Need Help with computer issues

[- JO -]

Hello!

I need help regarding computer

It's been a while since I've posted new maps or illustrations... it's because I let myself be drawn into a project that has taken on proportions beyond my control.

At first, I wanted to design a 3D castle on Sketchup, I started by drawing elements, then I made more and more, then I started to assemble everything and with enthusiasm, I found myself modelling the palace of the largest city in the world of Nossym, on which I have been working for several years...
Here are some examples of where I stand :





Obviously, this is where the problems start: I work with layers, which allows me to work easily on each element separately (by hiding the layers I'm not working on). But when I want to see all the layers, my computer starts to show serious signs of weaknesses: it needs long computational moments and the slightest click sometimes leads to minutes of absence. The problem is that I am far from finished: I still want to design a large palace and a citadel, as well as other smaller buildings.

So here's my question:

Do you think I can change some parts of my computer to improve its computing power. It was bought in december 2015, it's a MSI GE72-2QF, Core I7, 5700 HQ, 17,3", 16GB, 2xSSD128GB+1TB, Bluray, GTX970M, Win 10 ?
Should I consider buying a new computer ?
Or, given the scope of the project, I might as well give up right away, because no personal computer has the necessary computing power...

I tried to reach the computer shop where I bought mine, I had no answers... so I turn to some specialist here, that knows a lot about those machines...

Thanks a lot in advance for your help !

[J.Edward]

You've hit one of the classic problems artists face when working in 3d...
Detail. I used to work in SU a lot and encountered it often.
I would model every little detail and thus my models would have more geometry than they really needed.

Usually, a model is built for a scene, and a scene, unless animated, will have a view point.
The viewpoint will determine where the most detail needs to be based on the observer.
Details further in the back would be accomplished with materials or images applied to simpler geometry.

So all those stone supports or the windows further back would be done with flat imagery,
giving the look of detail but not the actual geometry, which is what is slowing down your process.

Even with all of that, you will still hit some limits if you create entire cities in SU.
SU is not really optimized for large sets of data/geometry.
Other 3d apps are better at handling that, like Blender, but not as easy or fun to use.

The alternative would be to model lots of smaller elements in SU and then assemble them in Blender and render them there too.
Depending on the version of SU that you are using, it may not even take advantage of 64 bit and thus all of the ram that you have.

That's just my bit of input based on doing some of this sort of thing in the past.
Hope that is helpful.

One thing I found helpful... 3d is a tool to assist, not an end in itself.
That said, I wasn't creating game assets or doing animation.
So my uses and needs may differ from yours.

I almost forgot to address this...
I think your specs are plenty good.
You are possibly just hitting the 32 bit limits of SU.
It's always been a problem when the geometry gets really dense/complex.
It may be 64 bit now, i'm not sure, as I use an old version of SU pro.

[- JO -]

You've hit one of the classic problems artists face when working in 3d...
Detail. I used to work in SU a lot and encountered it often.
I would model every little detail and thus my models would have more geometry than they really needed.

Usually, a model is built for a scene, and a scene, unless animated, will have a view point.
The viewpoint will determine where the most detail needs to be based on the observer.
Details further in the back would be accomplished with materials or images applied to simpler geometry.

So all those stone supports or the windows further back would be done with flat imagery,
giving the look of detail but not the actual geometry, which is what is slowing down your process.

Even with all of that, you will still hit some limits if you create entire cities in SU.
SU is not really optimized for large sets of data/geometry.
Other 3d apps are better at handling that, like Blender, but not as easy or fun to use.

The alternative would be to model lots of smaller elements in SU and then assemble them in Blender and render them there too.
Depending on the version of SU that you are using, it may not even take advantage of 64 bit and thus all of the ram that you have.

That's just my bit of input based on doing some of this sort of thing in the past.
Hope that is helpful.

One thing I found helpful... 3d is a tool to assist, not an end in itself.
That said, I wasn't creating game assets or doing animation.
So my uses and needs may differ from yours.

I almost forgot to address this...
I think your specs are plenty good.
You are possibly just hitting the 32 bit limits of SU.
It's always been a problem when the geometry gets really dense/complex.
It may be 64 bit now, i'm not sure, as I use an old version of SU pro.

Thanks a lot J.

To be honest, I don't really know what I'm modelling this palace for. I started, I thought it was cool and I wanted to keep going.
But I fully understand your point of view: if it's to have a model to draw it, I don't need all these details, let alone on all sides. I think I just thought it was cool to be able to "visit" the palace, turn around, look for points of view depending on the buildings, shadows, etc.
But obviously I'm not sure that's possible.
I think I'll see if SU 2019 runs on 64 bit, and if it doesn't, I'll wait to know for what purpose I want to model the palace (other than for itself)

[J.Edward]

Thanks a lot J.

To be honest, I don't really know what I'm modelling this palace for. I started, I thought it was cool and I wanted to keep going.
But I fully understand your point of view: if it's to have a model to draw it, I don't need all these details, let alone on all sides. I think I just thought it was cool to be able to "visit" the palace, turn around, look for points of view depending on the buildings, shadows, etc.
But obviously I'm not sure that's possible.
I think I'll see if SU 2019 runs on 64 bit, and if it doesn't, I'll wait to know for what purpose I want to model the palace (other than for itself)

I did very similar things, for very similar reasons.
I have a bunch of partially finished castles and other models.
Some were for stock 3d modelling that I used to do years back.
Others... I was trying to make environments I could wander around in, so to speak.
Sometimes I just wanted to see what i could do, or what could be done with SU.

I really wanted to be able to model whole cities.
I sort of had to give up on that, at least back then.

Keep at it, so long as you are enjoying it.
You'd be surprised what proves useful, in one way or another.

[Wingshaw]

Obviously, this is where the problems start: I work with layers, which allows me to work easily on each element separately (by hiding the layers I'm not working on). But when I want to see all the layers, my computer starts to show serious signs of weaknesses: it needs long computational moments and the slightest click sometimes leads to minutes of absence. The problem is that I am far from finished: I still want to design a large palace and a citadel, as well as other smaller buildings.

To be honest, I don't really know what I'm modelling this palace for. I started, I thought it was cool and I wanted to keep going.

I know exactly the feeling you're talking about. I encountered that same thing when I worked on my city of Birdseye. I wanted to make a full 3D model of the city (and still fully intend to keep trying) so that I could draw and map it with more ease, but just got sucked into the project. It didn't need the number of hours I devoted to it, but I don't regret that at all. Why? It was so much FUN!!!

Anyway, in terms of suggestions for what you can do, I don't have much I can offer you. You could try what I did, which is to divide the model into completely separate files. I started with the entire city, and then I found that I could work on only the Garden District as a distinct model on its own. With the Bridge District, I ended up having to divide that into four files. Thus, each file was manageable, and could be stitched together at a later point.

I also got quite lucky, in that Katto here on the guild saw my WIPs and volunteered to help. I don't know if he's still around, but he's an expert user of 3D modelling software (including SU) and had many suggestions on ways to streamline the project. Maybe you could reach out to him?

As John says, as long as you're enjoying it, persistence ain't a bad thing

Wingshaw

[- JO -]

I did very similar things, for very similar reasons.
I have a bunch of partially finished castles and other models.
Some were for stock 3d modelling that I used to do years back.
Others... I was trying to make environments I could wander around in, so to speak.
Sometimes I just wanted to see what i could do, or what could be done with SU.

I really wanted to be able to model whole cities.
I sort of had to give up on that, at least back then.

Keep at it, so long as you are enjoying it.
You'd be surprised what proves useful, in one way or another.

Thanks J. for the good advices ! I think I'll go on the most I can, and try to build with less details... (which is frustrating... because, separately, everything works just fine) and most of all, I'll try to think about what I want to do (other that just build and stare )

[- JO -]

I know exactly the feeling you're talking about. I encountered that same thing when I worked on my city of Birdseye. I wanted to make a full 3D model of the city (and still fully intend to keep trying) so that I could draw and map it with more ease, but just got sucked into the project. It didn't need the number of hours I devoted to it, but I don't regret that at all. Why? It was so much FUN!!!

Anyway, in terms of suggestions for what you can do, I don't have much I can offer you. You could try what I did, which is to divide the model into completely separate files. I started with the entire city, and then I found that I could work on only the Garden District as a distinct model on its own. With the Bridge District, I ended up having to divide that into four files. Thus, each file was manageable, and could be stitched together at a later point.

I also got quite lucky, in that Katto here on the guild saw my WIPs and volunteered to help. I don't know if he's still around, but he's an expert user of 3D modelling software (including SU) and had many suggestions on ways to streamline the project. Maybe you could reach out to him?

As John says, as long as you're enjoying it, persistence ain't a bad thing

Wingshaw

Thanks a lot Wingshaw !

It's good to see I'm not the only one to be overwelmed by that kind of projects ! It's true that a whole city in 3D makes me dream ! (kind of God complex probably ?)... I hope I can move forward a bit with this project, and I'll try to contact Katto !

[Ilanthar]

Hey, welcome in the club of those who lost considerable amount of time doing pointlessly detailed models.... and like to wander in it.

I have an AMD FX(tm)-6300 6 core Processor x3, 16 G0 RAM, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 and a dual-boot linux Mint (my main system) and Win10 (mainly for Sketchup).
I still have the same kind of trouble with some of my models, even if I restrain myself more than before (and sometimes fails to). The 2D option for details (windows, doors and such) is working pretty well if you just want a general view or drawing over. I don't have much more to add to the excellent counsels you already have from J.E. & Wingshaw.

PS : Il n'y a pas très longtemps, je me demandais justement si mes tipeurs apprécieraient que je poste un lien vers le modèle du galion ou les modèles que j'utilise en général

[waldronate]

One thing that can help is to bake the large amount of geometry for each building down to some displacement maps (or normal maps).
That way, you can model your buildings at whatever resolution you want and use simple geometry to put together your city.
I just realized that I don't know if SketchUp has that kind of feature available, though, so feel free to ignore me about this.

[Falconius]

Don't know about Sketch Up specifically but my inclination would be that it is a RAM issue. But before going out to get anything, I'd suggest opening up the Windows Task manager then the resource monitor at the bottom of the performance tab and find out specifically what the bottleneck is with a few tests.

In Blender it is possible to have the information in separate files and then call it into the big over file as needed (ie you might make your houses and buildings in various separate files which makes them easy to work on and have an instance in the big file where you are working on the overall shot and you can also use simple block ins or standin blocks until you are ready). The other thing to do is use instances within the same file, which you may already be doing. Instead of copying and pasting a tower you could make one tower and then make instances of the tower which rather than duplicating the information just refers back to the original tower for that information.

Also I don't know how Sketchup handles this sort of thing, but breaking smaller gemoetry down into normal maps or displacement maps where possible as Waldronate suggests would also be very helpful.

Edit: Forgot to mention: that looks really awesome Jo.