Here is 3 story terraced residential building for early era 1750 - 1870 or something.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/3ST1.png)
It still needs some work. any ideas for back yards are more than welcome.
trees, toilet in the eraly years, shed for rabbits and so, vegetables, a bicycle garage, a english tea-house :D ;)
Vegetable patches, definitely, they can apply to most eras. Runner beans growing up canes, that sort of thing!
Formal landscape elements (fountains, steps and terraces, lawns mown in stripes) for if you make a stone/ more upper-cl**** house version (which these are presumably not). That never went out of fashion either.
I'd also put iron railings between the front steps, as though there's a light well behind down to a basement floor. Fairly standard design - in fact that's the whole reason for the steps out front as you've shown them. Without the basement you wouldn't need the steps!
Excellent!
Perhaps also a block of flats in the same vein? Or perhaps larger 2x1 units? I am looking at Wikipedia's comments and photos of terraced housing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terraced_house).
Have you noticed the cities seem to grow "better" when higher-density housing is available...
Put some more stuff on back yards and rendered snow images.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/3ST2.png)
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/building.A_3StoryTerraced.pak.zip (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/building.A_3StoryTerraced.pak.zip)
That was model for this building.
http://www.eriding.net/media/photos/geography/where_I_live/beverley/060901_rfoster_mp_geo_bev_044.JPG (http://www.eriding.net/media/photos/geography/where_I_live/beverley/060901_rfoster_mp_geo_bev_044.JPG)
Thanks for ideas.
I got time to do more buildings if someone has photo.
Wlindley, simutrans doesn't yet support city buildings larger than 1 tile.
Perhaps some period tenements? Images from Future Glasgow (http://www.futureglasgow.co.uk/Index_Regeneration_Areas.html)
(http://www.futureglasgow.co.uk/East_End/Tenement.jpg)
(http://www.futureglasgow.co.uk/East_End/Derelict_tens.jpg)
And in the more modern era -- from flickr: "Erno Goldfinger designed Alexander Fleming House, now known as Metro Central Heights, Elephant and Castle, London." (http://www.flickr.com/photos/greenwood100/3325430586/in/set-72157601329022676/)
(http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3615/3325430586_a98ac10d10.jpg)
Might I suggest some modern high density buildings, such as:
(http://www.radiowaves.org.uk/ross/docklands.jpg)
(http://gallery.hd.org/_tn/std/places-and-sights/_more2007/_more05/England-London-Docklands-Canary-Wharf-skyscrapers-towers-including-One-Canada-Square-and-Citigroup-and-HSBC-gl****-and-steel-against-cloudless-blue-sky-skies-1-DHD.jpg)
(http://www.movingspace.com/newhomes/41_millharbour/front.jpg)
Or, perhaps, this:
(http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2194/1570583609_26d0e643dd_b.jpg)
for late 19th century high-density residential?
Here is preview of next building.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/4stenament.png)
As you can see there is still plenty of work.
Anyway, it's a great work! ;)
Very impressive looking so far!
It is here now!
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/4stenament1.png)
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/building.A_4StoryTenement.pak.zip (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/building.A_4StoryTenement.pak.zip)
Archon,
that looks good, although two things to consider: firstly, the colour of the bricks seems a tad light; and secondly, they seem to be a different (smaller) scale to those terraced houses... But excellent to see the building variety increasing so!
What about some nice tower blocks?
Specifically something like the Swedenborg Gardens estate. I think that the slenderness of the towers means they would work fine in simutrans, and also capture the typical style of the British tower blocks, which often were rather slender. It's a sad thing they don't make them like it today. ;c
(http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2233/1542664613_f9e7d15f2d.jpg)
1920 looks a lot more realistic now! Archon, could you possibly do an in-block (non-corner) variant of the tenement, to give us long rows of them?
Looking impressive so far! Really great to have a steady stream of new buildings coming on - should certainly add more variety to cities with the timeline on.
Somehow though they just don't quite look like the existing pak128.Britain style buildings though (or is this just me?), and I'm not sure why either. The colours are right, the buildings are good examples of British city buildings, and the scale is right.
They just looks a little blurred to me compared to the existing ones. Are they done in blender? If so I'd love to have a look at the blends and compare the render settings and see if I can play around with it.
Sorry to be critical - I really like them, just I'm not 100% convinced about them next to the existing buildings and I'd like to see what others think and whether we can fix it.
I tested it some more and walls indeed seem too bright. Here is picture with one rotation remade.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/4stenament2.png)
blender file can be found: http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/3storyterraced.blend (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/3storyterraced.blend) It contains both buildings.
Tenement might have little too small doors but other than that scale looks good.
My priorities are currently early buildings 1750 - 1940.
Ahh, the darker one is a definite improvement! It fits with the style much better.
good work, these would certainly give more variety to the current city buildings
new version with darker walls.
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/building.A_4StoryTenement.pak.zip (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/building.A_4StoryTenement.pak.zip)
Thanks for the blend. The models are perfect, but there are differences in the camera and lighting setup which I think explain why there are some subtle differences in image style.
I would be a lot happier if these were re-rendered using Kieron's setup (which is what everything else is rendered in). An example can be found in this zip:
http://simutrans-germany.com/files/upload/pak128Britain-blender-examples.zip
Use 1980-warehouse.blend as a template. The way to do it is to have the model on layer one and then use the lighting in layer 3; rotate layer 1 only and take the four renders.
The attached images give an idea of what I am talking about (although I don't have the image textures Archon used). Test1.png is Archon's original setup, Test2.png is the exact same object rendered in Kieron's existing setup - hopefully you can see the difference I am talking about.
Finally I got that lighting setup working. here is result.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/1.png)
That looks better :)
I would say now that the walls need a more obvious and darker brick texture, and the roof texture is a little odd (or is that the snow texture - if so there is no snow on chimneys/doorsteps).
It might not be a bad idea to copy one of the existing textures used. Keeping the set to a limited palette of textures gives a more consistent feel.
That said the building does look good!
Not a bad idea at all. I will upload all of the texture images used so far into a new thread this evening.
Finished version with new lighting.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/4stenament3.png)
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/building.A_4StoryTenement.pak.zip (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/building.A_4StoryTenement.pak.zip)
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/building.A_3StoryTerraced.pak.zip (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/building.A_3StoryTerraced.pak.zip)
Excellent! Much more consistent style now :)
Is there any way to make building types cluster in simutrans? I mean, can it check what the adjacent tiles are before placing a new building? Because, having made my demo, I quickly found that, as one might expect, in British towns it looks more normal to have rows and rows of victorian terraces, or several streets of townhouses in the centre, than to have a random mixup of them all.
No it isn't - in fact the game engine tries to avoid placing identical buildings adjacent to one another. I agree though, it would be good to create rows of terraces etc, maybe someone could write a patch that enabled that?
Wasn't this an extension request about 6 months ago...?
Next building getting ready.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/s&o.png)
there are still more work but I would like to hear your opinion.
Also pub (industry one) is missing needs_ground=1.
Nice. I think the brick texture is too smooth - any chance you could make it more co**** so that it looks more obviously brick like (probably use one of the textures I uploaded the other day).
Some more work on it + texture on walls.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/s&o1.png)
Nice :)
Another thought: For your tenement and this graphic, it would be nice if you could have both corner buildings and non-corner buildings. You can then use these together to with dims=1,1,8 to get corner buildings always on corners and non-corners elsewhere. Does that make sense?
Ah! I updated the wiki (http://en.wiki.simutrans.com/index.php?title=Building_dat) to explain that you can have eight building directions. This makes me think perhaps I could redo some of the high street shops as well.
p.s., I can't remember where the explanation of what "north" is for the .dat definitions -- is 0=north? That needs to be in the wiki as well. It does bother a little that the directions increase anti-clockwise.
p.p.s., Archon: This building is in Washington State USA but perhaps a half-timbered structure like it could be a larger 1600s British city residence building, consistent with the existing house drawings?
(http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_b1X3QY0jHNs/R8NpdN9OGJI/AAAAAAAAAaw/TidfKFpxULs/s400/d20080225-004f.jpg)
Different graphics for corner and non-corner buildings was new to me. It sounds good idea and should require too much work, but I think i will make next another terraced house. First one retires 1895 (should it be lower?) and after that there is big gap between low density housing and my tenement.
For an example of the corner-graphics, take a look at the current 1880 terrace shops in pak128.Britain and the corner-shop. These are specified by the same dat file:
http://simutrans.svn.sourceforge.net/viewvc/simutrans/pak128.Britain/citybuildings/com-1880.dat?revision=249&view=markup
As for what you do next, do what you feel like. We need so many buildings of all sizes, eras and types, it doesn't matter if you focus on one rather than another at this stage. At some point (once planes and ships are all finished) I will start to think more seriously about citybuildings and what we need, but that won't affect things too much at this stage.
@wlindley,
We do have timber-structured old buildings over here, but the original ones tend to be less block-like than that picture. There was also a phase in the 1930s where half-timber modern construction houses was fashionable.
Time to release this building.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/s&o2.png)
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/building.A_ShopsAndOffices_1885.pak.zip (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/building.A_ShopsAndOffices_1885.pak.zip)
Will make something new tomorrow hopefully.
If someone has photo of some 1890 - 1940 med density residential building I would be interested.
Excellent! The snow on the roof of the latest building is a little too grey for my liking though - any chance it can be whiter? I normally add two layers of "clouds" texture in two shades of pale grey in blender and that does the trick. Maybe something similar would work for you.
File updated with whiter snow on roof and without special colors.
Any chance of window frames or am I being too picky? :P
Preview of next building early stone shop.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/stoneshops.png)
I think it would be good idea to make similar looking terraced house for early ages and make 3 story brick one later.
Kieron: It has brick window frames. :)
Looking great.
I generally think it's a very good idea to make similar looking buildings in "families". Helps for consitency. Can we have this shop in corner and non-corner versions as well?
Updated the 1870s offices, replacing the too-skinny tower with some better proportioned ones, and with snow for the 1970s...
(http://www.wlindley.com/images/1870-offices.png)
zipfile with .png .dat and .pak (http://www.wlindley.com/images/com-1870.zip)
(http://www.wlindley.com/images/70%27s-office-snow.png)
"Families" of buildings, yes... actually the "corner" and "non-corner" versions of a particular building are more "siblings" to each other, as opposed to the four rotations of each which are the "same" ... Archon, your lovely new stone corner shop, could have its non-corner version be a matching stone row-house, for example. Thus the corner shop never appears mid-block, and the row-house never appears on a corner.
Mod Note: double post merged
Good work on the tower blocks and snow images wlindley. I think we are just missing snow images for the earlier tower blocks and warehouses now, and then the industry-chain shops/pubs.
about the corner versions - it would be best to have a non-corner shop and a corner shop rather than a non-corner house and corner shop, so as to make sure that both corner and non-corner versions are either both residential or both commercial. But never mind about that, as long as new graphics of this quality keep coming in, I'm not going to complain too loud!
Someone has been busy.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/stoneshops1.png)
I will release all my buildings in one pak after I get houses for these ready and inn rendered with correct lighting.
Those are simply awesome - your best yet!
I really like the design of these buildings from Archon. However as The Hood already stated they look slightly more blurry than the existing buildings. There's not much in it, and maybe it's just my eyesight, but does seem like a difference to me...
Constructive criticism - the verge detail on the gable ends needs some shadow - there would be an overhang, it looks a bit 'flat' at the moment. Same on the eaves where the gutter would be. Just an extra row of darker pixels would improve it immensely. :)
There isn't really such a thing. Everybody was building low density suburbs after Ebenezer Howard's 1890s book advocating 'garden cities', and trying to move out of the existing high-med density accomodation, which was all pre-existing from the victorian period. The move out was income dependent, with the poorest staying in urban areas longest, and consequentially suffering most in the Blitz in 1941.
High Density Urban a la modernists came post WW2 in the reconstruction - you could set the start date earlier for concrete 50s buildings (but post 1923 - Vers Une Architecture was published then), if you hypothesise WW2 not having happened, but then again it's more likely suburban sprawl would have just persisted unchecked!
Mod Note: double post merged
Archon: Gorgeous! But yes seems slightly "blurry" ... a few sharp edges would solve that, methinks.
I'm busy adding snow to the 1870s commercial blocks, and have re-done them one last time, replacing my least favorite of the batch, with corner and non-corner versions of this one:
(http://www.wlindley.com/images/towerblock-variations.png)
There are some lovely buildings here. I wonder whether anyone could turn his hand to a set of headquarters? Pak128.Britain currently uses headquarters from Pak128, which don't fit very well with the style...
Pak128.Britain doesn't currently use any headquarters...
Given they don't add anything to gameplay, I don't really think they are a priority, but of course anyone is welcome to have a go. HQs should probably be 2x2.
I wonder, could the HQ building be a much bigger building? Because, then, we could make it as the "locomotive works", like the GWR at Swindon / LSWR at Eastleigh, etc - then it would have a purpose. Maybe it could be a 3x6 building or something suitably large? With a turntable and suchlike.
It could start out some sheds and a lot of fields, and grow over time as expansions are paid for...
If someone is clever with code, perhaps it could confer a 'loyalty bonus' on the company with respect to inhabitants of the town it's located in? Or function as a p****enger-or-material-demanding industry in its own right? Could it demand Steel say?
I suppose the trick is to make it not railway-specific... maybe big office building is best after all?
Just thinking creatively... don't mind me! ;D
It took longer than expected but now they are ready.
Packed all my buildings in one file.
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/A_Buildings.pak.zip (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/A_Buildings.pak)
Any chance of the source files?
Headquarter produce p****engers. And they can be larger than 1x1. Pak64 has 2x2 headquarters.
1850s warehouses with snow: zipfile with pak and sources (http://www.wlindley.com/images/ind-1850.zip)
Still to come, final 1870 offices with snow.
Sources are in that file (it is actually .pak.zip).
@Archon,
Thanks - I had to rename as .zip and it was OK.
@Dwachs,
Thanks for the clarification. Even so, less of a priority than citybuilding variety / planes / ships for now. If anyone does want a go, I think 2x2 office type structures are the way forward, several different levels of design. Unfortunately AP's suggestion doesn't reflect the way the game deals with it.
As far as the game is concerned, the headquarters is just eye-candy, and produces a few p****engers, right? So why not break with the (boring) tradition of other paks and have something fun like a big railway works? Or do I miss something here.
Yeah, you might even have a HatQuarter ;)
edit: This hat-Issue we had gave me the idea of having a building with a hat anyway. Ok it's not so suitable in this set here, i admit.
The headquarters are more of a status symbol than mere eye-candy: they are expensive to buy and maintain and have little function in themselves, so only the most successful companies can afford them.
and, at last, the 1870s commercial buildings, zip with pak and sources (http://www.wlindley.com/images/com-1870.zip). (TheHood: Anything else you need for the release?)
mobo: how about the Henry Heath Hat Factory from London's West End? Could it be a proper Factory, accepting Wool producing Textiles, like a small-scale city-based Textile Mill?
(http://farm1.static.flickr.com/218/503281191_fe68975a77.jpg) (http://www.flickr.com/photos/ianoak/503281191/)
Probably best as a city industrial building (of which we need more anyway). Excellent idea, though!
@wlindley - thanks for the snow images. We still need the 1950s parking lot (currently the only citybuilding without snow) and at some stage (not necessarily for this release) the industry-chain shops you did.
TheHood: OK, I'm on it.
Meanwhile, a little bit of noodling about with remixing photos into paks... The angles came out all wrong, and it's photo colors not game colors, but it's a work in progress. Homage to my favorite store in London (anyone guess?)
(http://wlindley.com/images/fortnums-example.png)
no fair peeking at the filename.
Hmm, I really think blender is the way to go - it ensures everything is nice and consistent if the right settings and the same textures are used. Feel free to keep experimenting though, but I think you might spend a very long time tidying up the image into something that fits in with pak style...
Parking lot .pak and sources (http://www.wlindley.com/images/ind50.zip) with snow images, and both 1950 and 1980 eras.
(http://wlindley.com/images/parkings.png)
Awesome. I'll add all of these to SVN and we're nearly there then for the next release :)
Small point - would it be better with white on blue for "P" sign?
The problem with using photographs is that it is very difficult to get consistent lighting with the rest of the buildings in the pakset.
This is what I made today. Coaching inn 1750 - 1880 level8.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/CInn1.png)
Give your honest opinion.
Car park -- I made the red P as a neon sign. I would consider changing to white for the 1980s version, though.
James -- As to lighting, more like "impossible" ... photos are best used, I am quickly discovering, as "trace-over inspiration" for rendered or drawn images.
Archon -- Another winner! Although perhaps with no stone pavement in the rear ... What do you think of an early level-1 stone cottage, or perhaps something with a thatched roof? For the village look.
Very nice!
Two things I noticed:
.. the contrast between doorway and walls is too low in the bottom image
.. there is not door on the backside of the house (the doorway only lead in the house but not in the yard)
Very nice. I would agree with Dwachs's comments though. Also, as with all corner buildings, it would be great to do non-corner versions too as with your stone terrace houses.
@Wlindley
I find photos/drawings are best used in blender if you can get the orthographic views and "trace" over them with the objects. That's how I did most of the trains I drew, and some of the early buildings, until I got good enough to be able to do it intuitively.
I do like the coaching inn, and agree with W. Lindley's comments on it. One small suggestion: had you thought about producing different versions of it, the only difference being the markings on the sign? That might create some welcome variety with little effort. You would only have to re-do two of the four renders, as the sign is only visible from the two angles.
Archon -- if you do two different signs per james' suggestion, you might make them the "corner" and "non-corner" versions in the same .dat file. I am really loving the "corner" distinction.
problem with my buildings is that they all seem to end up corner versions.
btw. that doorway is for horses, not supposed to go trough building.
I think the doorway should go through - normally in these inns there is a stable in the yard at the back so the horse doorway goes right the way through. For non-corner versions, just lop off the bit at right angles - the sides can be boring as they will be next to other buildings.
Which makes it very easy to make a later version of the same building - just replace the horses with parked cars!
Latest version of coaching inn.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/CInn2.png)
Archon: Lovely!
How about this 1600s stone church?
(http://wlindley.com/images/stonechurch.png)
Looks good, but I'd reduce the tower height by about half or maybe more. Also probably best coded as a curiosity rather than a citybuilding.
Love the church!
Just wonder though - is reworking the parish/town/city hall on the cards any time soon? It looks so out of place amongst all the other buildings, and there are so many nice English precedents (1 (http://www.openaircl****room.org.uk/images/images%20english/market%20hall.jpg),2 (http://www.berkshirehistory.com/villages/images/abingdon_thall.jpg),3 (http://www.henleytowncouncil.gov.uk/media/townhall.jpg),4 (http://edsphotoblog.com/wp-content/photos/800px/0306_manchester_town_hall.jpg))
Finished snow images for C inn. All buildings in one zip.
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/A_Buildings.pak.zip
Right, ... coding it as a curiosity, starting with the 1980s church .dat as template. Also as a larger version, which should have an accompanying walled church-yard ... work in progress. i have found some excellent shortcuts that are making pixel-editing a breeze.
(http://wlindley.com/images/stonechurch2.png)
@AP
No current plans for new townhalls. I don't think the current style is out of place anyway, just there are plenty of other styles that could be used as well.
@wlindley
Looking good. I'd make the larger one a 2x2 (with yard).
The current town hall is based on St. Albans Town Hall (http://www.webbaviation.co.uk/gallery/d/10555-1/stalbans-townhall-aa11155b.jpg). I tried to work out a progression of images by which the building would be upgraded (the actual prototype is I think the 2nd last stage). Reasoning behind this is that Town Hall should be quickly recognisable, if town halls vary wildly between levels then it becomes more difficult to find it. That said I think there'd be a strong case for having a medieval style town hall and a modern style town hall in addition to the current one to cover different time periods. I'm sure the existing model could be improved as well.
Also, and I will repeat this again, Archon's buildings do not fit the rest of the pak buildings completely - that's not to say there's anything wrong with them design or detail wise (both of which are great) but something in the rendering setup makes them appear more blurry (compare the windows in the screenshot above - on wlindleys church, The Hood's farm, my town hall and pub they are all a lot sharper than on the buildings from Archon).
@Archon,
In the light of Kieron's comments, could you make the final .blends you used in your render available so I/we can do some tests? You'd also need to include all the textures you used etc. I really like the stuff you are doing so it would be great to iron out any minor style differences between your stuff and the existing stuff - especially as it is all 3D models and therefore fairly easy to adjust.
As another comment, I notice that none of the snow images have pavements - could you add a snowy pavement texture to each of the snow images?
Here it is (hopefully with all textures).
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/earlyCitybuildings.blend (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/earlyCitybuildings.blend)
I already made some modifications after last renders(disabled filtering for textures). Also I used ray shadows for C.inn and those are still enabled.
Thanks! Not sure when I'll be able to take a look (I'm busy the next few evenings), but maybe Kieron will get chance (and I he set up the render settings in the first place so he might be able to find differences quicker than me).
Is there snow version of sidewalk? I tried to find it from svn but can't find it.
My next project will likely be old brick school.
(http://www.futureglasgow.co.uk/Regeneration/GovanA.jpg)
It will be 2x2 curiosity building.
Not on SVN, as the sidewalk itself doesn't support snow images, bizarrely. If you take the pavement and add a pale grey musgrave texture that should do the trick. Nice idea for the school - looking forward to it.
Interesting how the modern addition for the air-handler follows the original design and materials. I guess that would be only in the 1960s version of it!
As for curiosities ... how about just a little city park:
(http://www.wlindley.com/images/park.png)
@wlindley,
City parks are generally a good idea, and again larger than 1x1 is probably better. I'm not sure about the one in that image though - (a) it does look a bit too small and also the telephone box is too bright I think.
@Archon,
I've looked at your blends and there are a few differences in render settings. The key one is the antialiasing filter size. Yours is set to 1.00, whereas mine are set to 1.50. If you increase to 1.50, everything looks a little less blurry and suddenly fits in the style much better. You may need to adjust some other texture settings though elsewhere to compensate. The other thing to alter is to set all interiors to pure black (RGB=0,0,0). The render below is with those two changes made.
Glad it was something simple - those models of yours are far too good to be spoilt by a small inconsistency with the existing graphics :)
Nice, very nice :)
Should someone make snow image for sidewalks just in case it will be supported later?
It seems little task and would make pak more consistent if it was used as base for buildings winter images.
Also I didn't get what you meant with setting all interiors black.
The surface for all windows should be set to render as pure black. This means the material should be set to V 0 and as shadeless.
preview of 2x2 church. add some gravestones in churchyard, perhaps? or...?
(http://wlindley.com/images/stonechurch3.png)
As per a comment I made earlier on, you need to show the shadow line from the roof overhang - in this case on the gable end of the ?vestry? At the moment you can't see any evidence of tiles on the surface facing away from you. Also, what material are these church roofs? They are very black, even for slate (compare Archon's slate roofs). I can't imagine it's meant to be roofing felt! You could always give the larger church a lead or copper(malachite) roof, of course.
Also with churches, if it's easy to do(?), you might want to make sure all game-churches align the same way (ie east-west).
@wlindley,
Looking better, although I'd make the churchyard fill up most of the 2x2 (doesn't quite look like it does at the minute). After that, add some gravestones, a path, and I think some more detail to the tower (like a clock and gratings for the belfry).
@AP,
It would be possible for all churches to face East by only specifying one direction, but then they would look the same when everything else rotates, so I'd prefer a full 4 rotation image. In any case, there are enough churches in the country which don't point East for me not to worry about that too much!
Render no "lost count + 8"
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/building_A_1750_inn.png)
If jury thinks it has everything right I will render rest of my buildings with these settings.
This jury member votes in favour :) sorry if we've been trying your patience, but it's good to get it right (I struggled a lot with that at first too). Hopefully you have it all set up right to never have to worry about it again now.
i don't quite understand this, shouldn't this be actually the other way round? all rotations are needed to keep it oriented into the same geographical direction while turning the map.
the offtopic that really surprises and interest me however is that many english churches don't have their apsis in the east. is this through all periods, or only for some architecural styles/aeras?
oh, btw, the new city buildings all of you made look really good. this will greatly improve the pak!
@sdog,
If 4 rotations are specified, they will be used at random on generation, so approx 25% facing any direction, and it will rotate properly. If 1 rotation is used, they will all point the same way, but when you rotate, the rest of the map buildings rotate but the church wouldn't. Hope that makes more sense.
Most churches do point East, but enough don't for me not to worry about it. Examples I can think of are Liverpool Cathedral and All Souls London, both of which point more or less north.
@the hood
thanks for explaining the random rotations. in that case it's impossible to align the churches properly anyway.
do you think this is worth an extension request for standard? i was missing an indicator pointing north for quite a while, geting confused when turning the map. churches could do that job in a very natural way.
i got to be carefull if i travel to england. usually i use churches to determine directions on overcast days and during nights. (i love the japanese custom of having a compas rose in front of every subway entrance!)
Jury decides executioner gets to work.
Stone shops and houses ready. 4 more buildings to go.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/rerender1.png)
I am not getting impatient. Just starting to have fun. :)
Should I update my zip now or after they are all done?
If someone finds this useful, feel free to use it.
(http://standard-city-base-middle-open-4+snow.png)
Just update once they are all done. I'll include them all in the next release of pak128.Britain, which will be pretty soon after you finish them!
If the church was built first, or at the same time as the surrounding estate, or in its own enclosure (large churchyard), one of which is normally the case, then it will almost always face east-west. If the church is built later than the surrounding buildings, say on a constrained urban site, it will fairly often be oriented to best fit in with surrounding buildings or features (eg align with roads etc). If the church is pre-Georgian, it's a fairly safe bet it faces east-west.
I carry a lensatic comp**** in my bag at all times (both for work and for hiking), it's very handy to avoid getting lost in places like London!
more on the building, (better roof texture and windows)... no progress on the surroundings yet.
(http://www.wlindley.com/images/stonechurch4.png)
That's better. Just watch out for stray white pixels around the edges...
All buildings ready. Remembered special colors while writing this message and removed those.
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/A_Buildings.pak.zip (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/A_Buildings.pak.zip)
Also made non-corner version of tenement and stone cottage.
haven't tested these much yet but should be ok.
Archon: splendid!
Excellent! Going in SVN now...
This is preview of my new school/prison.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/2.png)
it still needs lot of work.
Very much like! But "school/prison" - what are you saying about education? ;-)
Very nice. I was wondering why it had gone quiet on here. I think we'll go with school rather than prison.
well it is supposed to be school but it looks more like prison to me. And there are gates so kids have no way to escape. :)
Prisons don't generate p****engers in quite the same way as schools do... :D
That one starts to remind me of Scotland Street School (CR MacKintosh), which has its own 'compound'
(http://www.firthphotography.co.uk/images/portfolio/glasgow/large/Scotland%20Street%20School.jpg)
Re prisons, if you want to do one, maybe a victorian type on the radial model plan: Link (http://images.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=http://www.victorianweb.org/periodicals/iln/11c.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.victorianweb.org/periodicals/iln/11c.html&usg=__32AyLFEWNPL2brnt_EVEdfvdEIQ=&h=493&w=576&sz=92&hl=en&start=17&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=VOlKyXGjs9_dXM:&tbnh=115&tbnw=134&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dvictorian%2Bprison%2Bplan%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26safe%3Doff%26sa%3DG%26tbs%3Disch:1)
Nice building! Be it a prison or a school :P
But the roof looks a little bit too continuous. There should be some more contrast around the roof ridges.
Second take.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/3.png)
It looks maybe little more like school now but yard needs some details.
What do you think about those roof windows?
Second picture is first from that angle so there is still more work needed for it.
I like the roof windows...
Yard details could include some things like hopscotch squares or a football goal or similar marked on the floor/wall. Roof light is a good idea, but maybe better smaller.
Don't forget a sign out the front (the sort that would say "Anytown Grammar School" on it). That'll help too.
Can't get the latest tilecutter working on my linux system (python script just returns with no display, no error), perhaps someone can take this over? gimp source (http://blog.wlindley.com/images/stone-church2.xcf)
(http://blog.wlindley.com/images/stone-church2.png)
That looks beautiful - although I'd think that the graveyard would need more graves, and possibly iron railings around it, too...?
I agree with jamespetts. Also leave the gr**** as blank and let the game fill it in with the underlying ground. I use tilecutter under wine, and it is rather tempramental. I'll have a look at it when I get time if no-one else does before me - I don't have much time for simutrans right now...
Could you post the tilecutter.log file? Most likely reason for it exiting so quickly is not having wxPython installed.
Nice looking church :)
Wow, just wow :) I think it l looks perfect - though obviously ingame screenshot would be nice to check consistency but looks good to me!
oohhh, some nice progress here :D
Some progress still little things that need work.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/4.png)
I can almost smell the chalk and the floor-wax.
Very nice indeed. I may need to ban your contributions from the pak as they are nicer than mine :P
Regarding the latest renders - you seem to have shadows enabled in some form. While it's a nice effect rest of renders don't have it (and it doesn't work well with the simutrans engine which is why I didn't have them to begin with).
Haven't done much work on it for awhile, but for the record here's the Stone Church files (http://blog.wlindley.com/images/stonechurch.zip) (source and pak). Mostly needs ground removed (except in graveyard, where the gr**** is always greener) and correct fences added.
Little bug fix for previously released buildings.
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/1880-office-5f.png (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/1880-office-5f.png)
Should go /citybuildings/images/com/ in svn
@wlindley - link does not appear to work...
The Hood,
I have downloaded it - the revised version can be found in my Pak128.Britain-Ex Github repository.
re-uploaded stone church (http://blog.wlindley.com/images/stonechurch.zip) file to correct server this time (oops).
1 more building. Modified version of 3 story terraced.
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/1900-rowhouse-3f.png (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/1900-rowhouse-3f.png)
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/3Sterraced.dat (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/3Sterraced.dat)
Nice. Is this a replacement or a new building?
It is new.
It is supposed to be more modern version of old 3 story brick terrace.
Following discussions here (http://forum.simutrans.com/index.php?topic=4867.msg48635#msg48635), it has become apparent that there is a significant lack of high density city buildings in the 1920-1950 era (especially after 1930). Does anyone feel like drawing some art deco apartments and offices? Perhaps the retirement dates of some other buildings might be extended somewhat, too?
The Hood - perhaps you could send me some .blends and textures so that I could have a go at one or two...?
Which ones do you want? As far as I'm concerned, city buildings are quite low on my priorities right now. I'm currently working through a list of graphical bugfixes etc, and then it's back to work on the ships, and I don't have a huge amount of simutrans time at the minute anyway.
Ahh, in which case, I'd better have a go myself, unless Archnon or WLindley or someone else wants a go. As to the .blends and textures: can you send me all of the textures and a good sample of .blends from which I can make various city buildings, when I get the time, perhaps including the 60s shops/flats, the tenements, if you have them, the 1960s tower blocks, and perhaps anything else that you think might help (the art deco airport buildings, perhaps...?).
I recall another discussion a long ago noting that the reason for there being no high-density buildings in a 1920-1950 style, is that very few were built in reality - this being the time period when much of suburbia was built - and only in the 1960s did high density blocks become favourable again.
Not sure how that resolved itself re simutrans, however.
Well, there are some high density buildings from that era around (I know of a number in London), so we should have a few in the game, especially since not having them causes all sorts of problems as discussed in the thread to which I linked...
Perhaps one way to model the "suburbia is wonderful" period would be to extend some of the earlier high-density buildings' lifetimes to around 1960, while increasing the probability of the period's low-density buildings? This would permit a few of the older buildings to appear in games starting in 1940-1950, would it not?
Perhaps the "high probability" versions of the low-density houses would be 1940-1960, and then reappearing in 1960 with standard probability alongside higher-density buildings...
jamespetts: perhaps we could find some Google streetviews of those London buildings?
WLindley,
yes, we could give the 1930s high density buildings a low chance. As to street view pictures, here (http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/YfKUOjTaOa0kXOde4-PklQ)'s one, for a start...
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/bakery.png)
New bakery candidate for early years. If you like it I will make something similar for butcher, fishmonger and greengrocer.
does industry shops support 8 rotations?
That looks great. AFAIK industry doesn't support 8 rotations (it doesn't even detect road edges in the way city buildings do, which can lead to these shops facing the wrong way on streets...)
First two ready. Bakery (green) and butcher (red)
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/Ebakery.png)
Sorry, should have mentioned this before, but can we stick to the same colour schemes as the existing industry graphics? Green/white = greengrocer, red/white = butcher. I think bakery is brown/white, but check the existing graphics. It will be less confusing that way.
Well
Then that green goes as greengrocer. :)
Another half of shops.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/Ebakery&fishery.png)
Excellent, thankyou.
Got bored and made 2 new tenements.
Paks and sources are here http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/tenements.zip (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/tenements.zip)
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/tenement-2.png)
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/tenement-3.png)
Nice work, although the tops of the chimney stacks (not the pots) look a little too black. Maybe replace this with a brick texture, and snow in winter?
I hope that Archon gets bored more frequently in future...
Talking of Archon's boredom, did you ever finish the school, or did you get bored of that too? :p
School has problem with iron fence and simutrans 1 bit transparency. + I didn't get tile cutter working.
I could remake 4 story version winter images with snow on chimney stacks.
Archon: Another excellent addition, love it!
TheHood: Updated 1950s shops including Butcher and Furniture, Department Store, and the early 1950 storefront supermarket (pak, dat, and png) here (http://blog.wlindley.com/images/1950shops.zip).
Thanks. Wlindley and Archon shops are in r288. Archon, if you could fix those chimneys that would be great.
Snow images for tenements have now more snowy chimney stacks.
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/tenements.zip (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/tenements.zip)
All chimney stacks for new tenements are now fixed + I have done some work on modern industry buildings.
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/industry1.png)
Looking good!
Another welcome addition :-)
First versions of industry buildings ready.
http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/industry.zip (http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/pak/industry.zip)
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/industry2.png)
feedback for graphics is welcome.
Very good. I'm just not sure about the white edges around the tiles in those snow images - it looks a bit odd for that small bit of pavement to have a very different snow texture to the tarmac car park area.
bump
Some progress on old project.
Has there been any progress on sidewalk snow graphics?
(http://www.saunalahti.fi/jusskiiv/img/School.png)
Excellent. Sidewalk snow graphics are now do-able in game, but I haven't drawn any yet...
nice work on the new buildings.
If I may comment on the snow images. Parking lots and sidewalks will have a snow mound if they are plowed. Some lots of a parking lot may become unusable when all the snow is piled up and usually they're pushed into a spot that gets low usage during non snow days. There are often large mounds separating sidewalks and the road that only get cleared at intersections.
Snow mounds -- we're talking about england here! ;-P
Were you not here in January? ;D
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8447023.stm
i was! at heathrow, catched the last flight there from Munich on that day. Incomming flights to Heathrow were canceled for the invisible snow chaos. (it was most likely insufficient deicing capacity, i bet). :-)
Ah, yes, I could see how that might be problematic!