Rayline Tower

[RadicalOne]

It's an R$$$, with an 8400-resident capacity. How is it?
Please note that the textures and nightlighting are still in progress and will most certainly improve.

Does anyone have any idea what is causing the odd shadow over the lower third of the tower? I've seen similar effects on other BATs, such as NDEX's Vendel Tower.

[SimGoober]

Ahh.. recycling an old design... 

That shadow is caused by using too small a lighting rig I believe. 

[citymax]

nice !!

[RadicalOne]

Ahh.. recycling an old design... 

Are you referring to Prism Tower Condos, or the old Rayline? I certainly am recycling the old one into the new - it still is the same building at heart. Everything here is an upgrade of sorts of the original design. As for any similarity with Prism Tower, it is likely that all of my Residential Towers will have some form of a roof ornament.

That shadow is caused by using too small a lighting rig I believe.

I suspected as much. I'll fix that.

Here it is:


Here's a roof update:
I added a bit of roof clutter.


What else is needed on this tower?

[Sciurus]

Just an awesome work!

Guillaume

[SimGoober]

What are your plans for the base? Looks like you have a small lobby there now. Making it 2 or 3 storys tall may balance it with the height of the tower, and at a glance, there is no obvious entrance.... 

[RadicalOne]

What are your plans for the base? Looks like you have a small lobby there now. Making it 2 or 3 storys tall may balance it with the height of the tower.

I can double its height, sure.

and at a glance, there is no obvious entrance....

I've added two since this image upload.

Does this mean it's ready for the (likely 24-hour-long) export?

[SimFox]

What this tower needs is a working lighting rig. The one you are using now doesn't. Ask around for a fixed rig or fix it yourself. It really is very simple procedure. tedious but simple. You'd need increase "catchment area of all lights in the rig.
look there are no shadows and odd lit up bits and pieces here and there...

Apart from that... well I think SimGoober meant more than just "tiara"
Given that the tower is in fact a twin... at least it seem that way the cross-section is perhaps a bit to small to be both structurally sound and provide meaningful residential space, particularly as you market it as R€€€

Base is also needs to be FAR more substantial. Right now it doesn't look realistic....

[SimGoober]

You may want to show a new shot of the base, but one more idea. SimFox hit on a point; the tower IS rather thin, so where is the living space? With elevators and ductwork, there wouldn't be as much space per floor as you might think.  Maybe an elevator shaft up the backside? (wait, that sounded off....) You have an indention on the front and back of each side in the center. Maybe on the back, you could revers that, having a protrusion out that contains the elevators?

[RadicalOne]

You may want to show a new shot of the base

I will.

the tower IS rather thin, so where is the living space? With elevators and ductwork, there wouldn't be as much space per floor as you might think.  Maybe an elevator shaft up the backside? You have an indention on the front and back of each side in the center. Maybe on the back, you could revers that, having a protrusion out that contains the elevators?

I like that idea.

I have one problem - and it's major. I did a test render at zoom5, high quality, just to estimate how long it will take to export, and it took nine hours just to do a day render of one view. Which means that it will take about 242 hours to export - 10 days. I obviously cannot do that; what do I do?

[swat-medic]

Try simplifying your geometry.  Delete any non-visible faces, use less geometry, (Less vertexes)

I would make a separate scene and do a few test renders.  9 hours is a bit much. 

[RadicalOne]

Try simplifying your geometry.  Delete any non-visible faces, use less geometry, (Less vertexes)

I built it simple from the beginning. There's nothing more I can do that won't be immediately obvious in quality.

I would make a separate scene and do a few test renders.  9 hours is a bit much.

I render small models with ease, but large towers take hours. My Prism Tower Condos - you remember that - took 36 hours to render. I'm not going through that again.

[swat-medic]

What is your PC specs?

[RadicalOne]

What is your PC specs?

Motherboard
ASUS

Processor
Dual-Core Pentium 4, 3.6GHz each

RAM
3 GB

Graphics Card
NVidia GeForce 6600

Sound Card
Realtek HD Audio Driver

Operating System
Windows XP Home Edition

[swat-medic]

What are you using for your windows?  Plane, box, etc.  If you are using a box, or extruded spline, you could instead use a plane with 1x1 segments.  this would minimize the amount of polys by a fair amount.

[RadicalOne]

What are you using for your windows?  Plane, box, etc.  If you are using a box, or extruded spline, you could instead use a plane with 1x1 segments.  this would minimize the amount of polys by a fair amount.

I'm using an extruded spline, but the problem is I can't use planes - the windows are not simple rectangles. They are often angles.
                                                                       
For example, one shape looks like this from above:

   _
  | |__
  |___/

[Diggis]

There is very little you can do to reduce the time of your render, GMAX is very slow and it's a case of suck it up, or simplify the models.

[io_bg]

Interesting design, but I think it's too tall. What about a version which is half of the size of this?

[RadicalOne]

Interesting design, but I think it's too tall. What about a version which is half of the size of this?

I don't know about half - that's only 35 stories - but I'll reduce the height, which should help. I'll try 52 stories.

[swat-medic]

There's always splitting the model up.