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ÆRDEN ~ new streets!

Started by vortext, May 31, 2013, 11:31:03 PM

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mgb204

Krashspeed - we miss you come back wherever you are - or at least let us know you are OK  :(.

Erm, I think for the RRW stuff you perhaps want to praise Willy / Eggman more than I - I've handled some textures and I'm looking to make a few buildings (not RRW specific I might add) but my contributions are quite minor here.

Also, if you send one of the broken BATs my way, perhaps the rendering error is fixable without the original 3DS Max/gMax files, I could take a look and see if it's just stuffed the texture UV mapping up on export, a common and fixable problem.

11241036

Your arrangement of these timberframe buildings look really great! Especially with the dirt roads. These buildings are much better than those I am using, especially because they are looking more dirty and "aged" (but well-aged). Really something entirely new, I even thought for a second that this isn't a screenshot from SC4... I'm missing a few stuff like shrubs, benches, fences and the like, but that's only a minor quibble. I'm looking forward to see more awesome pictures.

vortext

Hi all quick couple of words from my holiday address. First of thanks everyone for all the kind words, I greatly appreciate it! Individual replies will follow.

Secondly about Alex's models: rendering errors are indeed as bombardiere described, and iirc alex used 3dmax. It would be great if it were fixable in the reader. Robin, I'll send you one of the models next week when I'm back home. But now I'm gonna go for a swim! :sunny:
time flies like a bird
fruit flies like a banana

vortext

#363
Hey there, I just uploaded the first overlay texture set onto the LEX! Get it here!  :bnn:

In this download you'll find:

6 sets of grass overlays, 48 shapes per set
6 sets of dirts overlays, 48 shapes per set
5 sets of unpaved overlays, 32 shapes per set
8 sets of twotone base textures, 48 shapes per set

Which makes a grand total of 1120 textures. Yes. I may have gone a bit overlay crazy!  :party:

At any rate, here's the selection I made.



The decision which textures turn into overlay was primarily based on visual aesthetics. That is: based on which textures could be rotated and mirrored in the LE without looking (too) weird. The decision which combinations of two-tone base textures to include was in large part informed by my own lotting needs, there're so many combinations to make! Feel free to let me know your preferences and if I happen to like it I will consider churning out that combo.

Onto the basic set of shapes then. Admittedly 48 may be a bit daunting at first, I've struggled with it for sure but with some getting used to it allows for some pretty neat lotting imho


And this is with just overlays!

Now, I'll also be the first to admit some shapes are frustratingly missing, something I found out after the fact, and it can be hard at times to carry on some paths, or to make the transition to different path widths. Once again there are so many possible combinations, I had a hard time figuring out which path overlays would be the most useful to include. So with an eye on available time and file size I decided to not include any at all, and instead address it later on.

However, the addition of the two-toned base textures allows for greater flexibility, since you can then effectively have three, four or even five different textures on one tile. Also remember that in the SC4PIM you can actually use overlapping overlays as long as they're from the same set, so you can do stuff like this:


Trust me when I say there are overlapping overlays in this picture.

A final remark: within the same texture set I noticed a slight color difference between the base and overlay in zoom 4. However time did not permit a thorough investigation as to why this is, let alone come up with a possible solution. And that it's as far as the Grass 'n Dirt overlays are concerned.

It may be a bit disappointing for some the current release does not contain pavement overlays yet, as judging by the comments and their usage it seems they are well received. Thing is that, unlike the grasses and dirts, I can't rely on one and the same set of shapes to derive the overlays. For instance: simply cutting a pavement texture in half will disrupt the pattern. Moreover, most pavements can't be mirrored in the LE – without looking stupid that is – and thus require multiple corner pieces. In short: tailoring overlays to each pavement texture is taking longer than anticipated. Besides, I personally had the greatest need for grass and dirt overlays to begin with.  ;D

Rest assured though the next planned release will be a Paths & Pavements overlay pack (as per standard policy release date is yet unknown). And there may be one release after that containing Farm and Garden textures, though I'm not sure about that yet. I may actually update the base texture set in between because I've made some new pavements.  ;)






Quote from: mgb204 on August 17, 2015, 01:08:18 PM
Figured I should chip in too, perhaps a bit late but if indeed the pox has come to your cities that would be very sad. By the sounds of things it seems you've not lost a large amount of stuff in the process - it's hard to imagine how you'd feel loosing a region like this, one can only guess at the countless hours of toil behind its creation.

Everything I read about the pox wouldn't suggest T21's could be the cause, if you made changes to the RTK settings of prop exemplars used in T21s then maybe it's possible, or perhaps with the nightimestate change theory that's recently been proposed also. But simply removing the props and saving the tile, whilst that's really bad practise - don't berate yourself, I get into much trouble with all the modding I do making a mess of cities from time to time - I didn't think it could cause the pox?

Anyhow, hopefully you can get everything back on it's feet, about 2/3rds of the time I suffer loss due to CTD's, I find I'm happier with the second attempt so it's not always a negative.

Yeah you're right, I rebuild much of the tile to much greater satisfaction. As for haphazardly changing/removing stuff in the plugins: I recall one particular test tile where I kept working on lots which had already grown. In other words I was careless with bulldozing/saving procedure before I made changes. Besides a considerable number of immortal lots and props, after some time it appeared as if the tile had become poxed as well. This strengthened my opinion the pox is a symptom of memory corruption, which itself can be brought about by a different number of things.


Quote from: manga rivotra on August 17, 2015, 02:23:50 PM
"Prop pox" is a nightmare that I had the misfortune to know several time ( like a lot of people i suppose ) without other solution than to use my hundred save game  &mmm. In these cases there, it is very difficult to not give up. So, I am very happy that you have find a way to continue this great MD and thanks to amaze us again :thumbsup:

In hindsight the damage was undone pretty quick, but it did serve as a warning to not mess about. Thanks!


Quote from: bombardiere on August 18, 2015, 01:29:30 AM
Sad to hear about the prop pox. It is a fear that it lurking out there.

Quote from: vortext on August 17, 2015, 12:31:43 PM

The BATs you see are by Xannepan / JENX which he sent me with the intention to make a medieval lot set - which I'm obviously still working on. However, seeing he has moved on to Cities and numerous models have rendering errors I'm not sure if they'll ever be made public.

Shame. These medieval half timber houses look superb. And in to style of what I am currently working with. What kind of rendering errors these have? The buildings looks squashed in certain zooms and orientations? It has happen to me too. Especially when I had a brief test with 3ds Max. I have read a post that it may be fixed with iLive reader, but I haven't tested it.

Quote from: vortext on August 17, 2015, 12:31:43 PM
About the Historic Harbor project: we had plans for both your ideas (alternative base and rail addon) and much, much more. Unfortunately Krashspeed went MIA shortly after release, almost a year ago now, and he hasn't been online since.  &mmm

Another shame. I really liked this project. Very much into what I like in SC4. I don't have Krashspeed's skill level, so sadly I can't pick it up.

Yeah it was a good scare. You'll be happy to know it is indeed very much possible to fix the rendering issues in the Reader. Thanks to Robin (mgb204) I learned a neat trick and I have since restored all the models. Now it's only a matter of lotting. . . ::)


Quote from: noahclem on August 18, 2015, 06:46:17 AM
I almost described those beautiful pictures as "unreal", meant as a compliment, but I think they'd be better described as "amazingly real" :D  Stunning work which again showcases your attention to detail and prowess with textures. Glad you seem to have resolved your pox issues (yay for backups!). I'll have to read back through to pick up all the details and anything else I've missed but wanted to let you know how much I enjoyed the update first :)

Thanks for the kind words Noah! Back-ups ftw indeed.  :D


Quote from: Vizoria on August 18, 2015, 08:30:50 AM
What a lovely medieval town, while the custom tree controller is pretty amazing spawning grass and flowers around the trees. Also I am glad you have resolved most of the prop pox in your older city tiles.

Thanks! Though I should note the flora you see is the result of making multiple passes with different controllers.


Quote from: Pat on August 18, 2015, 12:10:34 PM
Vortex I read the whole thing on Prop pox and I learned a lot (bad pun) ;-) anyways thank god for a backup, I know i was happy I stored a backup of my cities to my XHD cause back in april of this year my puter had a meltdown and got wiped and nothing from SC4 was salvaged by the repair man ugh....

Thanks Pat! Bummer to hear about your pc, that's about the worst thing that can happen (not just in terms of SC4). Glad to see you around again!


Quote from: feyss on August 19, 2015, 11:49:37 AM
This game is so cruel. You spend hours and hours trying to make something good looking and it ruins everything in less than one second for no apparent reason.


Great pictures though. It just looks like another video game. I can't wait to see more  :thumbsup:

Yeah the first suspicions were unnerving, the subsequent confirmation disheartening, but all is well again. I'm looking forward to making new pictures. Thanks!


Quote from: romualdillo on August 19, 2015, 12:17:50 PM
I'm glad you could recover most of the city tiles!!! I'm looking forward to seeing more of the new and improved city!!!

Thank you Daniel!


Quote from: carlfatal on August 19, 2015, 12:30:12 PM
Thank you for the speedy answers, Eric!  :)

One thing is, that I really understand, why Alex decided to leave us and join the C:SL community, I tried the game and was totally impressed by alone the vanilla version. And although I know his decision, I would think, he never would be angry, if you would ask him to repair the BATs. I mean, these are damn great models, and they would give a lot of opportunities to create old town centers. And also I am sure, that I am not the only one, who would like to build with them. ;)

To the harbor: I hope, Krashspeed is fine, - I mean, this sounds strange, if someone vanishes without a word.  ()sad()
Making BATs by myself - well I only have a netbook, and I don´t try to install the BAT here. I am still happy, that I can play SC4 and use all the tools like the reader or the PIM. The only thing I know, is how to create lots - and now I try to "play" SC4 the first time with fun.  $%Grinno$%
But I really would like to know, how to make textures, mostly cause I am totally a railroad freak, and realistic rail properties still are, what I miss in SC4, although I see mgb´s work on the RRW.

But I am not here to talk about all this OT stuff. I am eager to see more pictures of Aerden!  :thumbsup:

You're welcome! As I said: the rendering errors in JENX models are fixed, now it's a matter of lotting. . and you know that can take a while.  ;) Thanks.


Quote from: mgb204 on August 19, 2015, 01:51:01 PM
Krashspeed - we miss you come back wherever you are - or at least let us know you are OK  :(.

Erm, I think for the RRW stuff you perhaps want to praise Willy / Eggman more than I - I've handled some textures and I'm looking to make a few buildings (not RRW specific I might add) but my contributions are quite minor here.

Also, if you send one of the broken BATs my way, perhaps the rendering error is fixable without the original 3DS Max/gMax files, I could take a look and see if it's just stuffed the texture UV mapping up on export, a common and fixable problem.

I too hope Krashspeed will some day make a return, however briefly it may be. Thanks again for your help with the UV mapping business!  :thumbsup:


Quote from: 11241036 on August 19, 2015, 02:39:01 PM
Your arrangement of these timberframe buildings look really great! Especially with the dirt roads. These buildings are much better than those I am using, especially because they are looking more dirty and "aged" (but well-aged). Really something entirely new, I even thought for a second that this isn't a screenshot from SC4... I'm missing a few stuff like shrubs, benches, fences and the like, but that's only a minor quibble. I'm looking forward to see more awesome pictures.

Thanks for the kind words! As for the lotting: keep in mind I'm aiming at a historic recreation of sorts, so fancy stuff like public furniture will not make an appearance. Instead I'm keeping these lots fairly simple for now, so I can dress them up with MMPs ingame. On that note, I could really use a gutted animals and intestines MMP as that was a more common street sight back in the day.  :D
time flies like a bird
fruit flies like a banana

romualdillo

I think there's someone who's going to edit his lots...   :bnn:

vortext

#365
To those three people who have already downloaded: please be advised to re-download asap. I switched the IIDs of two-tone base texture sets around for better visibility in the LE. Subsequent sets of brownish-greenish textures made it hard to tell them apart, so now they're in a different order.  :)
time flies like a bird
fruit flies like a banana

FrankU

Quote from: romualdillo on September 13, 2015, 11:40:04 AM
I think there's someone who's going to edit his lots...   :bnn:

I hope you are not referring to me. I do indeed feel the temptation, but it would mean I have to completely remake more than a hundred lots. Sorry for that.  :-[

But hey, Vortext.... Great work! I am certainly going to use them.  &apls

Girafe

The Floraler

This is the end, hold your breath and count to ten, feel the earth move, and then...

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *    *   *   *   *   *    * 

carlfatal

Quote from: vortext on September 13, 2015, 11:07:03 AM
You're welcome! As I said: the rendering errors in JENX models are fixed, now it's a matter of lotting. . and you know that can take a while.  ;)
Yeah I did read it.  :) But to be honest: I´m still only interested in model files, if it comes to framework. I still have an unfinished set of old town relots on my harddrive, and sooner or later I will continue with it.  :-\

Quote from: vortext on September 13, 2015, 11:07:03 AM...As for the lotting: keep in mind I'm aiming at a historic recreation of sorts, so fancy stuff like public furniture will not make an appearance. Instead I'm keeping these lots fairly simple for now, so I can dress them up with MMPs ingame. On that note, I could really use a gutted animals and intestines MMP as that was a more common street sight back in the day.  :D

Good idea! In the past I loved detailed lots, but with all the MMPs around this changed completely. Sometimes I see situations, where the work in the LE is still the better solution, but more and more I can find myself erasing props from lots to get free space for MMPing...  :D

And at last: I love your new textures.  &apls

Simcoug

The Seahawks lost yesterday, but seeing your texture set on the LEX turned a bad day into a great one :)

Bipin

These are pretty nifty! I envision these being a dependency in the near future for my BATs. Thank you!  &apls

vortext

#371
So, over the week I did some lotting and quickly found myself annoyed with something. Despite being visually separate in the LE, it was still bit of hassle to find the corresponding sets of overlays for the two-toned base textures. Luckily the SC4PIM has the option to create your own custom groups of textures (and props), which is its best feature if you ask me. For example you can put your favorite fence props, from multiple packs, into one custom group so you no longer have to first load all the props and then stare at thumbnails for ages in order to find that one 8m section of white picket fence. But I digress.

Anyhow, I wasn't particularly looking forward to manually drag close to a thousand textures into custom groups, as that is how it's done ordinarily. Then I wondered if I couldn't just directly edit the groups.ini file, since I have the texture IIDs at hand and some limited scripting capabilities. Thus I spend the better part of this evening figuring out how to put the IIDs in the proper syntax so the SC4PIM could read it, with desired results.  ()stsfd()






For those interested I've uploaded the text file [linkie]. Simply copy/paste the contents into groups.ini, which is located in the SC4PIM installation folder. To be on the safe side, please make of backup of groups.ini beforehand. Needless to say I'm not responsible for any mishaps which may occur.  "$Deal"$




Quote from: romualdillo on September 13, 2015, 11:40:04 AM
I think there's someone who's going to edit his lots...   :bnn:

Who could it be?!  &Thk/( :D Can't wait to see them in action!  :)


Quote from: FrankU on September 14, 2015, 12:09:29 AM
Quote from: romualdillo on September 13, 2015, 11:40:04 AM
I think there's someone who's going to edit his lots...   :bnn:

I hope you are not referring to me. I do indeed feel the temptation, but it would mean I have to completely remake more than a hundred lots. Sorry for that.  :-[

But hey, Vortext.... Great work! I am certainly going to use them.  &apls

Thanks Frank! Totally understand you don't feel like relotting. I'm a bit hesitant to do so myself, and that just concerns about 20 lots or so.


Quote from: Girafe on September 14, 2015, 03:19:56 AM
Good job Vortext  :thumbsup:

Thanks!


Quote from: carlfatal on September 14, 2015, 07:59:38 AM
Quote from: vortext on September 13, 2015, 11:07:03 AM
You're welcome! As I said: the rendering errors in JENX models are fixed, now it's a matter of lotting. . and you know that can take a while.  ;)
Yeah I did read it.  :) But to be honest: I´m still only interested in model files, if it comes to framework. I still have an unfinished set of old town relots on my harddrive, and sooner or later I will continue with it.  :-\

Quote from: vortext on September 13, 2015, 11:07:03 AM...As for the lotting: keep in mind I'm aiming at a historic recreation of sorts, so fancy stuff like public furniture will not make an appearance. Instead I'm keeping these lots fairly simple for now, so I can dress them up with MMPs ingame. On that note, I could really use a gutted animals and intestines MMP as that was a more common street sight back in the day.  :D

Good idea! In the past I loved detailed lots, but with all the MMPs around this changed completely. Sometimes I see situations, where the work in the LE is still the better solution, but more and more I can find myself erasing props from lots to get free space for MMPing...  :D

And at last: I love your new textures.  &apls

Thanks! Yeah, keeping the lots simple for MMP-ing later on not only allows for more variety ingame, it also considerably speeds up the lotting itself. As for the models, I'll see if I can get in touch with Alex as a prop pack would basically be a matter of dat-packing my wip folder.  &idea


Quote from: Simcoug on September 14, 2015, 08:39:54 AM
The Seahawks lost yesterday, but seeing your texture set on the LEX turned a bad day into a great one :)

Glad to hear I brightened your day!


Quote from: Bipin on September 14, 2015, 07:45:04 PM
These are pretty nifty! I envision these being a dependency in the near future for my BATs. Thank you!  &apls

Thanks! Looking forward what you come up with!
time flies like a bird
fruit flies like a banana

Girafe

Hi Vortext,

I absolutely love this texture. I would like to have a plain one, straight no diagonal. Would it be possible?  :thumbsup:

The Floraler

This is the end, hold your breath and count to ten, feel the earth move, and then...

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *    *   *   *   *   *    * 

vortext

#373
Yep, it sure it is!



Not quite happy how the tiles interlock along the diagonals though. Then again, it probably isn't even visible in game, which I haven't seen yet.

Speaking of textures, been making some new base textures. First one for all your fancy courtyard needs.


zoom 6

Secondly one that needs some attention still. I was going for a black granite look.  %wrd


zoom 6

And finally one which needs bit of backstory. Recently I came across this:



Yes, that is wooden pavement, so-called Nicolson pavement. Needless to say I was intrigued by the concept. But more so by the challenge it posed to turn it into a texture because each tile has a unique pattern to it, opposed to ordinary pavement where I rely on various noise filters to fill the tiles. Here another example which shows the wood patterns. At any rate, here is my attempt at it.


zoom 6

Even though I could only manage 5 unique patterns, which are randomly distributed over 25 tiles, I think it turned out rather decent. For the first iteration that is.  :D
time flies like a bird
fruit flies like a banana

Girafe

The Floraler

This is the end, hold your breath and count to ten, feel the earth move, and then...

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *    *   *   *   *   *    * 

FrankU

Hmmmm.... more textures to fill my lots..... Nice concepts and nice development!

romualdillo

Hmmm... I think I'm going to wait until you release all your textures before changing my lots... I don't want to lose any of them!!  &apls

art128

And to conclude our special 4in1 OSITM for the anniversary month at SC4Devotion, let us welcome one of the most outstanding MD created, from a not less outstanding author! Congratulations, Vortext!

I'll take a quiet life... A handshake of carbon monoxide.

Props & Texture Catalog

vortext

#378


And blammo! First update in before anyone even had a chance to comment.  ;D

At any rate, welcome to the last 4-in-1 OSITM during SC4Ds birthday month. Keeping in line with the previous candidates I too will show a lot of wip pics this week. In particular I'll focus on rebuilding Traelonisk after the city tile was struck with the prop pox (more on that here. And fun fact, todays banner shows some of the poxed farm fields). However, to start with some pictures taken in the old city tile. Enjoy!



The old trail. This bit was replaced with proper streets later on.



Same trail, different meadow.


Also, to the best of my recollection I've never mentioned before that this mmp-ed trail actually is one continuous path throughout half the region. It goes from this tile, located roughly in the middle of the valley, through the mountain pass and a thick forest out of the region, as seen in the three story updates.

Speaking of which, the next and final picture for today I'd wanted to use as the opening scene for the next installment, once the Potyomkin brothers had settled in the city. However, I kinda lost inspiration so that story line has run its course for now. That said, I do have a new series of story driven updates mapped out, it's just that the regional developments need to catch up first!  :D



Forests making way for more farm fields.


And that's it for today, will be back shortly!





Quote from: Girafe on October 19, 2015, 03:37:20 PM
These textures are superb, thanks a lot  ;)

Thanks!


Quote from: FrankU on October 20, 2015, 04:46:51 PM
Hmmmm.... more textures to fill my lots..... Nice concepts and nice development!

Why yes, never have too many textures, right?!   :D  Thanks Frank!


Quote from: romualdillo on October 21, 2015, 03:19:15 PM
Hmmm... I think I'm going to wait until you release all your textures before changing my lots... I don't want to lose any of them!!  &apls

Maybe I misunderstand you, however, just to be clear: any update to the base texture pack will always include all the previously released textures!


Quote from: art128 on November 24, 2015, 03:11:17 AM
And to conclude our special 4in1 OSITM for the anniversary month at SC4Devotion, let us welcome one of the most outstanding MD created, from a not less outstanding author! Congratulations, Vortext!
snip

Thanks for the kind words Arthur!  :)
time flies like a bird
fruit flies like a banana

Girafe

Congrats for the OSITM  &apls &apls &apls

Lovely rural scenes  ;)
The Floraler

This is the end, hold your breath and count to ten, feel the earth move, and then...

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *    *   *   *   *   *    *