If I were to model a number of buildings for a downtown city street scene,
my first inclination would be to use TrueSpace and convert with PoseRay.
I'll need a combination of detail levels for near, mid, and far buildings.

What would you all use?

CSG?
Wings?
Visual Basic?
???

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Bryan Valencia wrote:
> If I were to model a number of buildings for a downtown city street scene,
> my first inclination would be to use TrueSpace and convert with PoseRay.
> I'll need a combination of detail levels for near, mid, and far buildings.
> 
> What would you all use?
> 
> CSG?
> Wings?
> Visual Basic?
> ???
> 
> 
I'd write povray macros...

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Bryan Valencia spake:

> If I were to model a number of buildings for a downtown city street scene,
> my first inclination would be to use TrueSpace and convert with PoseRay.
> I'll need a combination of detail levels for near, mid, and far buildings.
> 
> What would you all use?
> 
> CSG?
> Wings?
> Visual Basic?
> ???

Ever heard of Blender? Looks weird at the start, but when you start working
with it it's a joy. I use it to model objects that I can't easily define in
SDL. It is -very- good (IMO) for creating triangle patches and importing
them via .OBJ export through 3DWin to Povray. Its a full-on renderer as
well should you want to preview a design and get a general feel for what it
will look like if rendered. Plus it can do animation, particle effects...
sure, they are not Povray, but there are export scripts to Povray (though
not for these effects).

I'd give it a try, if only for its modelling facilities. GPL'ed if I am not
mistaken - blender3d.org.

Regards,
-- 
Stefan Viljoen
Software Support Technician / Programmer
Polar Design Solutions

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"Bryan Valencia" <pov### [at] spamgourmetcom> wrote:
> If I were to model a number of buildings for a downtown city street scene,
> my first inclination would be to use TrueSpace and convert with PoseRay.
> I'll need a combination of detail levels for near, mid, and far buildings.
>
> What would you all use?
>
> CSG?
> Wings?
> Visual Basic?
> ???

I'd agree with Jeff, PovRay macros.

Architecture is one of those things that SDL does very well, and the variety
and flexibility you need for a street scene will be difficult in a mesh
modeller.

RG

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> Ever heard of Blender? Looks weird at the start, but when you start
working
> with it it's a joy.

Yeah I downloaded it and tried to get it to do *anything* for 3 days before
I uninstalled.

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Bryan Valencia spake:

>> Ever heard of Blender? Looks weird at the start, but when you start
> working
>> with it it's a joy.
> 
> Yeah I downloaded it and tried to get it to do *anything* for 3 days
> before I uninstalled.

:) - heard that a lot before & me too. I agree it is not easy to get into,
but it is like any investment - generally, the more you put in, the more
you get out.

I tried it several times before I fianlly started seeing how it fits
together, and now, I like it a lot. Its weird interface makes sense (to me
at least) and since it is free I use it with Povray.

But, then again, each to his own. Did you try a few of the excellent
tutorials available for it? They sure got me started...

-- 
Stefan Viljoen
Software Support Technician / Programmer
Polar Design Solutions

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"Stefan Viljoen polard.com>" <spamnot@<removethis> wrote in message
news:42d7505f@news.povray.org...
> But, then again, each to his own. Did you try a few of the excellent
> tutorials available for it? They sure got me started...


Yes, but the tutorials assumed you already had some working knowledge of
Blender.  For instance they would say, "Select the sphere and the cone and
...

I can't even figure out how to select a sphere or a cone.  I have heard
before that once you learn it, the Blender interface rocks.

FYI - the version of Truespace I use is free too.
http://forms.caligari.com/forms/ts3all_free.html
and it's got a *much* more intuitive interface.

The only thing I don't like about truespace if the help.  It will say things
like, "Select the Delete Face tool in face select mode to remove a polygon
from your object"

But it doesn't show you what the delete face tool icon looks like, or tell
you that you have to go into face select mode, turn the view so that you
have an unobstructed view of the face to delete, and then click the delete
tool, and then the face to delete.

I still like TS, but the help isn't much help.

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"gonzo" <rgo### [at] lansetcom> wrote:
> I'd agree with Jeff, PovRay macros.
>
> Architecture is one of those things that SDL does very well, and the variety
> and flexibility you need for a street scene will be difficult in a mesh
> modeller.

Agreed.  POV-Ray macros would definitely be the way to go.

Bent

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