I've been messing around with a test level, and I've come across a few problems:

1)The light from shaders fade too quickly. This:

Code: Select all

textures/bevelpit/windowR
{
   qer_editorimage textures/bevelpit/windowR
   q3map_lightsubdivide 16
   q3map_surfacelight 2000
   q3map_lightImage textures/bevelpit/pink.jpg

   {
      map textures/bevelpit/windowR.jpg
   }

   {
      blendfunc filter
      map $lightmap
      rgbGen identity
      tcGen lightmap
   }
}


Gives me this:


I can make the light brighter, but all that does is make the upper part of the wall blindingly bright - as in a blank white field with no discernable features at all. And the "just right" region never becomes more than a narrow band. Light objects do not behave this way, and real light certainly does not.

2) Curved walls do not seem to make shadows. Nor do their bevels. The same goes for domes and cylinders. The result is this:



Is there a switch or button I've forgotten to set somewhere?

3) Light on the inside of a dome behaves oddly. I get these strange triangluar / rectangular artifacts, like this:



Again: Is there a setting I've missed somewhere?

4)Textures on curved surfaces tend to get stretched beyong recognition. Like this:



Is there a way to have the textures projected onto the surface from a right angle instead of getting smeared out like this? (another missed setting?)

First: what version of radiant are you using?

C.Brutail wrote:First: what version of radiant are you using?

MacRadiant 1.4.

Ok so I know all the answeres for you

1.:
Generally, you don1t light up the area with the shaders, they only add some extra lightning for your environment. Use light entities instead. It's a very hard thing, you have to experimnet it for yourself.
Generall a light value of 300-500 gives a nice effect.

2-3.: Paches, bevels don't cast shadows normally. You have to compile he light phase with a special key:

-patchshadows

You can set this in the project settings menu under file. Just modofy one of the light command lines, add -patchshadows to it.

4.: Patches have a different texture alighment method. Select the patch (not the face), and "Shift+S" will bring up the texture preferences. In your case, click on "Natural", that should do the trick. For caps, use the "cap" button. Never use the "apply" button, because it's b0rked (at least on win and linux).

i sometime use shader lights as main lightsourcees. Th trick here is to understand thise two lines

Code: Select all

   q3map_lightsubdivide 16
   q3map_surfacelight 2000


The first one "slices" the surface in a #x# sized grid and emits q3map_surfacelight at every one of these grid points. So for a smooth decorative light (with a small surface area) something like the above is fine. If the surface is bigger and should be used to really light up the place a bigger grid and perhaps higher light values as well as more actual surface area is needed. sky shaders for example usually have light values in the hundreds range, not thousands (bit of a special case tho..) since these usually cover a vast surface area thats enough.

another thing thats your friend when it comes to smoothing out the overall light is -bouce #. This will first cast light from the source to a surface (like normally), then bouces this light off that surface and light the next thing it hits. it does this # times, so it can add major time to your map compile.

Allso, if you use -fast with shaders not designed for it, add -scale 1.25-2.5 to your lightstage compile. that will brighten all light by 125 to 250%. (-fast produces perfectly good quality lightmaps, just in another, faster, way. That also means they get darker then the old method)

An alternative to -patchshadows is if to use -pachmeta in the meta stage. That turns any patch into regular geometry at compile time. Can be usefull when you get gaps between patches or if you simply wish to have a fixed tricount.

C.Brutail wrote:Ok so I know all the answeres for you

1.:
Generally, you don1t light up the area with the shaders, they only add some extra lightning for your environment.

What? Aww..

Oh well (adds light objects to map)

Yeah, it looks better this way.

And thanks for your pointers for 2-4. Helpful. B)

tZork wrote:i sometime use shader lights as main lightsourcees. Th trick here is to understand thise two lines

Code: Select all

   q3map_lightsubdivide 16
   q3map_surfacelight 2000


Thanks for the suggestions.

An alternative to -patchshadows is if to use -pachmeta in the meta stage. That turns any patch into regular geometry at compile time. Can be usefull when you get gaps between patches or if you simply wish to have a fixed tricount.

I'll give it a shot the next time I mess with that testmap. (or any map with bevels / curves) B)

I'm really struggling to complete my 2048³ mapping contest entry because i came up with the concept way too late and, more importantly, my surfaces keep disappearing when i build. It's really frustrating.



If anyone knows what is causing this please say.

That looks uncannily like what has happened to me once before-

http://alientrap.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=19197&highlight=#19197

a: make sure you run meta -> [vis] -> light compiles every time ya changed the geometry. (vis is skipable / can be done later. but *always* vis maps taht are to be released public)

b: it could be a face not considerd visible by the engine. are there any transparent brushes between the observer spot and the buggy place? if so make sure thay have the "surfaceparm trans" in their shader and/or make them detail.

c: Make sure theres not more then one brush accupying the same space. this happens sometimes when radiant fail to undo a face texturing action. to conpensate for not beeing able to undo face actions it sometimes simply duplicates a brush a random number of times Try selecting the affected brush, hit h. if theres more brushers under there delete em one by one.

If that doesn't help you can also try to select all your brushes and entities press Ctrl+C to copy. Then create a new map and paste your selection witch Ctrl+V.
Then move the whole level some units around. Try to stay somewhat in the grid for easier editing afterwards.
I had a similar problem once and this procedure fixed it, but i don't know why that happened.
Sometimes Radiant seems to generate phantom-brushes which screw up your compile. But that's very rare.

ihsan wrote:I'm really struggling to complete my 2048³ mapping contest entry because i came up with the concept way too late and, more importantly, my surfaces keep disappearing when i build. It's really frustrating.



If anyone knows what is causing this please say.

How's this for a solution :