Symmetrical Architectural 3D Models

Fauvist

...are of very limited use.  The point of 3D is that it is three dimensional.  When you have the interior of a room where each of the four walls is almost indistinguishable from the others, or when the exterior of a structure looks the same on more than one exterior wall, it's as if you only have one wall, all the other walls give you no choices, they're all the same.  A 3D architectural model should strive to give you a variety of different aspects in the same room, or on the same exterior.  It's not useful to have every structure resemble a palladian villa; it's visually boring, and it looks artificial.  Renders are not like Hollywood movies - where huge interior sets are populated by hundreds of background actors doing all kinds of things, and where you can cut away to a view of the Grand Canyon or a speeding train.

nightwolf1982

A wall is a wall.  You can give it some visual appeal by putting windows or doors (or some combo of said) in it, or fancy texture patterns, but it's still just a wall.  The focus of any render is never going to be just a wall or empty room, it's the furniture, the objects, the figures and characters in the render which give it the dynamic aspects you're thinking of.

Same thing with exteriors.  Unless a specific building is the focus of your render, it's going to be the various objects and characters filling the scene which give it visual variety.  And even if a building IS the focus, it's unlikely you'll be rendering JUST that building, unless you're doing promos.

In the end, walls and buildings are background elements, used to help establish the environment.  They're usually not meant to be focused on, not meant to be the centerpiece of a scene.

maclean

"A wall is a wall"

I beg to differ. If I look around any room in my house, no two walls are the same. Each room's walls have similarities - ie. they're all wood-panelled or whatever - but one has a door, one has 2 windows, another has an alcove, etc.

I think the point Fauvist is making is that if you're going to build a room, rather than use 4 blank boxes, at least take the trouble to make them realistic by adding different details to each one. I haven't looked at a lot of my old products for a while, but I don't think I've ever sold a room with 4 identical walls.

Btw, Fauvist, one of the products on my (very long) To Do list is a multi-wall room where the user can choose 5 or 6 different versions of each wall.

mac

nightwolf1982

I don't think I've ever encountered a product that was just "4 blank boxes", or "4 identical walls".  But my point was, walls aren't usually the focus of a render.  They're background, meant to help set the scene.  That being the case, they're rarely built with much detail beyond windows and/or doors, sometimes baseboards, and textures for them tend to be fairly basic.

frogimus

Even though the room/walls is the background, they can ruin the render if they're generic, unrealistic, or just generally do not look like a wall.