alienwar9

Hey, I was playing around with pivot tables in Excel (half learned a long time ago in a class ) and found some really nice combination of information that could be really useful in LDD manager. I barely remember how to work access, and relate excel files to access, so I have no idea if the same features work the same way, but I noticed that sorting, filtering, modifying info in excel was super fast compared to trying it in the LDD manager. I was comparing 2 models (one made in LDD 4.0 that could only be opened in the highest compatibility mode, aka useless. The other, in LDD 3.0 that had deleted a bunch of pieces, but still ran). I copied both manager files to excel into one worksheet, and "filtered" by hand the pieces that were different (what LDD manager does easily). After that, all columns lined up, and I made a function column to find any piece counts that were different. I created a pivot table, sorted by only piece counts that were different, and added a subtraction column to find the number of pieces that were different. This is basically what I got(pic is low file size): Excel "pieces not in both" pic So basically, I could see which pieces were changed or deleted, and HOW MANY. This info would be super useful for those people wondering what those lost pieces were, instead of going through a complex LDDBrickDump file and doing guess work. I don't know how easy this would be to do for the LDD manager, but just allowing the commonality feature to have a column where is says whether there is a difference in the piece count so you can filter to only the different counts, and then having a subtracting column to show the number of pieces difference could help. Oh, and for some reason when I copy to excel, and excel adds the piece count, it gets to a different number than LDD manager. Any idea why?

Amazing work! The ship designs are of themselves fantastic, detailed, and inspiring. The work you have done to provide us all with accurate recreations (and introduce us to the wonderful works in the first place) is just brilliant and I am very tempted to build some of these just to play with. I'm probably gonna have some fun in LDD with these eventually too Thank you, seriously!

Oh my, thank you! And welcome to eurobricks! This really is one of the nicest communities (I even did s study on it), and we are all glad you are here. You can introduce yourself here, and trust me when I say the Adult Lego fan community is an addicting, welcoming, and fun group. I really do feel honored to be your first post (especially seeing some of the unbelievable MOCs other people have made). I'd love to add any vehicle, and for sure need all the help I can get! Unfortunately, since the design of the city is pretty set, I can't add anyone's buildings. But there is one building that is not finished at all, and I have yet to re-make the official Lego corner cafe style buildings, so I might open that up to people. As for pictures and looking, I am hoping to get this done in time to display it at the 2012 BrickWorld (which is the closest event for me; by Chicago). Yes that is a long time away, but I don't know how long it will take to get enough money for this, and that is the main constraint (I could always sell my car ).

I don't know if anyone has mentioned any of these, but it would be nice if the "view mode" changed to the higher quality render (or have the option to). That way we could easily see a pretty version of our model without crashing LDD (since the program doesn't have to run a lot of calculations in this mode), and then return to building (instead of having to restart the program, and pray it doesn't crash). It would also be nice to have a realistic outline of bricks option. I noticed the major problem with the current outline is that with darker bricks, it decides to make the outlines with a light color, making them stand out much more than in real life. But with outlines turned off, everything looks too smooth. Just making the outlines all dark would be a simple first step. Also, it would be fantastic to be able to turn the outline feature on without turning on the high-quality render features. I gain so much in terms of visual clarity on my models with it turned on, but I just can't run the larger models with high-quality rendering. I'm sure this is a problem for "normal sized " models for many people too.

Here is the LXF with a few of the tanks. To remind you, the designs of the tank and Humvee are not mine. Enjoy! Edit: Yup, its that one. You beat me too it by 7 minutes (the time it took me to make this post and upload )

Well, I've been working on this section for a while now, and thought it would be a good time to update. Here is building number 24 (city hall) and building number 25 (bank). You may notice similarities with other people's buildings, and I definitely got a lot of inspiration from pictures, melding multiple favorite designs and color schemes. (by the way, the reason the sidewalks are so plain is because there are just so many sidewalks in the whole model, it would be piece hell to make really nice detailed sidewalks ). The bank is split in 2 because of the subway that goes underneath half the building. It was the easiest way to allow separation. Here you can see how the building is taken apart just life corner cafe buildings. Once I test it in real life, I will see if I need some technic connections to further stabilize the floors. Hope you guys enjoy! Finally, sorry that there is no LXF this time . I decided I am going to upload everything BUT the final builds. I hope you guys can understand, within the context of this entire project. To make up for it, I'll have plenty of pictures, and put up (almost) any asked for!

lightpost LXF Here are the lightposts (plus some additional ones), numbered using 1x1 plates. Vote on favorites? Hard to see in picture, I know. Picture size limits

I had no idea I was complying with the US Federal Highway Administration Guess I better make sure my road signs comply when I add them! I was just going to use any Lego signs (a lot are not US style).

@ Nebsirob: left turn signals Yeah, it's not exactly easy to make those obvious in Lego, especially in LDD (not that I can think of a way to do it in real life either). It's my way of adding realism. That is why my roads are dark gray, instead of black; and sidewalks are light gray. @Brickdoctor: I guess its probably a good thing I didn't include my road crossings! @Captain Becker: I warn you ahead of time, if the wheelchair is what you are most looking forward to, it might be a little disappointing I'd say I'm most proud of the dumpsters (nothing special, they just look cool), and the hanging plant light post (anything with chains is a pain). Oh, and yes, I love LDD Thanks for all the kind words

LXF Here is the stuff I was working on yesterday (that wasn't saved) that I had to remake. Some stuff is not my design, but I don't know who designed them (I just have pictures). Most I made myself, and then there is just random pieces that are grouped that will be used in my city. This is basically most/all the items I will be using for my city on the sidewalks and alleyways. Some designs are in multiple forms; please let me know which ones you like best Items: light posts street lights garbage bins dumpsters bus stops newspaper boxes railings and walls plant enclosures fences benches wheelchair construction markers parking meter city sidewalk bars bicycle rack mail boxes plants Hope you enjoy! (Tips and ideas are definitely welcome!!)

@ BasOne: You finished that church better than I could ever have imagined! The window, the figures, the roof, all fantastic! And that is why I love these relay builds; the exponential quality of group creation!

I was thinking that it might work with the history, like the undo button or something. The undo and redo stays until you save a file, but I have no idea how the undo works or where it stores its history.

hey all, This might be a pretty wacky idea, but is there any way to load an unsaved file that closed? I was working on multiple designs in LDD and had to leave for a little, and when I came back my computer had restarted because of stupid windows updates. I'm afraid I might not be able to recreate the designs, as I was having some of the best moments of inspiration and creation I've had in a while and made all sorts of nifty things. I was thinking about ghost data, but does it work if the file never was saved? Is there any log of what was done in LDD, even temporary, that might be retrieved?

Wow. looks like I'm late to the party. For future reference, if there is any issue or point that I might be of help with, please don't hesitate to PM me. I'd see it for sure, rather than a few months later and I'd love to help in any way I can EDIT: guess its more an issue with themes in 4.0 as Bojan Pavsic found, and its being looked into. I can't say for sure, but I've had the most issues moving 3.0 DBM files to 4.0 This is an issue with LDD 4.0 and large models. I have a decent stockpile of saved large models and when I went back to check on some of them, LDD did the same empty load for me, unable to open items afterward. There is a certain threshold of size, though I have no idea why it happens or why LDD decides to go nuts after. The previous version does not have this problem, and also has a larger piece limit. It will load any saved model, and simply crashes without saving if a model is too big (basically you will never have a big file you cannot open, since you cannot save it in the first place). It is also less sensitive to piece positioning, as many models that were migrated to 4.0 had tons of pieces missing. I kept a back-up version of every previous LDD just in case, and when I had to migrate my models to 4.0, I swapped the installed files back and forth to accurately rebuild them. For your case, it seems (from the picture) that you still have a ways to go. If you can, find a way to split it up into sections and build them separately. Though it might not be the best solution if you are only building this in LDD and it doesn't look right split. I also noticed that you are using the regular DesignByMe mode, which handles less pieces and runs slower (from my experience). (I am guessing this as usually when you load a model it first switches modes, then loads. I might be wrong) If you are determined to build big, I might suggest using Universe mode. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Some tips: As a note for large files, save often, and use different names so that if a save corrupts, you still have the previous version. When LDD "save crashes" it corrupts the save file, leaving a tiny file size unable to open. If you saved a previous version on a different name, it will be safe, and you won't have far to rebuild. Even in 4.0, it sometimes happens, and its just a good practice. If you have a small amount to add to the model, you can always change to a lower compatibility mode, which sometimes allows for more pieces to be saved (I've gotten whole buildings to fit doing this )

ah fooey I was afraid that would be true. Well, I guess the current divisions will have to suffice. Thanks for the tip!

@ prateek: cause it looks cool ....and I got bored. I'd upload a smaller version but it looks like KielDaMan is a step ahead of me = LXF Thanks for the help by the way!

@ KielDaMan: I'm guessing you haven't seen the rest of my city WIP? In any case, here is a link to the post. I probably should have included it, huh? Anyway, the largest running savable model of the city has 39,926 pieces (though technically the first version of the city had somewhere like 51,000 pieces, but that doesn't count since it was a very simple construction). I've been asking around if anyone knows where I can get access to a super powerful computer to put the city all together, but no luck. So....does anyone know where I can get access to a pretty powerful computer? The difference between all my other models and this one? = this one I'm trying to build in real life

Hey, Great job with the manager! Been using it a ton for my projects, super useful. One thing I noticed, don't know if its a problem on my end or something, but when I installed the newer version, models took approximately 10 times longer to load. While some of my models are large, I tested it with a single 1x1 brick and it took 3 minutes to load. My computer is pretty fast, and it was working pretty quickly in the older version. Any ideas?

I am always amazed at the creativity that Lego fans have! Thanks so much for the help! I fear that all the angles might start to make the models unstable in LDD though, as I've just finished a section and it is already having problems running (and I already cut the city into sections to make it run better). Most likely, I will test out the different methods for stability and see what is the minimum I can get away with in real life. I've tried out the different ways you posted to see if/how it works in LDD, but it will be much better to test it with weights.

Section 1 High Contrast (half done) Here is the first of 11 sections of my city project. At this stage, I am doing a "high contrast" rework of the city. In other words, I am putting all the details into the city. For this section, I had to learn how to set up a few things. I had to make the supports for the raised buildings and roads, fit the subway underneath the city, and level everything on the city ground so that curbs looked good, and no height bugs were left. I also had to rebuild most of it, since the first build used giant pieces, unstable "fast" constructions, and ugly areas. I also had to put finishing touches on the subway. As always, the entire process was a pain! But its always worth it, and I think it worked out pretty well (considering it fell exactly on my estimated budget almost). EDIT:(Ok, maybe way off. But my budget was way off too ) The buildings are finished and posted below. (building: 24/25, 26/27/28, 29) I hope you all like it! TOTAL PIECE COUNT: 39,043 ----------------------------------------------- As I've noted, the file is huge. 21,000 complex pieces. It works fine with graphics down, but when I turned the graphical settings all the way up, it error loaded, and then crashed when i tried to move it. BE CAREFUL

Humveeee LDD (its 14,000 pieces, so be careful) As you can see, I got bored and decided to go nuts with humvees The design is a slight edit of Legohaulic's Humvee, and then color swapping. I was trying to do a quick build of a humvee for my city, using minimal pieces while still looking good (aka, no suspension) but it took a lot longer than I thought (most of today) so I just went crazy and built an army of them. I wanted to build an abrams, etc, but it all spiraled out of control. Looks like I better just get back to building the city ------------------------------------------------------------------- EDIT: Decided to go for the tank, got bored (again). Tank design by Rick S.

Oh boy. After some hours of working on this thing, I've had little luck with the diagonal supports. It seems with only 16 (plus 2 plate) brick height, I don't have many options for triangles. It seems that the ratio of brick height 5, technic hole 7, is causing a problem. I can't get even numbers worked out for a Pythagorean triple. Geometry oddly enough has never been my strong suit. The problem is in the mixing of brick height and technic pin hole distances. Supporting a brick height with a vertical technic beam is fine, but once a diagonal piece is needed, there is no easy triangle to make. It looks like once again I need help!

Thanks again for the help! I took a look into the link you provided, and it helped a lot with the diagonal truss techniques. Though I'm definitely not building any bridges of that size! Mine are tiny compared

Woah! Thanks for the help so far! It's good to know I've got a skilled professional helping me out Just to make sure I understand: for #3, you mean to fill in the gaps on the columns like where the "tie straps" are, right? Any ideas on how to place diagonal braces with Lego? My poor attempt at stopping lateral collapse was...well, a poor idea I'd need a cost effective method, as most likely these buildings would be shuffled around on not-so-slippery surfaces that would probably cause them to shift and tumble I have a larger building set on 4 32x32 baseplates, 24 stories tall, and I'd probably die if it fell. It needs serious support. Any idea if the current model, with column distances (with cross support, of course) is enough? By the way, The reason the columns are red, is that oddly enough, red bricks are the cheapest. Honestly, they will most likely end up being random colored as they won't be seen (though I will at least make the columns a solid color). Also, later on I'll be working on double sided draw bridge roads, trying most likely in vain to manage motorizing them. Don't know if that is under your expertise, but I most likely will need all the help I can get (especially since I am working with a very small space, and an angled bridge. I never do things the easy way )

Hey everyone, I've finally gotten back to working on my big project, and have been working on the support underneath the raised part of the city. This part needs to be stable enough to hold larger buildings with interiors, and scale to only holding roads. It also needs to be cost effective (aka, least amount of pieces, cheapest pieces possible). This is something I need help with, and included is the lxf file with a temporary solution. Building Support LXF Any design ideas, concepts, or tips would be greatly appreciated Don't mind the green pegs, its just for visibility. Also don't mind the second half of the building on the side, its just there for reference. The building is just for example, but larger/smaller ones will need support also. The height of the sidewalk and plates are exact and cannot be changed. Anything underneath is what should be the focus. Key areas: Solid build, low piece count, low cost I will use them as guidelines for the rest of the city also. Here is my post for the city just in case (its a big post, lots of pics).