February 2019 Challenge: Laugdenor's Tower

[ladiestorm]

This is where the mapping gets a little complicated, and tedious for me. What everyone is seeing in my map is three separate levels of the same building. The area surrounding this building is the same, except that as the tower gets higher, you see more of what's surrounding the tower. But how do you show higher elevations? Everything below you gets smaller. But then there is also the spacing of everything, because it all has to go in the same spot as it was before. My answer to this, is that from higher elevations, you can actually start to see what's under the taller trees and such, giving you a better view. This isn't my only trick, but I will keep that secret for now

### Latest WIP ###
Laugdenors Tower8.JPG

[Diamond]

Okay, now I see what you're doing. I was wondering why you were going to have the grass through the whole thing if you were showing multiple floors; now I get it! Clever solution. The only advice I can give you is carefully consider the height of each floor and how that plays into the 'length' of the tower's shadow and the size of the trees. Right now my thinking is that the tower shadow isn't long enough in relation to the reduced size of the trees. Unless the sun's almost directly overhead, but then you have perspective issues. At least, I do.

[ladiestorm]

I was noticing that myself. The question I have, is does the tower shadow need to be longer in all three levels? I'm thinking yes, but I will yield to the more experienced mappers here. Oh, and Diamond, I don't know if you realized it, but there is more to the 'story' in my previous post. There weren't any comments between my post last night, and the one today. So anyone following this thread may miss a bit.

[Domino44]

Looking great Storm! The library turned out great, I'm loving every update!

[Azélor]

When something gets too complicated, try to hide it. That's what the pro do.
Birds, mist, clouds, smog


The length of the shadow might be okay if it's close to noon. The sun is almost right above the tower, so the shadow is very short.

[Mark Oliva]

does the tower shadow need to be longer in all three levels? I'm thinking yes, but I will yield to the more experienced mappers here.

Is the suggestion here that the length of the shadow changes the higher/lower in level one goes? That's OK if one wants to do it, but it has no real world reality. A tower casts one and only one shadow, not a different shadow for each level.

However, I have a bigger issue with the wall shadows inside the tower. The west wall casts a shadow inside the tower as long as the shadow of the tower outside. A shadow is cast by something blocking light in an area in front of the space otherwise illuminated by a light source. There is no light source outside of the tower that illuminates the room within. Therefore, the internal shadow that you've created is impossible. What would be credible, however, are light patches inside the tower beneath the windows.

The shadow outside the tower suggests that the sun is in the northeast, a sun position that would be found only in the southern hemisphere. That means than if you choose to add light patches below the windows on the inside, the ones in the north and west walls would be brighter than those in the east and south walls.

All that said ... doing away with the internal wall shadow isn't always that satisfying, because it reduces the dimensional effect. Some mappers use a non-realistic solution that has only a minimal impact in terms of non-reality; they make a thin halo shadow down beneath the wall on all sides. That can look quite good. Halo shadows were quite popular with Dundjinni mappers. Unlike CC3+ or FM8, Dundjinni did not have a special effect for shadows, so one made the symbols themselves with halo shadows. The benefit was that a shadow effect was there without it's looking wrong in any rotation of the symbol.

There you have it. Consider yourself lucky, young lady. You've now gotten what we in Franconia call an Extra-Worscht (an extra sausage). You've gotten a sermon the day before Sunday, which gives any other preacher whom you may encounter the chance to give you another one tomorrow!

Hallelujah! Amen! Have fun! Servus!

[Mark Oliva]

The sun is almost right above the tower, so the shadow is very short.

The accuracy of that statement depends of course on both the distance from the equator and the time of year.

Where I live (10°35'53.80" east and 49°40'31.90" north), the noon shadow on the day of the winter solstice is fairly long.

Nix für Ungut!

[Ramah]

What you might like to do is actually move the trees and ornaments further in so that some are cut off by the towers diameter. You have shrunk the trees but are still trying to cover the same area with them so have added more in between to plug the gaps. Where our "camera" is rising and the trees are reducing in size so too would the area they cover and the diameter at the base of the tower. For instance, we probably shouldn't be able to see the outside steps now, or at least only the very edge. If you scale down that bottom layer and position it over the centre of the tower then you should see where the trees are supposed to be.
The shadow would be the same size as it was before, scaled down the same as the trees. It's probably a little short on your first level for a three story tower but as Azelor says, the sun could be right overhead (irrespective of time, Mark ) Just being there sets the tower on the ground and that's the main thing.

It's looking really good, by the way, Ladiestorm. It's interesting to see this thing grow.

[ladiestorm]

@Mark - hey Mark, always glad to hear your sermons! That is the one question I've always had about cc3+ or, in this case dd3. The wall directional shadow. I know you don't use cc3+ that much, but I also know that you have used it a bit... enough to understand the application. So here is the issue I'm dealing with... The longer the wall shadow on the outside (where it's supposed to be) the longer the wall shadow on the inside (where it really shouldn't be). I know lighting will affect the shadows... that's one of the reasons why I'm leaving the lighting until last, because I'm going to have to play around with all of the shadows to match. That's going to be a daunting task.

But I've never really been sure how to deal with the wall directional shadow, because it always ends up extending inside, which casts part of the room darker than it's supposed to be. But I can't create only half of a shadow. I do, however, love the window light idea.... that's something I can play around with, which will help... but then of course I have to make sure that my sources of light are congruent with the shadows.

I had thought about darkening the inside area... with the floor mask, and using the point of light directional shadows... but I never really learned how to work that. But then, I do have a lot of extra time for this map, and I've been working pretty diligently getting the things done that I know I can do. I was doing that because I knew that my third floor, my observatory, was probably going to take a lot of time to construct, seeing as how I need to add a telescope, and a glass domed roof, with an opening to sustain said telescope. Which means I'm probably going to have to make something... which of course, I've never done before.

So my biggest question is... any suggestions on how to deal with that wall shadow?

[ladiestorm]

@Ramah - Hey Ramah! I like your suggestion, and if there was a way I could move the trees farther in, I would definitely do that. That might work in photoshop, and some of the other mapping programs, but it doesn't work like that in cc3+. The example of that is actually in my current map. If you look closely at the lower right hand side of my map, near the map border where the trees are, you will see that, under the actual border, some of the branches from those trees are sticking out past the border. Now there is a way I can fix that, and I will once I get to that point. But what's important, is the REASON why those trees are sticking out the way they are.

That reason, is because of the order in which things are 'drawn' in cc3+. The sheets in cc3+ are similar, if I understand the concept, to the layers in photoshop. The sheets are drawn in a specific order, and everything on those sheets are drawn in that order. So my background is my first sheet, which means it's drawn first. My floor sheet comes next, and then on top of my floor sheet is the wall sheet, so the walls are drawn on top. Now all of those symbols you see, the furniture, the rugs, the trees... each type of symbol has its own sheet, for example, the rugs are on a flat symbols sheet, so that when I add the shadowing affects, they aren't affected, because rugs don't produce shadows, but every thing else does. I also have 3 different sheets for my trees, because some of my trees are taller than others. the taller the item, the longer the shadow.

But what is important, is where those sheets are in the order of the map, to make the program drawn them in the correct place. The sheets for those symbols is lower in the order than the floors and walls, so if I were to move them in closer, as you suggest, they would actually drape over my walls. Now, if I was making a one story building, and my trees were taller than that building, I would actually allow that, to show how tall the trees are in relation to the building I'm making.... but my tower has to be taller than my trees, so I can't have tree branches that drape over my walls. The solution to that would be to move the sheet that the trees are on to where they are above my floor and walls, but from experience with the program, I know that will cause even more problems further on.

I do have a solution that will cause a lot less headaches for me in the long run... and it's actually a fairly simple solution. I just haven't added it, yet. I will, once I get the garden finished on this level.