gottago to BAT

[alj]

Hello Gottago, I am sorry that I cannot offer something helpful for solving your problems but I am happy to see progress with your Köln Kabel Bat and that it is nearing completion.

While I was watching your latest pictures I got a little distracted and, instead of minding my own Bat business, I did some research on the real life building that you have modeled.

The Köln Kabel Bat is located on an industrial property called Carlswerk in Cologne-Mülheim, which has a rich history and it is not an exaggeration to say that it is a hallmark of industrial Cologne. The Carlswerk was founded in 1874 by Franz Carl Guilleaume. The factory, renamed to Felten & Guilleaume (F&G) a few years thereafter, produced, among other things, overhead lines, wire ropes and telepgraph cables. The first telephone cable between Europe and North America, passed in 1904, was produced by F&G. The factory grew over time and more production and storage facilities ware added. In the 1960's some 23,000 people worked in the Carlswerk.

The building that you have recreated was constructed in 1984 and was a storage / magazine facility for the surrounding cable and wire production facilities. The company F&G itself went through turbulent times since the early 70's when European economies transformed from industrial into services. Especially in that and in the following deacde the city of Cologne saw pretty much of its manufacturing and heavy industry base go downhill. F&G changed ownership several times until it was eventually acquired by Danish company NKT Cables.


Carlswerk Storage (from south-west)

In 2007 NKT Cables decided to move production away from the site in Cologne-Mülheim and sold the Carlswerk to real estate developer BEOS. The move of NKT to its new location in neighbouring Cologne-Flittard (with all of the ca. 500 jobs in manufacturing it offers these days) will be finished in 2010 and BEOS has already started to redevelop the Carlswerk property. Many of the older buildings on site will find a new function as fancy loft offices for tenants from industries like advertising, media and similar (at least that's what the new proprietor hopes for). Parts of it will even become loft apartments.



The storage (The Köln Kabel Bat) is offered to let as a ... storage facility. My speculation is that if the Carlswerk site turns successful as an upmarket urban office park as it is planned, the storage might as well be torn down in order to make room for a more profitable land use. At any rate, it is rather unlikely that those large cable reels will be in or around the the real world model to your Köln Kabel Bat in the near future.

Did I say that I look forward to seeing it in-game?

[kwakelaar]

Again a beautiful looking bat, I am impressed by your texturing work as well as the nightlights.

[gottago]

Thanks metasmurf for pointing out PEG's fencing--I had it somewhere and have used it, it's a very good set.

Thanks very much alj for posting the history of the Carlswerk; it's a fascinating bit of history and really appreciated and has helped quite a bit

And thank you kwakelaar for your comments, it's a real compliment and much appreciated 

The Cologne Cable BAT has been wrapped up and I've gone back to a model I'd started a while ago but was sidetracked by the work on CC. Back to the Cologne commercials series, but this time a bit of a change of pace; next up is a locally famous landmark, the Disch-Haus, a sleek Moderne building that survived WWII (though thoroughly gutted by fire, it was rebuilt) and which has recently been renovated again.

Here is the promoter's idealized view, and one from Virtual Earth: 





The great thing about the building is of course the austere Art Deco style and the wide curving corner, and I stopped work on this partly because I was pondering how I would ever get it to work ingame. I went back to it because I hate not finishing anything I start, and because I like a challenge and after some extensive measuring and playing around, I think I've found the way to get this BAT into SC4.

Here are screenshots of the work so far, filled out with planes that lay out the massing of the rest of the building and, in darker grey, an annex that will flesh out the building to fit a 4x4 corner lot--or a 4x3.  Also a screenie from Max showing the floor plan:







What's pretty uncanny about the building is that it actually fits perfectly into the game, at scale, if the lot is made for a corner using a FAR road along its angled side beginning 1 tile after the intersection. In RL, the main facade (the one already modeled) is exactly 72 M or 4 tiles long from the party wall to the end of the curving wall. But what is really a remarkable coincidence is that the angled facade is 17.5 degrees off vertical; the FAR road is 18.4, but because that wall starts basically one tile in due to the curving corner, using the building's RL angle makes that facade's far end fall perfectly on the grid--four tiles in and one back--when continued by the fictive annex building sketched out in darker grey planes. (You can see this by looking closely at the grid lines on the Max ground plan.)

So the building will be a FAR W2W corner sitting on a 4x4x4x3 lot. To get it to work, it will have to be exported as a prop or like a diagonal--but it should fit seamlessly into the grid, unless I'm missing something. Which is why I'm posting about it now--before going too far in the modeling and having to trash too much work-- to see what others think and what recommendations anyone can offer about how to make this work correctly, and what problems to look out for.

[mightygoose]

thats awesome, and i think you are right but i would wait for someone with more expertise in the subject to verify it, send dedgren a PM, probably the bestway to get a definitive and exhaustive answer, fantastic work nevertheless.

[Sciurus]

Yes, just awesome!!

Guillaume

[Girafe]

A very good start Gottago, your work is fabulous, and buildings are well chosen

 
 

[Delecto]

Great start my friend, a very appropriate choise of euro building one more time. 

Can't wait for more.

Best regards___DEL!

[seraf]

Interesting building... I'm waiting for more

[cubby420]

Wow, if the Disch-Haus fits with FAR, that will really fulfill a need in a unique way. Looking forward to your progress.

By the way, I am loving CC right now. I designed an industrial area specifically around it, with excellent results. It is truly a revolutionary addition to the game, and I encourage anyone who has not yet checked it out to add CC to your plugins asap, you will not regret it... I do not recall ever seeing anything like it before, with everything from overall concept to minute details executed perfectly. I hope that you have more massive, modern manufacturing facilities in the works. They are still sorely needed.

[DCMetro2834]

Wow, brilliant work so far on the model!