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[Crackshot]

*Deleted*

[Armageddon]

Looks decent. A little bit blocky. And the floors and walls are bare. Try adding some prop_physics debris around and some trash/grunge overlays. I like the trees. Some custom textures wouldn't hurt either. And some doors.

[Crackshot]

Looks decent. A little bit blocky. And the floors and walls are bare. Try adding some prop_physics debris around and some trash/grunge overlays. I like the trees.

Yeah, its hard to bring detail to it because the actual map is also pretty blocky, but i could try some overlays and stuff, and you have no idea how much of an adventure i had to go on to find palm tree models that didnt require the use of a 3d skybox like the stock ones in hammer, that is a hard fail in my book.

[Armageddon]

Well source can make the real map look better!

[Crackshot]

Well source can make the real map look better!

In the hands of someone with proper mapping skills you are probably right, but sadly the brush work and details in this map are truly the best i have ever made.

[Chopium]

Better lighting and fog would make this map.

[mookie]

Never played CoD4 so I'm not sure exactly what you're going for as far as a sandstorm look. But one thing you can try is having the skybox be a flat colour that matches the fog color in the map, so that past a certain distance everything fades away and you can't see anything. This could be way off from what you're going for though.

Like was posted above, light will make a big difference. It's a little hard to suggest exactly what way to go outside without having an idea of roughly what the skybox will look like. For that blue sky, I'd say the light is way too saturated and yellow, and that probably gives a weird quality to the map as it is now.

Try using a light_spot for the floodlights on the front of the building in the first screenshot and the fluorescent light in the second screenshot and see how that works. I'd think it'll work well for the fluorescent light if you set wide enough angles. One suggestion is that you probably want to use a ceiling texture that's a bit paler than the walls, whereas there it looks like it's a bit darker. I think (not sure) that's a general rule of interior design, and it should make it easier to get the ceiling lit with mostly refracted light coming off the floor and walls.

Your brushwork so far is neat and clean, which is a good thing. It may add a lot of depth in some places to add some depth; wherever there are two different sections of wall directly above each other, let them be a different width to create a ledge or overhang if it makes sense, or let the middle part that's sandwiched in between be recessed or extended a little. Find pictures of real buildings like what you're trying to make and look closely at them to see how they're constructed.

There are some little details, but there always will be. A lot of times they're a matter of opinion but they're always worth noticing and making sure you're making the map the way you want it.

You've got trees coming up out of what look like circular blocks. I think usually in urban areas all kinds of plants will be in some kind of planter, or at least a hole in the ground with curbing around the sides.

There are some shallow arches running across the front of the building in the third and fifth screenshots. I can't tell how far out they come, but maybe not far enough to put columns underneath. But it seems unusual to me to have any kind of arch like that without columns underneath; even where the arches are purely decorative I think you'd expect to find faux columns underneath which might only be rectangular strips coming a few inches off the wall.

Stretching that tile texture to make bricks for your walls is a neat trick, but it's probably not something you want to stay with in the long run. Bricks walls are almost always made with each brick overlapping two bricks below. It doesn't really stick out but people will probably notice it subconsciously and think that something is wrong, even if they can't quite tell what it is.

The curb with the hazard striping looks fine. You might want to consider putting it at a right angle though for a couple of reasons. (1) Probably not applicable here, but if you put a slanted edge at too steep of an angle it can screw up players walking over it, even if it's lower than a step that could be made if it were a right angle. (2) If you decide to turn the pavement below into a displacement, it will be fine to have it roll up and down a bit as long as the curb extends far enough below the pavement; if you do the same with the sloped curbs it will probably look a bit weird unless you keep the noise on the displacement very low. On the other hand, the sloped curbs do look good and are probably realistic in a lot of places, so it's really a question of making sure you know what you want to do.

You've got a couple of vending machines hanging out in the open. To my eye, it seems odd as usually they'd be in a recessed area or pushed up against a wall.

The metal trim around the windows seen in the second, third, fifth screenshots looks far too thick. You can probably take these down to four or even two units.

Looking at the first screenshot, the brushwork on the parapet looks paper-thin. The fence in front also looks a bit odd only because it's taller than the pillars on the low end.

It'll be very worthwhile to get to know VTFEdit and an image editor (Photoshop, GIMP, etc.), even if you just dump a few VALVe textures to TGA, recolor them a bit, and then make them back into VTFs. Being able to match colors however you like will make a big difference to the look of your maps. Just having some familiarity with materials files and then using BSPZip is important.

It can be very easy to go overboard with the car models.

[Imoddedu]

District is more run down, try to go for a darker theme.

[Unstoppable Florence]

The light from the sun is far too sickly. Refrain from using a dim yellow colour, it is completely unnatural and makes me feel physically ill. The middle east actually has the same sun as the rest of the world, it just looks yellow because of the sand.

Other than that, if your brushwork improves over time this could well be promising. : )

[RA7]

A good solid start imo. Hope to see more soon