Cathedral and crypts, isometric

[RecklessEnthusiasm]

I did an isometric map for the Lite challenge this month and really got into it, so here is another experiment: the beginnings of a cathedral I whipped up last night. I have been using sketchup as a base and touch it up in photoshop.

Edit: Woah, just noticed the weird black dotty artifacts in there. Probably because Sketchup only outputs a flat image with a background and I did a sloppy job color-selecting it to delete it.

[tilt]

looks great - gotta learn to do that some day ... like the shift of color/style as you go down

[RecklessEnthusiasm]

Thanks Tilt! I really want to figure out how to make these more useful for actual encounter maps. I am trying to fiddle with the wall heights to actually expose the floors, but I guess it still isn't really perfectly useful. I'll keep experimenting.

One of the awesome things about mapping in sketchup is that you have immediate access to a huge huge huge online collection of objects like barrels, chairs, tables, etc. If you're doing maps just for personal use or practice, then a few clicks will filling up your dungeon amazingly quickly.

[tilt]

it does sound good, I'm only "holding" on account on spending time learning a new program - I fetched Blender some weeks ago, but haven't even opened it yet *lol*

[Redrobes]

Reckless, that looks just great. I should try sketchup someday as it is said that it has a great user interface for making buildings. I think Blender would cause some head aches with that. Its not that it cant do it but I have found that the individual point picking and single polygon entering of Blender to be one of its weakest features. Taking a sketchup model into Blender for final rendering would be the best idea I think. Blenders render engine is pretty powerful and capable and IMO one of its strongest features.

[tilt]

hmmm that sounds like a good way to go redrobes, so maybe I should get sketchup after all - or at least after the finals for my marketing class

[Vorhees]

i like this mate , i have only been using Sketch up for star ships, maybe i will give some thing like this a shot , Repped

[RecklessEnthusiasm]

Redrobes - Thanks a tonne! I know what you mean about the interface. I opened blender once and exactly once, thought "I am way in over my head" and promptly closed it. But you're right that a more powerful program would produce some nicer results: Sketchup's biggest weaknesses are definitely the absence of manipulatable lighting (you only have one light source: the sun, and it produces only very basic hard shadows) and lacking in depth texture options (only basic, flat textures). One day I'm sure I'll give a more complex program a shot for those features alone. I did see that sketchup has some really great plugins that provide those options, but they are all commercial products that cost hundreds of dollars. Of course, Sketchup has really lacking export options too, so making stuff and switching over into another program is not really an option. I haven't tried importing models into Photoshop to give their basic 3D painting tool a try yet, but any 3D work I've tried to do in PS was laborious, slow, and frustrating. I am eager to see what new features Google adds as they go. Sketchup 8 came out, but the new (and impressive) features were geared towards making actual buildings for Google Earth.

Tilt - It is honestly amazingly easy. You'll get going in minutes. In fact, just watch the four short 'new user' tutorials and you'll already have enough going for you to make stuff. Sketchup has some pretty brilliant interface elements that make it super easy to know what you're doing and what is going on. Here is a link to the official tutorials, for when you decide to give it a shot: http://sketchup.google.com/training/...ew_to_gsu.html

Vorhees - Thanks a bunch, buddy!

[geamon]

Awesome stuff RE, from what I can tell Sketchup is a pretty simple and easy to use tool. But if I were to work with 3D though I think I'd want more then just simple shapes to work with haha. I haven't bothered trying 3D yet, but the software function I would want is where you can take a grey height map and subtract from a simple shape and get the topography or results wanted. I doubt Sketchup has it but would Blender?

[RecklessEnthusiasm]

Dunno. Sketchup has a new "sandbox" tool to make realistic terrains. I don't know if it had the option to import height maps, but I bet it does. You might be able to do that in the free version of Bryce 3D, and import it?