Lighting

TheDestroyer

<div class="IPBDescription">Perfecting it</div> Ok, I'm working on my map, and I am trying to light up the room (doing Marine Start right now). Now, I am a big stickler for perfection (which is why projects of mine, like the infamous NSXP, have taken me up to a year, and I'm still screwing with [yea, I'm still workin on that gd'ed WinXP skin]), so I want the lighting to be perfect. I went through and added all of these lights and used a lights.rad to do wad lighting. Well, it looks tacky. I want to know how everyone else is doing room lighting. I tried light_environment, but I don't think its working right.

So, how does everyone else light up the place?

<a href='http://www.clansos.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=172&start=15' target='_blank'>Here's</a> where I keep my map updated. Yea, notice the darkness on the last pictures.

BobTheJanitor

Lots of texlights are always better than entity lights. In general I find that texlights with overlays > texlights > light_spots > lights is the scale of prettiness. But don't feel bad about using the occasional plain old light entity just to give a room a certain feel or up the brightness a bit. Light_spots are nice because of the interesting pattern of shadow they give you. I'd avoid light_environment like the plague. You want your level to be lit realistically, by light giving objects within it, and not just by some ghostly magic map light. Always try and think where the light would really be coming from in the room and then build off of that. And a lot of lights, giving off a little bit of light each (say a bunch of computer monitors or such like), usually looks a lot better than just one or two lights giving off a lot. Try not to mix colors too much in one area, and don't overuse colored lighting. Most of your lighting should be white, or very close to it, because humans don't light areas with weird colors except to attract attention or because they're at a disco. Not to say that you shouldn't use colored lighting, because it adds a lot to your rooms. But use it carefully. The line between a soft hint of colors to bring the room to life and a rainbow orgy of light vomit is a very thin one.

I like lighting and detailing, tis my favorite part of mapping. The geometry and brushwork is where I bog down. So if you want more ranting about lighting, I'll be around. <!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/wink-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink-fix.gif' /><!--endemo-->