July/August-Norm-arran
 

Ok then - I'm in!

I got 'odd architecture'. I think I am going to try to design some sort of house.

Good luck to everyone else! :beer:

picasso, alice in wonderland. I checked in to a hostel in amsterdam once with odd architecture.

ah, Amsterdam - it's been far too long! Unfortunately flights from here are a bit too expensive. I'm confused though - picasso, alice in wonderland? Is that a name of a hotel or something?

Anyway - here are a few sketches that I have been working on. I think I am going to go with something a bit like the bottom two, though I may try my hand at a few of the other buildings as well.

nice arran! I like your idea :)
looking forward to se your models :)

nice! I could definitely see some kind of Dr. Seuss-ian inspiration coming in handy here. :)

hey - thanks guys! :beer:

Started laying out some of the basic shapes. Decided to give it an underground area. The dome is going to be a green house and there will be a central elevator. I might also make the rooms above rotate.

nice start!! I wanna see more now!

started to try and model one of the other buildings... I also tried modelling some plants without much success. :shakehead

Looking good Arran! Should be fun to put together!

Thanks gster!

Here is a small update - I have been adding some details to the dome of my main building.

I have also been trying to model a tree to go inside the dome. It probably took a lot longer than it should have and I am sure I did not go about doing it in the best way. oh well.

oh way cool :)

Very nice !
For the leaves, I see a lot of people using only plane and a material with opacity. Never try it.
But yours look cool anyway.
For the building, great concept :attn:
Looking forward

Nice one Arran, I really like the feel of the buildings and the tree that you've made.

looking good mate

also the tree looks like it would fit perfect in with youre scene

Jay

looking very cool arran :beer:
I really like your building designs and they are looking really cool now that you're "3D'ing" them :)

this is gonna turn out coooool!

this "tree-dome" kinda reminds me of sim city.. I like it!
can't wait to see it finished!
:beer:

wow - thanks a lot for all of the kind words everyone. It's really great to get some feedback - especially when you are not feeling motivated. cheers! :beer:

Here is a quick shot trying to get everything in place. At the moment I am thinking of placing my house on the edge of a canyon, maybe with some supports coming out of the rock to hold the base of the house. I also thought that it might be cool to have a tree on the edge, maybe with it's roots coming out of the side. What do you think? Just a few rough ideas...

Hello - here is another small update. I have started building the interior of one of the rooms. It's the first time I have built an interior and I am really regretting making all of the rooms round. :shakehead

At the moment I am planning on putting a garden and a hot tub on the top of a couple of the rooms and so I am trying to work out how to get the residents on to the roof. Possible ideas that I have had so far include having a ladder leading up to the roof, A spiral staircase possibly located in a seperate area to the side of the room or having an open area at the top of the elevator with walkways. I think I like this last idea best.

nice progress arran :)

How about making more of the 'odd' from the words.
Maybe inverting the interior so it has four corners but the walls are convex instead of the concave effect you'd expect in a round room? It'd lose loads of space but would definately be 'odd' ;)

Nice idea t1ck! :beer:

I had been thinking about maybe making some of the interiors square - Not sure if I will go for the full inverted concave effect, but I have been trying to think of ways to create more space for toilets, etc, and your idea has set me off thinking of a new approach!

Well, I have been struggling with dodgy internet connection for most of today - must be my turn! I did manage to do a bit of work on my project - I imported my vacuum guy to get a sense of scale and realized that everything was out of wack so I have been resizing the rooms so they all work together.

I have started adding an upper level with a balcony and walkways to each of the roofs and I also began building a bit of a podracer type vehicle to sit out front.

Any c+cs?

here is a quick shot of the vehicle so far...

looks like you're starting to have lots of fun with this one :)

I like your little pod ships too, simple and cool.

As another flip to 'odd' how about inverting the whole scene so the buildings are coming out of the bottom of a rock face, not the top?
Also maybe make the walls not quite fully transparent so the whole idea of a private room goes out of the window (I'm sure this would appeal to those voyeurs out there...)

Si

This concept really sparks the imagination. Cant wait to see this finnished.:beer:

Very nice Arran, i like it alot. Placing the house next to a ridge like that will give you some very cool options to play with. Integrating the house with the environment as you are doing will be very cool and unusual.

One more thing, it feels like house in a martian setting...a la "Total recall".

Thanks for the comments guys! :beer: yeah, I know what you mean about the martian setting minstrel - I have always pictured this house in a desert like landscape.

Well, I have slowly been adding a few more details to the main structure. Taking in a couple of t1ck's ideas, I rebuilt the viewing dome at the top and added a more open room beneath the surface. I had been planning on building some of the interior spaces, but now I think I am just going to concentrate on designing the exterior scene. I must admit that I am tending to lean towards the more practical rather than odd - I guess I have been trying not to over think the words as they tend to lose their meaning, if you know what I mean...

Here is a shot of one of the other buildings and a cactus that I have been working on for the background.

and finally, here is a picture of the tree with the roots coming out of the side of the cliff.

nice progress arran, keep it up :)

You could really go to town with little alien type things and insects that look like the tree branches - though that's not really architecture ;)
This would be cool in a fantasy type game.

I can definitely see this being really cool with some good lighting and texturing! Looking forward to watching it develop!

hey - thanks mtmckinley and T1ck!:beer:

yeah, some insect creatures would definitely be cool. I had been thinking about some sort of large creature sitting around, though I shouldn't really spend too much more time modelling as I should really get on to textures and I really don't have a clue when it comes to lighting!

Here is an update on some of the other buildings I have been working on...

I have also been having some problems making the windows in one of the rooms - I get wierd little shadow marks around the edges when I render. Is this something to do with the geometry, or lights, or normals. I have tried fiddling with different stuff, I remade the room a couple of different ways... I still get the same results. What would be the best way to model something like this?

Here is the render...

here is the wireframe of the same room. any help is appreciated.
:beer:

Looks like maya renderer is having problems with the inconsistancy in the wireframe.

If you notice the inner rim of the window is divided into many polys, but the walls around the windows do not reflect this. Essentialy you have what i like to nickname 'Phantom polys' appearing along the border between where u have many verticies/polys and fewer verticies.

Hope that made some sense. :confused:

I have had the same problem once, they told me that those stange x-sided faces is to blame.

Nice jobb besides that!

really cool scene
:beer:

hey - thanks Angalid and ChikaraNinja - yeah I was wondering if it was from having polygon faces with too many sides. I tried using the split polygon tool to clean it all up, but it didn't seem to have much effect. Maybe I should try again.

cheers guys!:beer:

I think all u should need to do is add edges to make the surrounding polys 4 sided. Quads always render much better.

Alternatively, build a frame to cover the problem area ;)

it looks to me as if you're getting self-shadowing. are you using depth maps, or are you raytracing?

if you're using depth maps then you may want to increase your dmap filter size, and maybe also your dmap bias.

hey - thanks ChikaraNinja and NeoStrider.

I'm using depth maps. I had a look at the filter size and dmap bias settings and that helped the renders a lot. I also sorted out the geometry a bit better. Cheers!
:beer: