Tutorials:Building Great Realistic Houses - From the Ground Up/Exterior

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Contents

What is this all about anyway?

Intro

In this exterior section of the tutorial we will be making a house while you follow along. Throughout the tutorial we will be showing you how we did things and explaining the techniques to you. We have also used good and bad pictures to show you whether you are doing it correctly or not so you can keep on track. The aim of it is to teach you new skills that creators often miss that will help you build an overall better exterior for your house.

What can I learn?

This tutorial has 8 chapters as shown in the contents list above. If you are struggling with a particular section of your house, such as landscaping, you can skip straight too it and see all the tips and instructions that help make your landscaping better. Reading the entire tutorial, or just a few bits, will help you learn key skills that you can think of every time you go to build a house. This way, you can look at it and think "did I do that right? Would it look better if I did this?" Hopefully after reading this tutorial you should be able to make better houses, no matter how advanced you are currently.

FAQ

FAQ coming soon!


Foundations & House Shape

This is the first section of the exterior tutorial, it will teach you how to make an interesting looking house and not a box house; it is the basis of your house and if it isn't right your whole house will suffer overall. If you are new to building you will need to know about foundations and how they work and can be placed, if not then you can more straight onto the "Box or Not?" section.


Foundations

Foundations can really make a house a lot better in many ways, they can add in detail, they can can enable you to have basements and cellars, and they can be quit attractive too, but not without their issues, this section will teach you the whats and what nots of the foundation world.


Building WITH foundations

On even terrain

Uniquefoundation.jpg

This section is one of the simplest, building foundations is the same in The Sims 2 and The Sims 3; you should use the brick foundation for the main base of the house, the other types of foundations like stages and fenced ones can be used to do porch areas but should not be the main base for your house. On an even lot you simply need to plan out how you want your house to look, to the right is how we have chosen to build our foundation, as you can see we have planned the main area out using brick foundation and the porch area using the fenced foundations. As a general tip, always make sure you leave at least 1 tile of foundation betweem the wall where your front door will go and the stairs otherwise your sims can't get in the house!


Below you can see how to, and how not to place stairs and walls when building a foundation, the bad side (left) shows that you cannot build your foundation so that there is no space to put a wall at the top, the game won't allow it; the good side (right) shows how you can place a wall 1 tile back from your stairs, this is vital because you will need to place front and back doors like this. If you intend to place the door directly in front of the stairs, 1 tile away, then you need to put the door in first then the stairs, if you put the stairs in first the game won't allow the door to be placed on the opposite wall.

Badandgoodfoundation.jpg


On uneven terrain

Foundationonhill.jpg

When building on uneven terrain you must place the foundation from the highest point of the terrain, when you drag if out it will be flat on top and it will change in height below according to the terrain level. You can build a house shape like in the previous tutorial, just make sure that when you start at the highest point; also when adding section of foundation to the side, front or back of the current raised block, make sure you don't drag from the empty space to the foundation, drag from the foundation to the empty space otherwise they won't fit together.


This type of foundation placing means that your step down from the foundation will be a different height, when placing stairs your game may automatically lower or lift the terrain at the bottom of the steps slightly so it doesn't end up with half steps at the bottom. If however you think that this doesn't look right then you can turn on the cheat "constrainfloorelevation false" (for Sims 3) or "boolprop constrainfloorelevation false (for Sims 2) and then flatten the terrain at the bottom of the steps, the terrain will snap up around the steps and will leave you with a half step at the bottom. *note* always turn the cheat off afterwards by repeating the cheat and changing "false" to "true".

The image to the right shows someone dragging the foundation from the high point at the top of the hill to the low point at the bottom of the hill, as you can see, the foundation stays level on top and underneath changes with the terrain.


Adding in basements

Basementfoundation.jpg

Basements can ONLY be done on houses WITH foundations! Just thought i would throw that out there first to save you reading all this only to find you can't do it! Basements are a brilliant idea in many homes, they offer small lots a way to get another floor of space, and it is really simple to do.

Once you have your foundation layed out you can begin on the basement, you first need to take the foundation tool again; go to your foundation and hold down the ctrl key and delete all of the middle of your foundation so that there is only ONE tile of foundation left around the edge of your house, make sure you don't delete this outer tile of foundation, the basement must be enclosed. This open area is going to be your basement but first you need to make it normal room size height.

Go to the stairs tool and place one set of stairs, then at the bottom of that place another one going further down and at the bottom of that place just one more. Now this bottom tile is the height of your basement, so delete the 3 sets of stairs, then get the leveling tool and level out the bottom of the basement so that it is flat. Now you can add stairs from the foundation above to the basement level, you can add walls and floors and furniture like a normal room, the only limit is that you cannot put any windows or doors in the basement!

The picture to the right shows a foundation with the stairs leading down to it from the foundation above. this is what you should aim to have when you have finished, if yours doesn't look like this then repeat the steps above exactly to get it correct.


Building WITHOUT foundations

Building without using foundations is the simplest form of building that there is and requires little explanation. You simple take out the wall tool and begin putting the walls in, please note however that the area where you are placing the walls needs to be flat! IF it is not flat your walls won't match up properly and you'll have to delete them and do them all over again. Also there are some disadvantages to building without foundations, the first one is that you cannot have a basement, unless you learn the true sunken basement but that is really advanced stuff and you probably wouldn't be reading about how to build without foundations if you can do that level of building!


Box or Not?

Here we are going to tackle and issue that so, SO many people have problems with, building box houses! A big fat box is NOT a house, maybe in the real world you might find a box house, but in the sims it is not attractive and won't get accepted at MTS either. So read on to learn a bit more about them.


1 Storey Buildings

Porchpicture.jpg

Storeys with only 1 building need to be a little more detailed than most buildings with taller floors because your eyes are drawn only to them. Now when people build bungalows they frequently build a rectangle house with a bay window or some similar extremity; this is also not a house, this is a box with a bay window! Right you need to begin with, guess what, a box; yes a box is the best building brick and is really simple to expand on to get a really interesting shape when working with single storey buildings. What makes a one storey more interesting is the use of little extensions here and there, so choose a point on your box and put a small extention of about 3x4 tiles, then choose another side and do one over there, this time make it with diagonal edges, like a bay window. Small additions like this all over your house will give it a LOT more depth.

Another great way to make your house more interesting is to use a porch on the front of the house, so for example you had an L shape house, and your front door is along the front part of the L shape (see picture to the right to see what i mean) then you can add in a porch reall easily. On the end that is open, opposite the end of the L you need to place a column/pillar that matches your house, this will support the porch roof. To finish just get the roof tool and drag it over the house and over to the column and tada you have a porch.

The other way of building a house is that isn't a box is to use a collection of boxes, for example, begin with your living room as a box, then add another box somewhere else for the dining room, and another box for the kitchen, and so on and so forth so that when you have placed all the rooms you get a much more interesting look.

The picture below shows how the techniques can determine a good home and a bad home, and the picture to the right is the example of the porch.

Goodandbadshape.jpg


2+ Storey Buildings

Good2storey.jpg

Ok when making a building that is at least 2 storeys or more you don't need to put SO much detail into every tiny aspect of your house


Finishing Details

Intro to this section here

Windows, Doors, & Arches

Windows and doors are magical objects. They allow you to see and pass through walls! On a serious note, every house requires them. This section is geared towards how to make sensible choices with them, though. We will start with windows, proceed to doors and then wrap up the section. Without any more delay, lets begin!


Windows

Windows are an absolute must for any house. They let in natural light, boost environmet scores, and break up walls to make them look less repetitive. There are two things that you need to know while choosing and placing the correct windows, style and placement, along with cheats.


Style

Lets imagine you have a shell of this nice and grand victorian house. You have ornate columns, precise attention to detail, and a lovely turret jutting up into the sky. Would you add in full legnth fixed windows? No, that would be stupid and illogical. The problem is, people do it anyway! You always want to pick the correct windows for type of house you are building, or else you run the risk of clashing styles and an ugly house. There is no exact way to tell you what window will always be right choice, but a good way of knowing which is a better choice is by knowing some background knowledge of what you are building. Chances are, if you are builing a victorian house, you have seen one before. They have panes of glass in their windows, not fixed arrangements. This same principal applies to all styles of houses, even if you are making something totally on your own, never seen before.


The Problem with Cheats

- This section is more geared toward TS2, but also also applies to TS3. When you are placing windows, sometimes it gets very frustrating. I can't even begin to tell you how frustrating it is to try and get those ridiculously stubborn windows with shutters on them to face the right direction. I can easily bet though, that you somewhere down the line enterd the cheat "moveObjects on" and placed the windows hassel free. It is SO much easier, right! WRONG. If you place windows while having this cheat activated, the walls will end up cutting through them. Not only is it really ugly, but the way to fix it is even more irratating then placing them the first time around. If you do place them with the cheat activated, you will have to deactivate the cheat, pick up the windows, and place them back in. So it is basically doing the same task twice. Another cheat to make sure you don't have activated is "snapObjectsToGrid". This cheat makes it impossible to palce windows properly. Save your self the trouble, and deactivate the ceats before placing windows.


Placement

- This is probably the most important aspect of windows. Many of the lots you find in Creator Feedback with changes required involving some poor descisions on the builders part. But if you read this, you will be able to avoid changes required for poor window and door placement. Windows use common sense for placement, but if you are unsure, here is a handy sheet.


-Kitchen = Counter Height/Medium
-Living Room = Full Legnth/Large/Medium
-Bathroom = Privacy
-Bedroom = Any
-Dining Room = Any
-Office = Any


Some rooms you can place any window, as long as the style fits, because these rooms can have different purposes. If you have a beach house you would want big windows, so you can see the ocean, but you wouldn't want giant windows in a suburb. No one needs to see what your sim is up to in bed, especially when there is special company over. Another big thing that I would like to point out is, no matter what style, shape, look, feel, taste or smell of the house, there are to be no giant windows in a bathroom. You don't see it in real life for a reason, don't bring it into the game [because no one wants to see you...doing your business].


Doors

Doors, the strongest and most reinforced part of your home. They are also very important to navigation, since humans haven't yet stumbled across a way to walk through walls. As for their importance in game, they do the same thing. Therefor, they are required for any house. The same three rules apply to picking doors as they did to windows.


Style

This is the obvious one, of course. Mid evil doors on a modern house looks flat out silly and makes it look like you didn't try very hard with your house. As society generally accepts, the nicest and biggest door of your house goes out front. This is properly titled "The Front Door". When choosing your front door, it should not only fit the style, but also match in color terms and not be made of sliding glass, as you don't often see that. Sliding glass doors can be placed on and style really, as they are often used as the main way to get into the back yard / garden...whichever floats your boat is fine with me. In short, don't be lazy, take the time to find something that matches and makes sense!


More Problems with Cheats!

Again, the same thing happens to doors as it does to windows, except it is worse this time! If you place doors with move objects activated, sims can still usually walk through them, unless something is blocking their path. The only thing that makes it harder is the fact that it is hard to spot when a door is improperly placed. In the sims 2, the give away was the wall would have a tiny border at the bottom of the door, and sometimes the wall would cut through it. In the sims 3, the same thing as windows happens, a wall will chop through it. Fixing it is also the same, deactivate the cheat and replace them.


Placement

I went over it briefly in style, but placement is the very most important thing about doors, if you have a poorly placed door, it might not work, it could look ugly, or it could even look stupid. Basically, sliding glass doors don't lead to bedrooms, they take you outside. Interior doors are acceptable to lead outside, but don't always look fitting. All doors that have glass windows placed inside of them, are to take you outside or bring you back inside, not to lead you into another room in the house. In the sims 3 there has to be a full tile between a door and an object parallel to it, in the sims 2 it isn't necessary to have a full tile, you can have them lining a single tile corridor, but that is also a no no that will be covered later.


Arches

Arches are the best of both worlds. They care acceptable inside and outside, can lead to [most] rooms, and have a decorative and beautiful property. Since these wonders are basically doors, all of the same principals apply, except for placement.


Placement

Arches are very similar to doors. The only thing that is different for them is that they are more versatile. They can be placed anywhere inside or outside with the exception of being the way to enter a bedroom or bathroom. You can use them inside of bedrooms and bathrooms, they just can't function as the main point of entry, as that would be dumb and very...revealing. There are doors into bedrooms for a reason.

Roofing

If you use autoroof, you are lazy. Lazy does not lead to nice houses! We understand that having the ability to click a button and have a roof pop up is really cool and convenient. And if you have ever used it you know how easy it is! But the main problem with autoroof is that it does a terrible job. Like, the epitome of ugly quality. Don't worry though, if you are a long time addict to autoroof, we can help. By trying to make your own roof you not only get better with each attempt, you also get a better roof 100% of the time.

Drives & Garages

Intro to this section here


Patios

Intro to this section here


Pools

Intro to this section here


Landscaping

Intro to this section here


Fencing & Final Touches

Intro to this section here

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