Adara - Update 184 - March 26, 2012

[threestooges]

Very nice work. I like the new farms that you've put in, and your pastures are very well done. I really like the overview of the first pic. Your neighborhoods really have a natural design to them. My only real critique (if you can call it that) is that some areas seem a bit too detailed/colorful. For example, in the last pic, there are numerous small patches of bold colored flowers amid other things. It's not necessarily a bad thing, but it seems to make some areas look overgrown. If that's the look you're going for, then you got it. The only reason I mention it is that the fenced pasture across the road from the cattle farm seems to be overgrown too which seems odd for a farm. Bits like the 6th pic near the water look much better in my opinion. Still color, but not as dense. One last suggestion (and then I'll leave you alone, heh heh) is that you should consider numbering your pics as it makes commenting on specific ones easier (1.01, 1.02, etc). Really nice update though. Looking forward to more.
-Matt

[GMT]

not a bad rural development I must say. good use of the rrp 

[Schulmanator]

Very nice work. I am glad to see it here to enjoy. 

[FrankU]

If you are referring to the big windmill with tulips around it, that is a building on a farm lot, not a park/landmark. Oppie's is a park/landmark lot and can't fulfill the same function as the farm one.

-Swamper

Swamper, yes indeed. I am aware of that. But I was not sure wether the farm was of the growing kind or of the plopping kind and secondly, there will surely be a way to change the Landmark building into a growable building? If the NAM is possible, and ploppable seasonal trees are possible and all the enourmous amounts of BATs and LOTs and.... you know what I mean... is possible, then this should be a piece of cake.
And in the worst case, there is alway the possiblity of plopping the windmill and letting the farm grow around it.

Anyway: the lot that surrounds the windmill is not really of a farming kind, but that is very easily edited in LE.

[Simpson]

Fantastic update my friend, the city is looking superb, as well 

[Battlecat]

Update 7 – Agriculture and Industry

Greetings and welcome back to Adara!  Today I'm going to put the finishing touches on one corner of the map which will include finally fixing up that industrial area.  But as always:

Dustin (thundercrack83): Glad the improved pictures are appealing to you.  I probably won't go back and fix the old images, partly because most of them are a work in progress format and partially because this remains a learning experience for me.  :-) Thanks for stopping by!

Albus of Garaway: Welcome to Adara!  Thanks for you very kind words, it means a lot to me. 

guurgkud: Welcome, thanks for stopping in!  I'm definitely shooting for realistic nature, so I'm glad you like it!

FrankU: Thanks for stopping in again!  Glad you like the results.  As Swamper77 has mentioned below, that windmill is part of a farm lot and can't be replaced.  I'll have a look at that lot you mentioned for future use though! 

Swamper77: Welcome!  Thanks for taking the time to let FrankU know about that lot!

io_bg: Welcome back!  Glad to hear you're enjoying the journal! 

Matt (threestooges): Hello again and thanks for all your comments!  You're right about some areas seeming a bit too bright.  I'll admit, I've been experimenting to see how different textures blend together, and what the final product looks like. 

In that last picture and the field surrounded by STR, I was going for the feel of an overgrown pasture, so I'm glad to hear I've succeeded.  I figure the owner has sort of given up on that pasture and has just let it go fallow.  There are some farms near my home that have done exactly that for whatever reason. 

The larger ranch in the sixth picture is more along the style I'm going for although I'm still experimenting.  And yes, you're absolutely right, the pictures should be numbered to make them easier to find, I had enough trouble finding the pictures you mentioned so I could make my reply!  Thanks for all your suggestions!

GMT: Welcome to Adara!  Thanks for stopping in!

Schulmanator: Greeting and welcome to Adara! Glad you enjoyed your visit!

Simpson: Greetings once again!  Please to hear you are continuing to enjoy this! 

Ok, now on with the current update, now with numbered pictures!

7-1: First of all, here's the finished valley with the logging facility.  As you can see, the operation is just getting started. 


7-2: Here's a second site where trees are just starting to get chopped down.


7-3: Alright, on with the farms for today, here's the first pair of farms for today. 


7-4: And moving on here's the rest of the farms I'm going to work on today. 


7-5: Here's a second trail in the works.  People just park on the side of the road to access this one. 


7-6: Here are the finished farms, first the final version of the farms shown in picture 7-3.


7-7: These farms are the ones first shown in picture 7-4, now with the final details.  You can see the trail in the bottom right corner near the covered bridge.


7-8: And one more set of farms, this area had it's detailing finished up finally.  The farm in the upper left corner was added today. 


7-9: Here's the farm that I pointed out in 7-8 in more detail. 


7-10:  Now to move on to the urban area.  Here's an overview of the urban area as it stands now. 


7-11: And here's the industrial area that needs some work.  The parts that will be staying include the large warehouse (Simgoober plopable) between the streets and the railway and the red brick building on the other side of the road


7-12: First things first, a tractor dealership seems quite appropriate for this city. 


7-13: Moving right along, I've fixed two problems in this picture.  The industrial has been removed from the main access to the city, and instead some more commercial buildings.  Secondly, I've re-developed the industry just opposite the railway tracks with some parking lots and some better buildings. 


7-14: On the opposite side of the road, now there are a couple warehouses, an equipment storage lot and a large animal vet. 


7-15: Here's an overview of the upgraded industrial area and commercial strip. 


7-16 To wrap things up, here's an overview shot of half this map now with the finished details.


So, this map tile is just about done.  I've got one more batch of farms coming in the next update and then something completely different in the next one.  Hope you all enjoyed this update, see you next time! 

Edit: No idea how I missed that double paste there, thanks for pointing it out FrankU!  I archive all my writing just in case, I guess I hit the paste button accidently while I was posting the update.  It's now corrected

[Albus of Garaway]

Woo hoo, new update!

I want to start by saying that I love the industrial area! You use the perfect method for sprucing it up. Very impressive, and that logging area is very nice! I like how you blended the pines with some of CP's trees. It's a very nice effect. Oh, and that last picture is stunning! Submit it to the SC4D Picture Competition!

[Nexis4Jersey]

Excellent work on the Farms and rural landscaping! 

[FrankU]

Ha, I also see that you rediscovered the copy-paste buttons 

Excellent work. So much detail.

[threestooges]

You certianly got the overgrown pasture look. I've seen it many times in RL around here too. I suppose I tend to think of citys in SC4 functioning with 100% efficiency that I seldom think of having rundown/unused areas like that. Your ranches (like in the 6th picture of last update) are really looking good. I really like the one in 7-8. This is some of the first uses I've seen of the lumber lots and they look like they're off to a good start. I love your inclusion of dirt paths and telephone poles (7-6 shows a great example of them). The area turned out well in 7-15, and I like the use of the curves to bring the tracks alongside the the road. Graceful, gradual, and a great little town. I also like the covered bridge (then again, I would). My only critique is that the grid still seems to be showing up in a few of the pics. Not bad in prep pics, but in pics like 7-11 - 7-14 it seems out of place. That's more of a personal thing though. It looks great overall. Very well done.
-Matt

[DarkLoki]

Amazing detailing, you spend a lot of time making everything perfect . The city has a very nice rural feeling.

[thundercrack83]

Looking good, Battlecat!

Once again, your ploppable water looks wonderful, and the forest areas look great, too!

Keep up the good work!

Dustin

[CommodoreTech]

Amazing! I wish I had your patience and attention to detail. The ploppable water and forest areas and especially the farms are amazing. Very nice.

[Battlecat]

Update 8 – Finishing up the Farmland

Hello everyone!  Today will be the second to last major update for the current map tile.  This has been coming along very nice, and it's been a great learning experience.  As always though, replies come first:

Albus of Garaway: Hello once again!  I'm glad my efforts to spruce up the industrial area helped!  I glad you like that last picture so much, the only reason I'm not going to submit that specific image is that it's not done quite yet.  There is still one valley left to detail on the right side!  But still thanks for you kind words!

Corey (Nexis): Welcome to Adara!  Thanks for your kind words and the thumbs up!  :-)

FrankU: I did indeed discover the copy-paste button although rather unintentionally!  Thanks for letting me know I'd made such a huge error, it probably happed when I was copying the forum code to an archive document.  Thanks for stopping in again! 

threestooges: Hello again, glad the number helps you out!  The beauty of Simcity 4 is that when it comes to farms you can have overgrown areas and still have your farms operating at 100%.  An oddity I've noticed is that I can remove all the fields from a farm just leaving the core farm building and it still offers the same number of jobs.  So I can create a farm that looks worn out visually, but in terms of gameplay it still provides job demand.

Thanks for all your other kind words!  As for the grid still showing up on occasion, it would appear I missed a few more images there.  Some of them are in progress images, but I should have replaced 7-14.  Getting better though! 

DarkLoki: Welcome!  I spend a great deal of time on the details, I'm glad to hear you like it! 

Dustin (thundercrack83): Hello once again!  The new plopable water is so easy to work with, I don't think I'm ever going to get tired of it!  Thanks for stopping in!

CommodoreTech: Welcome to Adara!  Thanks for your kind words. 

Now then, on with the update!

8-1: So the first thing that occurred to me today is that I have forgotten to put any sort of school in this town.  So, I'm going to add one at this location.


8-2: One quick plot later and a few details to improve the overall appearance of it.


8-3: Now moving along with the farming, first a batch of farms near the STR surrounded field.  The details are about half finished here. 


8-4: More new farms, this time along the highway out of town.  The details are mostly done here.


8-5: And the opposite side of the river from picture 8-3, the rest of the undetailed farms to the edge of the tile. 


8-6: Continuing from 8-5, I decided I liked the farm building but not the field, so I replaced it with fencing. 


8-7: This is the area with the completed details. 


8-8: I had an idea to try using the rye grass from the Rural Renewal project to blend the farm building in with the surrounding fields.  This was my first attempt in this image.  I'm actually fairly happy with the effect. 


8-9: Moving on to the last block of farms between the STR and the edge of the map. 


8-10: Developing a batch of farms.  I'm going to remove the fields from the pale green lot nearest to the edge, and the dirt field next to it.  I think I can do something interesting here.


8-11: Carefully dezoning all the farm tiles without killing the main building. 


8-12: Add in the fences and the details.  I'm making a second attempt at blending this farmhouse here.


8-13: And here's the final result.   My goal here was to have the pale green portions of the lot fade into the Rural Renewal Project farm.  What do you all think of the results? 


8-14: Here's another finished pair of farms in the same area. 


8-15: An overview of many of the farms I worked on today.


8-16: And to match the last update, here's a global shot of the other half of the map.  All three small urban areas are visible on this map.   


Ok, that takes care of this update, and almost the entire map tile.  Next time, I'll be wrapping up the map by working on this valley:


Thanks for stopping in!  See you all next time!

[Nexis4Jersey]

Too bad my region doesn't have an airport or i would fly in and take some fresh produce back, nice work again, it looks so peaceful and relaxing   

[Youcefk69]

very good job ! 

[jmyers2043]

8-13: And here's the final result.   My goal here was to have the pale green portions of the lot fade into the Rural Renewal Project farm.  What do you all think of the results? 

Well, well. That worked out very good. I also like the aerial view called 8-16. This was in enjoyable update to read and look at.

[Sciurus]

Waow
I can't believe it!! One day, you must explain me how you can do city as beautiful!!

Guillaume

[FrankU]

The blending in of the farm in 8-13, but also in 8-8 is great! Very good result.
Also your trick of bulldozing all farm tiles and replacing them qwith cattle on the base texture is very useful. I never thought of that.
Also I must compliment you with your choice of farms. You apparently cleaned up your plugins in a very balanced way. The farms fit together very nicely and the overal view is convincing.

You almost make me start a new rural region, but at the moment I am trying to develop an urban region, so I won't do that.

I'll visit your CJ MD (sorry) instead!

[Boernie]

Really nice urban aerea, as an grown-up country-guy I love it..