New Graphics - Blender ".blend" thread (Works In Progress)

[StRaVeN]

m-m-m Do you think, that yellow is a good color for the house roof?

[athanasios]

And I worried that there were no new posts for a while. Good!
Yellow is not common (there are yellow roof tiles though) but second attempt looks nice! A variation in Tycoon buildings is always welcome!
Try some texturing on the small roof too. Is it the dog's house or entrance to the basement?
A nice addition could be some stuff (boxes, an old vehicle) in the front: the pavement seems to have too much cement for a cottage house. You can remove a part and replace with ground, add some trees...

[Heathen]

Looking at these awesome models you guys are creating I decided to give blender a go, and I have to say for such a small downlaod it's very powerful!

Anyhoo looking through the wiki for something to have a bash at, I saw a bank was unclaimed, so decided to start. I did grab the lighting/scene file, but I just couldnt figure out how to change the views then.

I have this so far:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v60/a ... ankwip.png

I'm wondering if there is a way to copy/paste or import it into the tile/lighting/camera scene when I get more done so I can see it a bit better?

As an old 3ds user when making models for a BF:Vietnam mod, importing other models was second nature, I just cant suss it in Blender :S

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v60/a ... 82/3ds.png
See

Also, sorry for not putting in the images like the rest of you, I dunno how, should I just link them? (1st post )

Anyhoo bedtime, damn blender keeping me awake.... reminds me of the old days modelling a tank for a week ^.^

[Aracirion]

Hello Heathen,

is your model a Max or Blender model? If you made it in blender, just load the template file, and then use the append command (see attachment). If it's in max, you can give the import function (right under append) a go, however I have had my problems importing LWOs.

For switching the view just use the num-block. 0 is the camera view.

Btw, there are other people using max, and they even made an equivalent lighting setup so you can render in there, saves a lot of time if you're used to max.

[Heathen]

Aye it's in blender Aracirion. In max I was used to making low poly models. Them tanks and choppers are about 3k poly if i recall correctly, but for this the polycount is irrelevant, and It's been a year or so since I touched Max.

I did actually import a tank into blender, but like you said, there were problems! the different meshes were not aligned correctly.

I've opened the lighting scene and tried to add it via append, but It is not appearing for some reason, is there any reason for this?

I've attached my bank incase I'm not doing something right with it.

Its a .txt, just change it to .blend.

[Aracirion]

After loading the lighting (12,5x25) and clicking append, look for your bank blend file and click it. Now a list appears of different stuff this file contains. Click "objects". Now select everything that belongs to your bank, I suppose that's everything except the camera and the lamp. Then click "load library" (top right). Does hat work? It worked for me. You just have to shift it around a bit to match the tiles.

[brupje]

m-m-m Do you think, that yellow is a good color for the house roof?

I admit it looks a bit cartoonisch, but I like it And it's a game so if we can have hanging glass buildings, we can have yellow roofs

And I worried that there were no new posts for a while. Good!
Yellow is not common (there are yellow roof tiles though) but second attempt looks nice! A variation in Tycoon buildings is always welcome!
Try some texturing on the small roof too. Is it the dog's house or entrance to the basement?
A nice addition could be some stuff (boxes, an old vehicle) in the front: the pavement seems to have too much cement for a cottage house. You can remove a part and replace with ground, add some trees...

Well to be honest, I don't have a clue what it is. It's in the original too. I guess it's a basement entrance for coal or something. I think I will make doors in it.

I don't want to make it too busy. Maybe we should make multiple versions of buildings, like different colors of roofs, instead of a bike a car etc. That's easy enough to do, and would make a nice addition to the game.

[brupje]

Aye it's in blender Aracirion. In max I was used to making low poly models. Them tanks and choppers are about 3k poly if i recall correctly, but for this the polycount is irrelevant, and It's been a year or so since I touched Max.

I did actually import a tank into blender, but like you said, there were problems! the different meshes were not aligned correctly.

I've opened the lighting scene and tried to add it via append, but It is not appearing for some reason, is there any reason for this?

I've attached my bank incase I'm not doing something right with it.

Its a .txt, just change it to .blend.

I post my blend files zipped. It saves a lot of space

I always use 12.5x12.5.blend, and save it with a different name.

[Heathen]

After loading the lighting (12,5x25) and clicking append, look for your bank blend file and click it. Now a list appears of different stuff this file contains. Click "objects". Now select everything that belongs to your bank, I suppose that's everything except the camera and the lamp. Then click "load library" (top right). Does hat work? It worked for me. You just have to shift it around a bit to match the tiles.

It did indeed, I'll post the pic later when i have edited out all the black surrounding space, but for now I must pick up the missus for her shopping trip before I'm late.. again!

Thanks

[Heathen]

After a bit more fiddling my bank is starting to take shape, and I even managed to get it into the scene from the wiki

Here it is so far, any suggestions to help this noob along?



vs

[brupje]

After a bit more fiddling my bank is starting to take shape, and I even managed to get it into the scene from the wiki

Here it is so far, any suggestions to help this noob along?



vs

Looking good! Very close to the original.

Some suggestions:
1. Pavement on the roof is somewhat weird However, you could use this texture for the stairs.
2. I put some red rectangles around some minor moddeling issues in the attached image. You probably have to weld some verticles together (select both and press alt-m), and/or have to devide some edges (select edge, press w)
3. Maybe place something on the empty part of the roof.

[LordOfThePigs]

Hi,

I'm not a very good artist myself, but it seems that the walls are a bit too bland and need a bit of texturing. The window on the top of the roof looks too bland too, you might want it to reflect the sky (so we can see some clouds in it). Also how about adding some things on the big windows. The original bank seems to have some kind of white banner stuck on the windows, probably carrying the name of the bank, you might want to do the same. Don't use any text though, try using some nice logo graphics or something, it's been established that text doesn't look very well, and is not internationalizable in rendered images...

[brupje]

Hi,
The original bank seems to have some kind of white banner stuck on the windows, probably carrying the name of the bank, you might want to do the same.

That's just a try at reflection I guess ;p

[joed]

vs

Good start so far.

My comments:
- Scales seems too small (appearance), the building looks like it's only 1 floor whilst the original appears as two floors. Adding 2 windows in height would help.
- Around the dome (base and top), I think a colonade would be better rather than the windows, so it looks like people could get up there.

Here are a couple of examples:

[mexicoshanty]

I think the thing that makes the building look smaller than it should are the stairs. Try making the individual steps smaller by adding more of them to cover the same distance they do now.

EDIT: Also once you add the some plants into the garden boxes you'll get a bit more scale into things.

[Heathen]

Thanks for the feedback

I will admit, texturing is far from my strongpoint, to be honest, I'm usually quite awfuel when it comes to texturing - having never really done it before. The concrete on the roof just looked a lot better than grey ^.^

I also agree with the dome on top, As the reference image was tiny (even did some searches to see which bank the ttd one was referenced to, if any) I just hazarded a guess at windows. I like the look of the colonade style much better and will attempt that instead.

And yeah the red rectangled sections of the roof are from extruded sections of the roof overlapping, and since I just figured out how to weld verts in blender these should be sorted.

Not sure why the dome is like that, could be the way I've used the "make smooth" tool on the dome, but not the sticky out bits. Hopefully using 2 seperat meshes for the dome itself and the sticky out bits will help, we'll see

I'll also try doubling the amount of steps, and raising the overall building height a little, but plants.. I might have to mess with the lighthouse for now until I figure out how to do real looking ones myself!

Oo quick Questions,
1) how can I hide/show certain objects in my scene? this has been annoying me for a few days.

2) How can I add an image as a texture to use on an object?

[brupje]

Thanks for the feedback

Oo quick Questions,
1) how can I hide/show certain objects in my scene? this has been annoying me for a few days.

2) How can I add an image as a texture to use on an object?

1) select the object, press m (or move to layer in the object menu), toggle layers on/off.

2) the easy way is to change the material, by adding one or more textures. The hard way is to do some UV mapping, but you will have to read some tutorials on that

[Heathen]

I found an easier way, numpad / hides all other objects than the one/multiple objects you have selected

UV maps, done that in 3ds for my military models.. If im along the right lines anyway, the line drawings for a skinner to skin onto? I wasn't too bad at that, but again, trying to find it in blender is a pita, but once i find it i can bet it's easier than max, like most things so far

I also managed to get an image onto a material by Texture button>add new>type>image that'll do me for now until I find I need to UV something.

[Heathen]

Tried the colonade (from st peters ref pic, thanks joed), and it didnt turn out too bad, and looks much better than the boring windows imho!

Added double the amount of steps, raised the overall building height, as well as dome height. Changed the grass colour to one colour dropped off the reference pic (looks like a pool table now though), Fixed the roof overlapping verts problem. Added a gravel to the roof, and a kinda marbley stone type to the columns, steps etc. Still need a decent wall texture that will apply without it stretching all over the show, and to fix the strange shadows atop the dome.

Still stuck on adding plants etc, can't imagine how ima gonna make them, ah well, can but try.

Anyhoo, pic before bed before im late for work.. again..

[SSX]

Tried the colonade (from st peters ref pic, thanks joed), and it didnt turn out too bad, and looks much better than the boring windows imho!

Looks great.

Things I would still add:
1. The large windows on the building would look better with sills. Now the glass seems to touch the ground.
2. The columns could use capitals and bases.
3. The windows would probably look better with mullions (or muttons, depending on your geographical venacular) rather than one large sheet of glass. The skylight could use them too.