City Street

[fingereleven311]

looks good, like the dark feeling...maybe if you played with the curbs a bit, make them look more run-down instead of perfect. Just my two cents.

[FlexGiddy]

PS, I'm also noticing specks on the ground near the bottom left lightpost does anyone know what that is???

Well that looks like it could be a bump map that is too high. Your windows are too reflective... Everything else looks kind of worn....Maybe try turning down the reflectivity and adding some dust or something too them. Also I think you should look at some lighting tutorials so that you can set the mood that you are looking for a little more effectively. All in all I think it's a good start. :)



Ed

[methodicalj]

It's a great start, good geometry. I would try and dirty up the sidewalks a lot. Some grime around edges and the bases of lampposts would be good. Try using specular level maps to make puddles on the ground. The more flawed a scene is, the more believable it is. Also, try adding noise to the edge of the curb, putting in cracks, etc. Just mess around.

[spirogyro]

I'm trying to obviously catch a late night mood, so if anyone knows of any good tutorials or even ways you go around about doing creating that, I would really appriciate it. Thanks! Also to be hones there isnt a bump or even a map on the sidewalk yet. so I really cant figure out why its doing that.

[spirogyro]

Here's and update. I added some changes to the light posts (subtle) and I reworked the trainstations too.http://www.wayimages.com/data/11009/1107220148city_2.jpg

[jophus14]

i see your an illinois resident as well. I knew it had to be a chicago street from the L-train in the image.

[spirogyro]

Gotta love sweet home Chicago! ( there's just no jobs here :sad: ) LOL

[jophus14]

i know. i got an associate degree and an 3d animation certificate and i work a retail job :( . I'm focusing on architecture now.

[spirogyro]

another slight update:
http://www.wayimages.com/data/11009/1107232407city_3.jpg

Im still getting those specks in the picture, can anyone help??

[spirogyro]

no crits? I should just put it in my demo reel?

[Quendal]

Overall, it looks pretty good, but due to the lack of "stuff" in the street and sidewalks, it looks like a plastic model. If this is truely supposed to look like Chicago, you really need to add dirt and debree. Some grafitti wouldn't hurt either.

[spirogyro]

Well, thanks for the critiques, but this doesnt' necessarily have to be chicago. It's just a city street no particular one. debrit is next, for this wip, Ive already made garbage cans but theyre further down the street. I really liked the idea of puddles I think I'll try that. But please give me some ideas of what else I can do to increase realizm.

[spirogyro]

Maybe some signs and billboards too huh?

[spirogyro]

more updates:
http://www.wayimages.com/data/11009/1107291003city_4.jpg

[jophus14]

i'm not sure if those are entry door on the building closest to the left bottom of the image, if so, the base of your street lights are gigantic. are you using a reference pic of any sort and you need some more lights. add a billboard or a street light.

[spirogyro]

yeah I need to work on the scale of everything

[spirogyro]

This my latest update. what do you think? please more comments and critiques!!:bounce:
http://www.wayimages.com/data/11009/1107311931city_5.jpg
BTW, does anyone know whay this is soo pixelated, especially on the sidewalks?? (around the light posts.)

[Wintermute]

You've substantially improved this image since the start of this thread, but there is still more you can do.

The roadway itself seems to lack much history and character..what I mean by that is that you have no markings to speak of, which is extremely unusual for such an urban setting.

In the history and character area, you can add cracks and sections of newer and older pavement (think pothole patches and utility work) The markings I just mentioned should show some history as well..worn paint, missing line bumps (don't know if you've seen those) evidence of line re-painting etc...

Another thing you should look at is your lighting setup. The streetlights are fine as they are, I'm curious as to where all of the purple light that's acting as a fill on the background buildings is coming from (it's actually casting shadows of your lightpoles and buildings). If you take that down to almost zero, turn on the billboard lights on the large building to the right, and actually apply some light in the sky in the background (go outside at night when it's overcast and look up while facing downtown to see what I'm talking about), things will improve. You could also add in a line of people waiting to get into the club at the right. oh, and turn on the lights on the L

It's the small details that make the scene really something. as far as your texture problem, I'm not sure what I can tell you. are the streetlights set up to use shadow maps or ray tracing?-one or the other could cause that sort of noise seen in the 1st image.
take a look at your texture settings to see if you have a noise setting too high (or too low)

Of course I'm only guessing as to what's causing that problem for you.

I hope this helps, keep up the good work!
Looking forward to updates.

Cheers! :beer:

[hjalmar]

also, the end of your street has nothing...maybe another building down there?

also...usually street lights (from where i am anyways) have lil powerbox or small openings where people can operate on them if they go down..maybe smooth the base of them also? so you dont have a really polygony base...just lil details you can add...not nessissary...but nice....also a busstop sign would be nice to see at the busstop

and other little things like litter (newspapers laying around seem to work great for that), gum, tiremarks, scuffs, chunks broken off the sidewalk, graffiti on the sidewalk or buildings, a line down the middle of the road? i also dont see any alleys in between the buildings, they are all snug together...space tehm out a bit and add dark alleys would add a bit of darkness to the scene

one thing i noticed about your road texture is that it doesnt tile at the crossroads...you could easily fix that in photoshop

i like the idea and the composition of it and its prgressing along GREAT

other than that, what wintermute said, the purple lights need a source (neon lights from a sleazy bar/motel?)

cheers:)

[itsallgoode9]

What about Parking Meters and Crosswalk signs and stuff like that? Pot holes in the road would look good. newpaper racks.........I think your sidewalk texture needs work, as does you curb edge-it seems too rounded on the left sidewalk. I would find a reference picture of a corner light pole that has a handful of street signs on it. There are abundant in larger cities and would look cool. There should bee paint on the road for the cross walks too. Yeah, it really making some improvements

[megacles]

The scale is off. The sidewalk is way too high from the road. And the bin looks a bit big. Nice atmosphere though :)

[CodeNothing]

someone else said it looked like a miniature model? i think thats because the scale of the lightpoles is off. If you compare them to the buildings they are 7 stories high. Those are some BIG light posts! The ones around my neighborhood are 2.5 or 3 stories high.

[billy_HK]

i think you should paint the texture more detail
the road is flat i think
and there have very less shadow
keepgoing!!

[LordApophis]

There seems to be 3 distinct scales in your picture:
1. the garbage can on the right
2. the lightpost
3. the 1st building on the left and then repeated again on the right down the street.

for 3, i have never seen a building like that on a city street, look how the door on it is so short so there are no windows on ground level making it not fit into the scene. when it gets repeated on the right, the building is WAY to narrow for a building of that many windows. on top of which if you go walking around chicago u will notice that when there is a billboard wall you hardly ever see one of these buildings(many windowed) following it, there is some ambiguity as to which is in front of which...

also since the traffic light is in the foreground, you might want to add detail to the back of it

other than that, i think you have a really belivable scene

[spirogyro]

Thanks to everyone for their comments, because they've helped me out alot, and it's always good to get opinions to improve my work.

Wintermute- I'm going to mess with the texture and the geometry of the the road soon, just haven't gotten around to it. There are actually two sky lights that light up the scene. There is a blue light on the left with shadows, and there's a purple light on the right emitting specularity. To be honest this is a technique a teacher taught me while doing a haunted house project and it seemed to work well there. I'm not very good when it comes to lighting and any other ideas, or tutorials for a "night scene" would be nice.

hjalmar- Your right there's nothing at the end of the street but the background. The problem is even if I do put something there, you will not see due to the fog in the lights.

CodeNothing- Actually the lights are 2.5 to 3 stories high, but I think the angle of the camer make them look taller.

LordApophis- The building is repeating(actually this was a scene for an animation and there was a character on a motorcycle flying through the streets everything was kinda blurred which is why i didn't pay too much attention the detaiil of the buildings but since I like this and wanted to expand on it I will do it in the future.

Thanks again everyone!

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