CMU's to display realistically

[RJBPILOT]

Is there any way to have CMU's display realistically in 3 D?   The material is not doesn't line up realistically with the foundation walls.

 

 

[SNestor]

I don't think so...

 

What you are seeing is a picture...which is associated with the block material.  You could do it by placing a very thin P-Solid on top of the wall...then, find a picture on the web of the top course of concrete block...edit it with a photo editing software so that it repeats correctly when you paint it on a surface.  

 

Or...just live with the limitations and move on down the road. 

[CharlesVolz]

Is this what you are talking about?

 

[Alaskan_Son]

It seems pretty obvious to me from the OP that he or she is talking about the way The CMU material does not appear as it would in real life. The first block for example should start right on top of the footing and there should be a whole block on one end of the wall. In addition, the top of the wall wouldn’t have a seam in it. 
 

In order to get a more realistic representation, a person could do any number of things, but what I would likely lean toward doing myself is painting a unique material onto each wall and then adjusting the material definition to move the texture and pattern offsets.  Simply adjusting the vertical texture and pattern offsets should get you most of the way there. If you want the ends to be accurate it would require multiple materials… One for each wall.

 

For the top of the wall you would have to cap it with something and use yet another material definition for each wall.  Either that or just use a series of p-solids or other 3D objects as Steve suggested.

[Gawdzira]

In my opinion, this is an exercise in futility. If you really need this to establish a count or to guide a novice in how to place stones then I would build a CMU block as a poly object and copy them around the foundation walls. It would probably take me less time to do that on your foundation plan then to make the maps and get that adjusted correctly since CA does not refresh the maps as you adjust them in the DBX.

 

I have done a similar thing with board and batten siding to get a better look.

[Alaskan_Son]

2 hours ago, Gawdzira said:

In my opinion, this is an exercise in futility. If you really need this to establish a count or to guide a novice in how to place stones then I would build a CMU block as a poly object and copy them around the foundation walls. It would probably take me less time to do that on your foundation plan then to make the maps and get that adjusted correctly since CA does not refresh the maps as you adjust them in the DBX.

 

I have done a similar thing with board and batten siding to get a better look.

 

I tend to agree for the most part.  I personally model a lot of things from scratch myself as well.  For these block walls though, I typically just adjust the vertical offsets of the one material definition and call it good.  I don't worry about the top of the wall or how the blocks look on the ends...not that important.  Having said that, adjusting the material definitions is a lot faster than modeling each wall from scratch IMO.