F4F|Black
Senior Squad
PLEASE READ THIS THREAD BEFORE YOU POST YOUR QUESTION OR USE THE SEARCH FUNCTION. You can post all your questions about building a stadium here.
How do I build stadiums for FIFA? (
Stadiums for FIFA are built completely from zero (this is much easier than editing an existing stadium like in FIFA 2003)
The program you need is actually not the "Stadium Builder" from FIFA ECP (Download here: http://files.filefront.com/2140607). You will need this one for the conversion later, but not for the construction of the stadium.
The program needed for building a stadium is "Rhinoceros 3D" (or any other software which is able to export *.3ds files). There's a trial version available here: http://www.rhino3d.com
If you open the "help.chm" file in the main folder of "Stadium Builder", you will find a good Rhinoceros tutorial explaining the main steps that are needed to build a stadium (in English).
Questions about Rhino 3D
It's very useful to have any kinds of "plans" of the stadium that you want to build. With them you see the size of it, its shapes, height, etc etc.
In addition, grab as much information and photos of the stadium as you can get! There is no limit, grad EVERYTHING you might need. The photos can be used for textures, so the larger they are the better it is.
Try searching on the homepages of the clubs, on stadium pages like www.stadionwelt.de or on Google Image Search.
DOWNLOAD (FIFA 07)
For FIFA 06 and older please use THIS file.
(the size of the pitch has changed in FIFA 07, it's a bit smaller here).
So before you start building a stadium, open this file and build your stadium in it. If you already have started your stadium, you can check if its size is correct by importing the file (File --> Import --> Select the file).
In the file, the grid settings have been set, too. So don't change them. One small square is about 50cm in real life, by the way.
Always save your stadium as a *.3dm file. This is the easiest way to save a stadium, 3ds is needed later.
It's not that important actually because you can always rotate the stadium. Anyway: In the "TOP" view of Rhino, you see two lines (red and green). The side of the red line is the side where the camera of FIFA is placed (and mostly, where the players are running coming out to the pitch).
How do I build stadiums for FIFA? (
Stadiums for FIFA are built completely from zero (this is much easier than editing an existing stadium like in FIFA 2003)
The program you need is actually not the "Stadium Builder" from FIFA ECP (Download here: http://files.filefront.com/2140607). You will need this one for the conversion later, but not for the construction of the stadium.
The program needed for building a stadium is "Rhinoceros 3D" (or any other software which is able to export *.3ds files). There's a trial version available here: http://www.rhino3d.com
If you open the "help.chm" file in the main folder of "Stadium Builder", you will find a good Rhinoceros tutorial explaining the main steps that are needed to build a stadium (in English).
Questions about Rhino 3D
- How to start?
It's very useful to have any kinds of "plans" of the stadium that you want to build. With them you see the size of it, its shapes, height, etc etc.
In addition, grab as much information and photos of the stadium as you can get! There is no limit, grad EVERYTHING you might need. The photos can be used for textures, so the larger they are the better it is.
Try searching on the homepages of the clubs, on stadium pages like www.stadionwelt.de or on Google Image Search.
- What size does the pitch of FIFA stadiums have (to adapt the size of the stadiumto it) ?
DOWNLOAD (FIFA 07)
For FIFA 06 and older please use THIS file.
(the size of the pitch has changed in FIFA 07, it's a bit smaller here).
So before you start building a stadium, open this file and build your stadium in it. If you already have started your stadium, you can check if its size is correct by importing the file (File --> Import --> Select the file).
In the file, the grid settings have been set, too. So don't change them. One small square is about 50cm in real life, by the way.
Always save your stadium as a *.3dm file. This is the easiest way to save a stadium, 3ds is needed later.
- In which direction do I have to build my stadium?
It's not that important actually because you can always rotate the stadium. Anyway: In the "TOP" view of Rhino, you see two lines (red and green). The side of the red line is the side where the camera of FIFA is placed (and mostly, where the players are running coming out to the pitch).
- In the help file of StadiumBuilder (see above) it is written to use only "Single Mesh Faces". Do I have to build the whole stadium with those or can I also use things like "cube" etc?
Only use SingleMeshFaces. This is the only way to be 100% sure that there will be no problems during conversion to FIFA.
SingleMeshFace is just a flat rectangle. To build stadiums, you have to add one mesh to another, piece by piece. It's almost always the same ... copy a mesh, paste it, change it's position/size/texture and go on.
You can find the "SingleMeshFace" icon by right-clicking in the left menu on the blue icon looking like the window from "MS Windows" and then selecting the most left icon in the bottom line.
- How do I edit such a SingleMeshFace (size, position, form, ...)?
There are two ways. If you want to "move" the mesh as a whole, just select it and do what you want to do with it
If you want to change its size or form etc, you can move every single edge point of the mesh. To do that, select it, press F10. This activates the four edge points. Now you can select one (or two or three or four) single point(s) and move them where you want to. To show the "normal" mesh again just press F11 and the point selections will disappear again.
- How can I activate the cursor SNAPPING to the grid to prevent gaps between my meshes (IMPORTANT!) ?
This is a really important setting! You can find it on the bottom bar. It's called "SNAP" (next to "ORTHO", "PLANAR" and "OSNAP"). Normally you should have activated this! Otherwise your meshes won't be placed exact enough and there will be ugly errors later in the stadium (gaps between meshes etc). "SNAP" can be activated / deactivated by pressing F9, too.
"ORTHO" is a setting to have only one direction. It's useful if you want to add things to be in one line etc. Just try around, you'll see when you need this setting
"OSNAP" is something like "SNAP" but contains even more options, for example that your selection will snap to another edge point, to a line etc. Sometimes really useful!
- Should I work with "layers" How do I do that?
Yes, working with layers is another important thing of stadium building. Layers "divide" the stadium into different parts. This is neccessary, because also the FIFA stadium file contains several parts, so it's important for the conversion.
It is suggested to use ONE LAYER for ONE TEXTURE. So for every texture you use, use a new layer! This way you can a) easily select all meshes with the same texture (eg. to change the texture for all those meshes) and b) you can easily chose which parts you want to export.
You can edit the layers by right-clicking on "Default" (next to the black square) in the bottom bar of Rhino. A new window will appear where you can add, delete, hide, rename etc new layers.
The layer with a "tick" on it is the "active" layer. Every new mesh will be added to that layer.
You can also change the layer for meshes. Select them, press F3 and change the "Layer" under "Object".
Layers also make it easier to look "through" the stadium. If you don't want to see some parts of the stadium, just hide them, giving you a better view on those parts you want to look at.
- How can I see my stadium in 3D ?
Just take a look at the "PERSPECTIVE" viewport. This is the viewport where you can see your stadium in 3D. You can move the view by right-clicking into the viewport and moving the mouse then.
If you're seeing only lines but want to see your stadium with textures, right-click on "PERSPECTIVE" and then select "Rendered Display". Then you will see a preview of your stadium with textures!
To get a "real" image of the stadium, there is also the possibility of "rendering" the image. To do this, at best maximise the PERSPECTIVE viewport (double click on PERSPECTIVE) and then click on the icon with the blue ball ("Render").
- How can I assign textures to the meshes?
Select the mesh(es), press F3. A new window will open. Click on "Material" (under "Properties") --> "Basic". At "texture bitmap" you can now add a texture. It has to be a BMP texture!
- How can I get my textures transparent?
Rhinoceros doesn't support the transparency we need for FIFA! There is no possibility to add *.gif files as textures, for example. It won't work with FIFA.
But of course, you can have transparency later in FIFA. You will add this later during the conversion. So for the construction, just add the texture BMPS as they are. It doesn't matter which colour the background of them (which will be transparent later, for example) has.
If you need the transparency only in Rhino (for example to see through a wall to work behind it), you can do this by selecting the mesh, pressing "F3" and chagning the "transparency" there. Your textures will be semi-transparent in the PERSPECTIVE viewport then. But again, this is not the transparency you need in FIFA, so it doesn't have any effect on the stadium.
- How can I change the grid size and the position where the points should SNAP to?
As already said above, the grid settings of the pitchsize...3dm are set that one small square is about 50cm in real life. If you want to change that, click on "File" --> "Properties" --> "Grid"
"Grid extents" means how far the grid is displayed (default for stadiums: 148.234 millimeters)
"Minor grid lines every" means the size of the small grid squares (default for stadiums: 0.274 mm)
"Major grid lines every" means the size of the large grid squares (default for stadiums: 5 minor grid lines).
"Snap spacing" means the positions where your mesh or point should snap into the grid (default for stadiums: 0.03425 mm)
(IMPORTANT: If you change this, take care that it must be a factor of 0.274 mm (eg. 0.03425 is 1/8 of 0.274)! If not, the snapping will be different from the grid line!)
- How can I rotate a mesh (eg if a texture isn't displayed in the correct direction)?
Select the mesh, click on "Transform" --> "Rotate". Then click on the point where you want to rotate the mesh on. Then the mesh will start rotating. If it has got the right position, just click again.
- Do I have to add crowd meshes?
Not directly. You will first need them when you convert. In the conversion tutorial it is explained how you can create crowd. But during the construction, you don't need them.- Do I have to add a field?
No. The field is already included to FIFA, you don't need to build it in Rhino! Don't misunderstand the green "field" of the "pitchsize...3dm" file, it only shows the size of the pitch, you don't need it as a field. What you have to build all all things AROUND the field though, like space behind the goals etc.
- How can I bend a mesh or make it round?
You can build a "round" stand by different ways.
The easiest one is the "bend" command ... just add some polygons next to each other (the more you add the more "round" it will be) and then click on "transform" --> "bend". Select the first point to rotate, and then the end point. You'll see
Another way (a bit more complicated) is to use "flow along curve".
Here you firstly build a "curve" (you can select it in the menu on the left).
Then you also add a line to the thing you wanna make round, and then you use "Tansform" --> "Flow along curve", first select the line of the thing you wanna make round, and secondly the round curve you added before.
Sorry that I can't explain it more exactly, but these are the steps, just try it (don't give up !), you'll understand it anytime).
Please also read the following:
http://www.fifastadt.de/fifa-thema45664.htm
http://www.fifastadt.de/showthread.php?t=26030
Tutorial - How to Use Shear Effect !
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* will be continued *
(Thx to Schwenker and linkin_park) - How do I edit such a SingleMeshFace (size, position, form, ...)?
