graphic of immovables are too big

[Kristin]

Several graphics of immovables are too big, so they overlay with the road around the immovable.
The attached pngs show examples.

[Hans Joachim Desserud (hjd)]

I've noticed this as well.
Nice job gathering the various examples. :)

[Chuck Wilder (chuckw20)]

The buildings I have reviewed (i.e. those posted separately from the zip file) may still be used as they are if we tweak the hotspot. You can't avoid hiding roads that run behind the immovable but we can center them better to accommodate the side roads.

The barbarian buildings will be addressed in concert with bug report #677337.

[Hans Joachim Desserud (hjd)]

The fields can overlap various buildings as well. See for instance the field on the weaving mill, and the fence of the blackroot farm. I attached it here rather than reporting a separate issue, since this already covers overlapping elements.

[Astuur (wolfsteinmetz)]

This problem may also pertain to the space requirements of other elements (buildings and immovables).
(I had similar problems with the boulders I created (currently called standing stones "sstones)

The reserved space on the map is not sufficient to accomodate the house models (existing as well as new ones) without conflicts. While in some cases the layering in the Z-axis keeps up the illusion of "behind", it distroys it in other cases. Those conflicts cannot be resolved by only changing the hotspot. Animation of carriers and animals usually kill the illusion.

To reproduce: build a house (I used the new Empire bakery) and build roads as close as possible before the builder arrives. Watch the building animation (groundplate) and look at the working animation after the worker has occupied the house.

To demonstrate the problem I have prepared a montage (attached).
It shows in 2 rows a building sequence of Chuck's new imperial bakery model.
The upper row shows building at the normal (adjusted by Chuck) hotspot.
The lower row shows an alternative hotspot chosen (by me) to solve the conflict by moving the building closer to its flag.
The problems are marked. I have found no hotspot that could avoid all conflicts.

The answer to this may be, to be more generous in reserving that space, but that others must decide.

The montage will show that the hotspot cannot be used for _major_ tweaking of the positioning, because the
delivery of wares will break the Z layering.

[Chuck Wilder (chuckw20)]

It is obvious to me that the simplest solution to this problem is to have the artist ensure his design "fits" within the parameters and take the hot spot position into consideration and incorporate it accordingly in the model when he/she is initially designing the image.
I find that all too often, I am struggling to make a graphic (usually my own) work with an unwisely positioned hot spot point.

We just have to heighten the artist's awareness of the critical nature of hot spot positioning.

It may be attractive to place a building's front door in the southeastern corner or some other extreme of the building, but you run the risk of other parts of the image colliding with other map elements. At this point, we just have to design with the intention of placing the the image's hot spot as centrally as possible.

With the Blender rendering stage templates that we use, it should be a simple matter to design the model's hot spot in the middle of the stage. (Something I don't always consciously do and eventually pay the price for it. The empire bakery is a prime example.)

Rather than saddle the coders with the onus of accommodating an artist's whimsy, I suggest placing the responsibility on the artist and provide a "reminder" of sorts in the blender rendering stage templates, (empty_building_template.blend and empty_worker_template.blend.) This could be accomplished with a simple text comment or with some graphical reference to keep placement of the hot spot foremost in the design process from the beginning.

[Chuck Wilder (chuckw20)]

In my comment #9 above, I refer to the rendering templates available to the 3D artists and I attached a screenshot from within Blender showing the stage with its focal points (the white and black arrows) in the middle of the trim box which, itself, delineates the boundaries of the camera. We have these guides available to us.

Additionally, I attach here a 2D gauge which is available in the media trunk as a .xcf (GIMP) file. It can be used with a rendered image to display the closest roads given the size of the image and its hot spot.

IMO, these should be sufficient to the need. They just have to be used.

[Astuur (wolfsteinmetz)]

@ Chuck's #9
Well, of course all problems can be amended by producing "suitable graphics" (except as you say the Z-Layer problems, especially with free running animals.)
But the outcome is different.
Uniform offerings of space and hotspot position within that space make uniform house architecture models, (to a certain extent) however any benevolent artist might try to overcome uniformity!

Chuck, I guess you also have some guidlines about the scale of the models at hand.
I think there are different scales used in the models. (the Colosseum seems different from the lumberjack's hut)
So it seems the differences in "real size" (i.e. a natural size of such a building) is bigger than is reflected by the change from a "small" to a "big" building.
Manipulating the scale has its drawbacks of course, and you certainly don't need me to tell you that.
But I have made the experience that persons not directly preoccupied with graphics, often do not take into consideration that artist like you are working at the absolut minimum of resolution for showing _necessary_ details.
(i.e. the "loom" problem).
Being able to dedicate a few triangles more to an otherwise very suitable house model, would not only allow more
architectural freedom. but also in some cases a higher resolution.

And I have been saying in 2009 already (and keep it up) that it would not hurt to have more space available for houses and so graphically less crowded settlings.
In that light I wrote https://bugs.launchpad.net/widelands/+bug/832583/comments/2

Now, although you say there, that you'd welcome more freedom, your #9 post here seems to transport, that it's not necessary. I really have no idea how revolutionary and awkward a concept of variable space requirements per house would really be for the programers, but I would indeed beg them to investigate into this direction.
I don't want them to assume that everything is fine, and a non-fitting building is the artist's fault.
Don't you think they could try to open up the door a bit wider for your work?

[SirVer (sirver)]

I think that giving houses variable sizes will make the game quite confusing. Currently, you can quite plan out how to lay out your buildings, but when every building has a different size you can't: you are stuck with trying things out. Astuur, I can understand that you want more freedom in designing graphics, but the game mechanics must not be compromised with imho.

[Astuur (wolfsteinmetz)]

Yes, I have realized the weak part in this.
It would have meant in the end to replace the simple buildhelp overlay
with a calculated x*y type indicator to show what size is available.
This is not in the least intuitive and would have required the user to know the building sizes.

I did not so much want to expand the size, but would have liked more variation in possible forms of the plot.
Especially in the relative position of the path to the house.
No good, alas.

And how about simply pushing the limits?
Add one row of triangles to each size in Chuck's 2d plot to allow for larger and more detailed buidlings?
Probably already too much, eh?

[Chuck Wilder (chuckw20)]

Hot spots have been adjusted in numerous buildings with rev #5976.
Buildings still requiring remodeling:
atlantean - guardhall, high tower, shipyard and tower
barbarian - fernery and warmill
empire - scouts_house and vineyard

These buildings will be addressed when new animation is added for them.

[Kristin (ha-kripo)]

There is the same problem now with the new Barbarian metalworkshop.
rev. 6008

[Chuck Wilder (chuckw20)]

This is a continuation of the z-layering problem (bug #839386) which, IMHO, is a coding issue.

The model can certainly be resized or even redesigned entirely, but that is only a workaround. If smaller graphics are desired, they can certainly be provided, but it would be nice if the z-layering could be handled as one would expect.

[SirVer (sirver)]

Chuck, what would you like to be seen in the attached tiff from #15? The metalworkshop goes over the road, should the road be painted over the leg of the roof? That seems wrong to me as well.

To solve the attached case with coding would mean that parts of the building (floor) must be drawn before the road and some (legs of the roof) after.

[Chuck Wilder (chuckw20)]

I confess that I did not see the tiff from #15 before I responded in #16. I apologize for that.
Obviously, either the model or at least its hot spot must be altered. I will address this immediately for it impacts the building upgrades to axefactory and warmill.

Thank you for bringing this to my immediate attention. Again, my apologies.

[Chuck Wilder (chuckw20)]

The barbarian metalworks and axefactory have been re-sized to hopefully avoid further encroachment on the roads. Changes are in r#6017.

[SirVer (sirver)]

Released in build17-rc1.