@unknownuser said:

1 - you create a terrain from the elevation lines.

2 - you project an IMAGE of the project (including cities, etc) over the terrain, so you can flatten some surfaces for roads, etc. Can you give some more details on this workflow? Do you use the standard SKP terrain tools or Artisan?

3 - you use ToS to draw the streets, sidewalks, over the terrain, which is already painted with the image of the project, making it easy to paint it. (why you use ToS instead of DRAPING the DWG streets, etc?)

4 - you extrude stuff up (or maybe down, if you do with the streets) with Joint Push Pull?



Yes to all of the above. The terrain can come from contour lines or a point cloud or just google mesh corrected by hand with the CAD drawings. I prefer the google mesh approach and you can get pretty accurate with the sandbox and by moving vertices by hand using the directional arrows as guides. I take many photos of the site and try to capture the elevations everywhere so that I can tune the mesh by hand. (note: the inference engine in SU is the prize to beat all prizes for this method. As far as I am concerned it has made Sketchup what it is today in terms of popularity. But like anything you have to practice. When I first started moving vertices around manually I had no idea and it was very painful but like any fine instrument, if you put in the hours it becomes second nature. I am glad I persevered cause moving mesh is easy now. (ask any SU car builder how good he is at moving vertices manually)

@unknownuser said:

DRAPING the DWG streets, etc?)

Oh my god no!!! building the roads and then trying to attach them via drape creates a nightmare mesh that is impossible to work with. The streets are normally way too complex.

@unknownuser said:

modeling approach, for example curbs and ramps

Where the curbs/ramps break down the original CAD is created as you see it so that it can simply be folded flat to the pavement by selecting the lines manually. After folding you can smooth it by using "from contours". The transition becomes seamless this way.
It is best to experiment with SU creating the template where the sidewalk breaks down so that you can use the template mesh in the initial CAD.

@unknownuser said:

Very fine rendering!
What method do you use ?

Lumion....very tough work flow....those images took between 3-4 seconds to render..

@unknownuser said:

Roland Joseph, from your images, it seems you only work with VERY planar streetscapes.

No...I live in Ontario. There is no flat ground in Ontario anywhere.....sorry Windsor is flat.

@unknownuser said:

It results in sideways sloped streets

No, you need to start with a relatively accurate mesh.
The roads can be contoured and flattened as per drawings manually with a projected image as a guide before you start building road mesh.

Just like building on the site. Once you have a road bed you can cut the roads in easily.

This example would represent a more typical street contour in Ontario.... http://ibuildmodels.com/JMC2/beaverton/intersections.html
All of it with TOS.

sorry...forgot this image..

and this link to some rendered examples.
http://ibuildmodels.com/JMC/SF/streets_four_profiles.html

I do many streetscapes. I don't really understand the dialogue here. The example you provided is completed quickly with tools-on-surface. I see you already use TOS so now I'm really confused....Do you use TOS or soap skin?...hmmmm. Yes I'm totally lost now. Oh but wait! The title of the post is about making faces..... there is no face making required to complete the streets. Yikes!! I better leave

That's a very attractive result. I like the B&W/desaturation. The models have nice detail.
Pretty girl but a bit big and in your face for daily consumption.

My opinion has nothing to do with technique. The concern would be psychological. If Sketchup has the depth to do your work (and usually it does) and you entrench it in your workflow you will feel ill each time it doesn't and you are forced to revert back to 3dmax. Once upon a time the 3dmax artists got all the cool jobs. In a boutique engineering office the architects had one choice. Now the unique, one-time design jobs are walked down the hall to the Sketchup artist because he can complete the same job so much faster, as you say Sketchup is 100x's easier and that equates to dollars and cents. So that is an odd disadvantage but it is serious for and experienced modeller because frame of mind has a lot to do with the finished result.

The rendering business itself is experiencing a bit of a renaissance as well. Traditional non-biased rendering is being nudged aside slowly by many for the same reason, it is just painfully slow. The new real-time rendering engines are completing work faster by a full order of magnitude. Hard to ignore for your bread and butter work.

If you want to experience the difference, load up the trial version of Twinmotion or Lumion, go to the 3d warehouse, pick any complex model and open it. Aside from the setup you have just completed your first rendering job in seconds and the results are very exceptable.

That is exceptional and inspirational!! Thanks for showing us.

If you are using "large textures" (windows/preferences/opengl) Your max size is 2048. So yes your textures get compression. To keep the detail in place I break the image into pieces with "make unique". I am painting buildings and ground so my original images are never bigger than 16000X16000. I can easily pick out a door or window or special feature in the image and ad mesh there so that I can then turn that separate area into a unique image.
Otherwise I swap out the low res imaqe for high rez in my rendering app which is happy to devour textures up to 16000x16000.

@unknownuser said:

Best Render Engine (must include ability to make video) -

Lumion is a hands-down choice if you are very busy modeling and need video and stills. It may be expensive but I don't know anyone with a copy that isn't booked solid. If you don't like it (can't find work) you can sell it back. It retains it's price. Pretty hard to loose. My copy of Lumion runs all day everyday and is capable of superior video and stills right out of the box. I nearly choked over the price but the selfish side of me says that a high entry fee amounts to less competition.

note: Lumion uses procedural texturing. They have a juicy library of stock substances and you can use free Algorythmic tools to build your own. If your models need rich custom textures then Lumion is a texture factory and procedural texturing is mind boggling.
Try the demo....fall in love....

@unknownuser said:

a hole is just one pushpull away

sometimes it takes a little effort..

@unknownuser said:

Not something you'd want to use 'au naturale'

No, there is no hole in it.

@unknownuser said:

Ngons

It wasn't only a few short months ago that building watertight models was an excruciating task in SU. You had to find ways to decimate the mesh and plug the holes manually. At that time I looked at the SU mesh and was very disappointed....felt handcuffed by the odd ngon.
Looked to me as if it would never be fixed. Then out of the blue came some built in SU tools for creating solid models. Now I believe anything is possible.

I was looking at this thread recently. "Simple Artisan examples collection"
Within you will find dozens of interesting shapes. I don't see any with complex unfold able textures. I have always been surprised that a ruby-driven mapper didn't emerge with such a big Artisan audience out there.

As you see it is desperately needed.
Great Suggestion!! (I wish I could code)

How do you keep your mouse from sleeping on the job..

mmm.mmm.mmm...... what a nice piece of work!!

@unknownuser said:

Logitech $10 scroll mouse.

My advice is to get a scroll mouse that is comfortable in your hand, nothing else matters

Learned this a few years ago (might have been from you then solo) when I bought a fancy 75 dollar Logitech with the chrome trimmings and endless supply of buttons with a shape that made it look like a stealth fighter, probably double as a soup bowl.....

My hand arm and elbow where falling of within a day or two and the mouse broke a day later.

After that I was thinking I wanted one more like the shape of a cricket...the closer the better.

Sorry guys...I can't edit that mess....!!

"they learn with me and in the end the job is very rewarding for both. "

I don't take creative licence except for hobby. Most of the time I have been given very detailed specifications. Right down to latin names for vegetation.
There is no flat ground anywhere in my province but I am expected even with the retail units to geo-locate and scale accurately.
The projects are sponsored by the government/townships and so the workflow is very formal.

I think in many ways we are alike but just in different stages of our career....we want to learn, we wamt to produce work, we want our clients to be happy and impressed.
We want to be payed because we are skillful and we have some hard earned knowledge.

I've learned that keeping healthy requires that I keep busy.
I will never turn away the opportunity to build a model....for example here is one from a week or so ago....ha...does that look like architecture to you.

As far as the technical work goes. I have a very fast workstation. I have very powerful and very quick software. I have amazing speed with models that require a lot of rectangles...lol.
I have rendering software that cuts hundreds of images by the minute if nesessary so I don't render in a classic raytrace fashion at all.
The quality I aquire is not raytrace but with a little handywork it can look close enough for the average person..... as in the example above of the water filter.
Because of those things I gain a lot of time per unit depending on my competition by a full order of magnitude. That gives me a very large margin.
It takes about 100$ of my time to put together a retail front. I mark that up to 200. It is then the property of the Architect for what ever purpose.

You see as you know JQL, you are an Architect/Artist...I am an image factory.

My life isn't all that boring here is an on-going...the developer has just made the land purchase. I will be doing all the exteriors and interiors in this park. These image are from the first set I made when investment was being sought.

"they learn with me and in the end the job is very rewarding for both. "

I don't take creative licence except for hobby. Most of the time I have been given very detailed specifications. Right down to Latin names for vegetation.
There is no flat ground anywhere in my province but I am expected even with the retail units to geo-locate and scale accurately. The projects are sponsored by the government/townships and so the workflow is very formal.

I think in many ways we are alike but just in different stages of our career....we want to learn, we want to produce work, we want our clients to be happy and impressed.
We want to be paid because we are skillful and we have some hard earned knowledge.

I've learned that keeping healthy requires that I keep busy.
I will never turn away the opportunity to build a model....for example here is one from a week or so ago....ha...does that look like architecture to you.

[img]
http://www.ibuildmodels.com/images/filter_water_3.jpg[/img]

As far as the technical work goes. I have a very fast workstation. I have very powerful and very quick software. I have amazing speed with models that require a lot of rectangles... lol.
I have rendering software that cuts hundreds of images by the minute if necessary so I don't render in a classic ray-trace fashion at all.
The quality I acquire is not ray-trace but with a little handiwork it can look close enough for the average person..... as in the example above of the water filter.
Because of those things I gain a lot of time per unit depending on my competition by a full order of magnitude. That gives me a very large margin.
It takes about 100$ of my time to put together a retail front. I mark that up to 200. It is then the property of the Architect for what ever purpose.

You see as you know JQL, you are an Architect/Artist...I am an image factory.

My life isn't all that boring here is an on-going...the developer has just made the land purchase. I will be doing all the exteriors and interiors in this park. These image are from the first set I made when investment was being sought.