Player Homes and Floor Plans

[LordMalachi]

So I'm in school atm for Interior Design and was wondering, if I were to draw up floor plans for a house or something, could someone take those and make a scale copy of the house as a mod? Or are there restrictions I'd need to be aware of? Such as walls have to be in certain thicknesses, or lengths, or doors can only be certain sizes. Stuff like that.

 

Related, does anyone know of a good way to get references of objects to use in AutoCAD? So I could possibly use the actual shape and size of a Skyrim bed instead of the ones that come in ACAD?

[Kraeten]

Well, Skyrim's architecture isn't scaled realistically. If you were to design something in feet and inches, the modder would have quite a bit of work on his hands as he scaled your blueprint down. In addition to that, you also have to take into account lighting. A single mesh in Skyrim can only be illuminated by five or so lights before the lighting physics start to fail. So you would want your architecture to be made up of numerous meshes/nifs if it requires more than five lights.

[jet4571]

I would suggest using BSA opt and exporting all the nif files for the architecture style you want and then export those to .obj with nifskope. But honestly thats more work, just use the CK to model the house and take screenshots of the floorplan and use those screenshots as a guide for autocad.

[LordMalachi]

Well, Skyrim's architecture isn't scaled realistically. If you were to design something in feet and inches, the modder would have quite a bit of work on his hands as he scaled your blueprint down. In addition to that, you also have to take into account lighting. A single mesh in Skyrim can only be illuminated by five or so lights before the lighting physics start to fail. So you would want your architecture to be made up of numerous meshes/nifs if it requires more than five lights.

Not scaled realistically how? I mean, I understand a doorway might be a different width than ones we normally have, but there must be some form of measurement. Even if it's just points on a grid. But I suppose that'd be one of the restrictions I was asking about. I could potentially create a scale to base things on. Such as "The wall should be 4 beds long" which sounds silly, but it could work. It wouldn't be hard on my end at least because I can always change the measurement units to anything I want in CAD. Though learning how to measure in beds might take some getting used to.

Your second point on lighting is actually something I had no idea about, and might explain why so many mods I see tend to have dark spaces and few lights. Technically that'd be something the modeler would have to worry about, not me. But now that I know about it I'd probably at least try to work around it.

 

I would suggest using BSA opt and exporting all the nif files for the architecture style you want and then export those to .obj with nifskope. But honestly thats more work, just use the CK to model the house and take screenshots of the floorplan and use those screenshots as a guide for autocad.

First sentence: That sounds complicated...

Second sentence: That sounds like I'd be defeating the purpose of making the floorplans in CAD to give to someone to model. I've tried using the CK for Oblivion and found it extremely confusing and difficult to work with. My goal is to touch the CK as little as possible and work in a medium I'll understand, then have someone that currently understands CK make it a reality.

[Kraeten]

 

Well, Skyrim's architecture isn't scaled realistically. If you were to design something in feet and inches, the modder would have quite a bit of work on his hands as he scaled your blueprint down. In addition to that, you also have to take into account lighting. A single mesh in Skyrim can only be illuminated by five or so lights before the lighting physics start to fail. So you would want your architecture to be made up of numerous meshes/nifs if it requires more than five lights.

Not scaled realistically how? I mean, I understand a doorway might be a different width than ones we normally have, but there must be some form of measurement. Even if it's just points on a grid. But I suppose that'd be one of the restrictions I was asking about. I could potentially create a scale to base things on. Such as "The wall should be 4 beds long" which sounds silly, but it could work. It wouldn't be hard on my end at least because I can always change the measurement units to anything I want in CAD. Though learning how to measure in beds might take some getting used to.

Your second point on lighting is actually something I had no idea about, and might explain why so many mods I see tend to have dark spaces and few lights. Technically that'd be something the modeler would have to worry about, not me. But now that I know about it I'd probably at least try to work around it.

 

When designing a mesh for Skyrim or Fallout at least, the modeler is typically measuring in Generic Units or GU for short. Which is different from US standard or Metric. If for instance you wanted to create a tileset of meshes that worked with the Creation Kit's snap to grid system, you would have to make sure that the mesh was 128 GU wide or long. If the mesh needs to be larger, then it would be 512 units instead. But I'm probably making this sound more complicated than it really is.

 

What kind of architecture did you have in mind? A small cabin/cottage?

Edited February 13, 2014 by Kraeten

[jet4571]

Seriously? you find creating from scratch in Autocad simpler than drag and drop parts with snap to grid then move them about and rotate with the snap for rotate set? you can make a farmhouse in less than 2 minutes with navmesh in the CK. I hope you never open 3DS Max as that is far more complicated than the CK.

 

*Edit,

 

Also this forum is not for mod requests as that seems to be what you are looking for. If you want a house mod close to your autocad floorplan then make a floorplan and ask in the mod request forum for a house setup that way as close as possible.

Edited February 13, 2014 by jet4571

[LordMalachi]

 

 

Well, Skyrim's architecture isn't scaled realistically. If you were to design something in feet and inches, the modder would have quite a bit of work on his hands as he scaled your blueprint down. In addition to that, you also have to take into account lighting. A single mesh in Skyrim can only be illuminated by five or so lights before the lighting physics start to fail. So you would want your architecture to be made up of numerous meshes/nifs if it requires more than five lights.

Not scaled realistically how? I mean, I understand a doorway might be a different width than ones we normally have, but there must be some form of measurement. Even if it's just points on a grid. But I suppose that'd be one of the restrictions I was asking about. I could potentially create a scale to base things on. Such as "The wall should be 4 beds long" which sounds silly, but it could work. It wouldn't be hard on my end at least because I can always change the measurement units to anything I want in CAD. Though learning how to measure in beds might take some getting used to.

Your second point on lighting is actually something I had no idea about, and might explain why so many mods I see tend to have dark spaces and few lights. Technically that'd be something the modeler would have to worry about, not me. But now that I know about it I'd probably at least try to work around it.

 

When designing a mesh for Skyrim or Fallout at least, the modeler is typically measuring in Generic Units or GU for short. Which is different from US standard or Metric. If for instance you wanted to create a tileset of meshes that worked with the Creation Kit's snap to grid system, you would have to make sure that the mesh was 128 GU wide or long. If the mesh needs to be larger, then it would be 512 units instead. But I'm probably making this sound more complicated than it really is.

 

What kind of architecture did you have in mind? A small cabin/cottage?

 

It sounds like I could still convert GU into Feet though, maybe a rough conversion, but a conversion nonetheless.

 

I was thinking a bit bigger than that lol, like a proper manor, 3+ bedrooms for family and guests, sitting room, drawing room, library, study, armory, kitchen and dining hall. All that good stuff. I mean, I could probably start with a cottage to get used to the sizing and such, but that's not the final goal.

 

 

Seriously? you find creating from scratch in Autocad simpler than drag and drop parts with snap to grid then move them about and rotate with the snap for rotate set? you can make a farmhouse in less than 2 minutes with navmesh in the CK. I hope you never open 3DS Max as that is far more complicated than the CK.

 

*Edit,

 

Also this forum is not for mod requests as that seems to be what you are looking for. If you want a house mod close to your autocad floorplan then make a floorplan and ask in the mod request forum for a house setup that way as close as possible.

First off, yes, I find drawing exact lines to my specifications simpler than dealing with what you just described. I have opened 3DS Max before and put it away for that exact reason, in favor of line based programs.

 

I'm certainly not looking for a mod request at the moment. But I don't expect you to understand that as you're fighting the essence of my post to begin with. I at no point requested a mod be made. I asked for help and tips on making CAD floorplans as easily translatable to the CK as possible, while keeping my interaction with the CK as minimal as possible. A couple months or so from now, after the question posed in this post is well answered and my classes in CAD have taught me what I need to know, and I've gone through the process of creating the floorplan, "then" I will post in the mod request forum asking for a mod that matches my floorplan. But because I went through the process of learning to make said floorplans, and make them translatable, I could then make additional mod requests for other mods. This post is the building block.

[Tamb0]

If TESAnnwyn is correct (I think it is), then

 

1metre = 100 cm = 70.175 GU. Round it off to 70 GU

 

this gives us

 

1 GU = 70 / 100 = 0.7 GU = 1cm

 

therefore

 

10cm = 7 GU

 

1 inch = 2.54 cm = (2.54 x 0.7) = 1.778 GU

 

multiply this up and you see that 6ft = (72 inches ) = 72 x 1.778 = 128.016 or 128 GU

 

To round thing off, it's generally accepted that 128 GU's are equivalent to 6 feet (imperial).

 

Hope this gives you a foundation to work on.

 

As Kraeten said, most static sets stick to multiples of 128 GU i.e 128, 256,...etc so that everything snaps into place.

Edited February 14, 2014 by Tamb0

[LordMalachi]

If TESAnnwyn is correct (I think it is), then

 

1metre = 100 cm = 70.175 GU. Round it off to 70 GU

 

this gives us

 

1 GU = 70 / 100 = 0.7 GU = 1cm

 

therefore

 

10cm = 7 GU

 

1 inch = 2.54 cm = (2.54 x 0.7) = 1.778 GU

 

multiply this up and you see that 6ft = (72 inches ) = 72 x 1.778 = 128.016 or 128 GU

 

To round thing off, it's generally accepted that 128 GU's are equivalent to 6 feet (imperial).

 

Hope this gives you a foundation to work on.

 

As Kraeten said, most static sets stick to multiples of 128 GU i.e 128, 256,...etc so that everything snaps into place.

You are fantastic :smile:
So now I know that I should work in 6ft sets whenever possible. Which I think I can do, I got really good at working in 5 and 7 block sets in minecraft.

Edited February 15, 2014 by LordMalachi