beautifully) what is ? I know that the technical possibilities of the available game tools put certain limites to what can be done re the shape of buildings (curves, for instance), but a lot can still be made (and has been made) out of the usual boxy shapes, either as projects or as actual buildings. And now gird your loins for an onslaught of pictures ; those are not requests per se, just examples.













OK,t there two we can do with MMPs and such, but :





And it is not only buildings ; can't we also have more, ah, sexy bridges, either road-rail or pedestrian ? :











(now just to blow your mind  -- and damn, I can't find again a largr version of the last one)

[Terring7]

If I could BAT, I would made more from this kind of buildings. We have tons of grey-and-brown buildings but very few green ones.

[pressus]

Architecture is art, unfortunately not always, but it has a colossal future 

[evarburg]

If I could BAT, I would made more from this kind of buildings. We have tons of grey-and-brown buildings but very few green ones.

Hi, Terring. I too wish you could bat ! :-) Seems to me some of the buildings in my post woud be a breeze for many batters, for instance Mattb325, JPShriffer or Reddonquixotte (among others still batting). And Korber seems to be able to do ANYthing ! But I dare not disturb them. Also, nowadays, seems that small requests are heard, but not big ones. Then again, I'll have to put my mouth where my mouth is (er...) and ask.

[mattb325]

^^While a bit thin on the ground, there's a number of bats available with green roofs. Here are a couple of stand-out ones that I use from other creators:

* https://community.simtropolis.com/files/file/26964-vip-orange-an-der-alster-1/
* https://community.simtropolis.com/files/file/28181-lavaughn-biotech/

I've made some:
* https://sc4devotion.com/csxlex/lex_filedesc.php?lotGET=3612
* https://sc4devotion.com/csxlex/lex_filedesc.php?lotGET=3584
* https://community.simtropolis.com/files/file/32073-city-link-transport-hub/
(there are a few others as well: apartments, hotels, industrials, where I have included trees and shrubs on the roof in both gmax and 3ds style models, but listing these is enough)

And, not quite a green roof, but a huge seasonal green platform on which the building sits....
* https://sc4devotion.com/csxlex/lex_filedesc.php?lotGET=3624

I'm sure there are plenty more available   

[evarburg]

I have all the buildings you link to, Matt, as well as a few others -- and I would have linked to them if anyone had asked (well, I should have linked to them from the get go, in fact ! But with the pictures the post was already hellishly long !). And yes, I confess you're the one I've been thinking about most when talking about batters who could do it -- I just not so secretly now wish you'd do more, and  perhaps more like the ones in the picture, where the greenery is more pronounced CT14,on simtropolis, tells me there is definitely a technical problem with trees in gmax, though, perhaps it is the reason why greens like trees and buches are not more prominent in existing would-be green buildings. Is it your opinion too ?

[mattb325]

Apart from the fact that gmax is very old and has a number of limitations, it isn't impossible to make trees that look OK in gmax. I released approximately 100 trees and shrubs made in gmax of varying quality. Some I downloaded and tweaked (which I acknowledged in the prop pack description) but I made a large number from scratch.

You need to think outside the box though; most modelers approach 3D modelling mathematically. I found that thinking mathematically for gmax and flora doesn't give the best results; you need to take artistic liberties and be creative. Here's a selection of different methods that I have used to build trees in gmax between approx 2005-2012:

Geosphere method:

Flag method plus high quality map:

Flag method plus Maxis map:

Modeled leaves with an array:



I think they still look alright, and are perfectly acceptable to this day:


Note the conifers in the bottom left were all rendered by me using gmax, too:

The flag method once rendered:


Of course 3dsMax makes it a hell of a lot easier to get better results:


But there is a very old saying: it is a poor tradesman who blames his tools.

[pressus]

...
You need to think outside the box though; ... you need to take artistic liberties and be creative.

This is a holy truth and that's why your work is so good 

[CT14]

Huzzah! I'm going to try those methods out, thanks mattb325!