Springfield Reproduced
Given that technically everyone's town is a reproduction of Springfield; somewhere around 5 or 6 years ago I decided to design my town as closely to the show as I could. I found maps (that only do ...
Forum Discussion
"lucienleon519;c-2160309" wrote:
You've put together a great Springfield! You've made really good use of the map and I'm impressed by the logic in the design. I've gone for a super-compact design and part of me is disappointed I didn't give just a bit more space to things as you have.
Space is an illusion. There are a number of ways of creating this illusion.
Framing. One larger area as a center piece and lines of buildings crammed together around it. If you know how to line up the framing buildings, they don't feel cramped and the feeling of the open center piece makes the frame look less cramped.
Shifting. The houses in my residential area don't have much space at all. I limited their space to transfer it over to things like the schools and churches. I put trees to keep the houses from looking bland, but not too many. If you fill it in too much, it feels tight. Fewer trees gives it a lighter feel.
Use of space - heavy in the front or heavy in the back and light in the front. When I do my strip malls I never build right up to the road. I put a space or two to create side walks and decorate the sidewalks with benches, phone booths, newspaper dispensers, etc. This allows you to put a number of buildings in a small area but they don't give a claustrophobic feel.
For a building I want to give more attention to, I put it towards the back and use taller decorations (tighter trees) in the back and lower decorations (shrubs and flowers) in the front. This makes a small space look very big.
Share boundaries and build outward. A plot with three buildings towards the center with open front yards defined by fences again gives that illusion of having a lot of space where when you're actually not using much space at all.
Some buildings are strong center points. Other's work well together. Think of tall decorations as heavy and flatter decorations as light. Grouping 4 or 5 similar buildings (heavy) tightly together but going light in the front makes it feel like you're giving them a lot of space when they're really piled on top of each other.
It varies from area to area. Some of my areas are very busy where others are sparse. A mountain range with a flat field in front of it makes a nicer picture than the same mountain divided up equally into mounds on the patches of the field.
