Tips on lighting?
<div class="IPBDescription">Especially for large rooms</div>I know lighting is pretty straight forward, with there only being 3 types and a handful of vars, but I'm not able to reach my desired look from my brain picture.
I'm especially having problems with large rooms, because I find I don't really know how to set an ambient tone for the room. I try to use one light with 1 intensity, and to max the circular range out, but this doesn't seem to do it in larger areas, or areas that are not uniform.
Another issue I seem to have is light leaking through the faces. I'm 99% positive they are sealed, but the light still bleeds out from beneath the floor. Perhaps I need to weld the faces, I'm not sure.
Anyone have any tips, or a tutorial specifically for lighting? Or even better can you upload a map source so I can take a look at how it is supposed to be done?
Thanks!
I'm especially having problems with large rooms, because I find I don't really know how to set an ambient tone for the room. I try to use one light with 1 intensity, and to max the circular range out, but this doesn't seem to do it in larger areas, or areas that are not uniform.
Another issue I seem to have is light leaking through the faces. I'm 99% positive they are sealed, but the light still bleeds out from beneath the floor. Perhaps I need to weld the faces, I'm not sure.
Anyone have any tips, or a tutorial specifically for lighting? Or even better can you upload a map source so I can take a look at how it is supposed to be done?
Thanks!
Comments
i would be interested in lighting tutorials too! im getting better with it, but still have problems in large rooms.
I'm especially having problems with large rooms, because I find I don't really know how to set an ambient tone for the room. I try to use one light with 1 intensity, and to max the circular range out, but this doesn't seem to do it in larger areas, or areas that are not uniform.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Do some research. Gather images of the style you are going for and then deconstruct the scene into the different light sources.
For example, in the image below you can clearly see the number of the yellow/orange lights needed to illumate a large steel mill. There is also the skylight which adds a paler tone in the middle of the room.
<img src="http://wwwdelivery.superstock.com/WI/223/1566/X5/PreviewComp/SuperStock_1566-031456.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
I'm especially having problems with large rooms, because I find I don't really know how to set an ambient tone for the room. I try to use one light with 1 intensity, and to max the circular range out, but this doesn't seem to do it in larger areas, or areas that are not uniform.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
One thing games never do is bouncing.
This is for good reason, first off bouncing is really expensive to render, and secondly, level designers can fake it pretty easily, but getting rid of it is harder.
The thing you probably want to do is remember three things. You can remember a lot of other things as well, but three things that are applicable everywhere and are a good start, are:
1. A small light will light a whole room, more or less, because the light will find its way into everywhere eventually.
2. Corners are always darker.
3. Try to light things from the front and the back.
So, when you add a spotlight to a room, add a bunch of ambient lights or omni lights to simulate that light spreading out through the room. Remember also that the corners of the room will be darker, it's what ambeint occlusion tries to simulate and I don't know the physics behind it, but the edges of walls, the corners of rooms, the bit where the wall joins the floor, all of these are faintly darker than the rest, as are any little recesses, so be careful with ambient lights, as they will ignore this, try to place your ambient lights so that they fade off towards the corners. Also consider adding another spotlight to the room, only make it a different colour. That way, anything between the two lights will be lit by one colour from one side, and another colour from the back, this helps the player to see detail because the details will be different colours. When doing this try to make one light the primary light, and the other light the secondary one, the secondary one should be more subtle, so consider a server room where the main lighting is yellow/orange but the servers themselves give off a faint blue glow, put objects in and pick your colours carefully and the room will look quite striking, and the detail on your props will really stand out. Combine this with the ideas about ambient lighting and shadows, and you'll set a strong mood in the room but also maintain good contrast.
The thing about bouncing is important too, all of your lights are probably a lot more limited than they should be, when in doubt, try adding more ambient lights to add a colour wash and light to the room.
Here is my current work in progress, it's the first room I've started to really work on. It's not UWE quality, but I'm quickly getting up to speed with things.
<a href="http://img805.imageshack.us/img805/8748/ns2mapa2.jpg" target="_blank">http://img805.imageshack.us/img805/8748/ns2mapa2.jpg</a>
As you can probably tell, the cylindrical geometry is not working well with the lighting. I'll probably have to model this if I cannot find a solution. I don't know what the thing is anyways lol, I just randomly made it. But all in all, I've definitely made some personal strides due to everyones help. Any other tips would be great.
Thank again,
Michael
EDIT: I just watched the NS2 map preview for summit. I'm starting over.
<img src="http://i.imgur.com/SqWOU.png" border="0" class="linked-image" />
That's all for one room, connecting to a hallway. These 3 ambient lighting set the tone from lightness to darkness VERY easily. Giving me a much easier bend of how much lighting I should use, and where.