Guide : Using lights in your mod
Posted: Fri Apr 29, 2005 1:14 am
I've been playing all the mods that have come along so far and i'm very impressed. There is some cool stuff here. But one thing has consistently been a bit rough, is the use of lights. This is understandable, as lights aren't particularly intuitive or easy to edit in the in-game editor. However lights are essential if you want your mods to look their best.
All of the maps in the final game of Darwinia have 2 light sources. Generally speaking the first light is high up, neutral coloured, to give a general illumination to the whole level. The second light is generally low down (virtually horizontal in some cases), and coloured quite strongly, to give a glow or edge to one side of all the hills. This gives Darwinia a lot of its distinctive look.
To create lights in the map editor, click on Lights, then click Create Light. Pretty self explanatory. You can have 0, 1 or 2 lights. Anymore than that won't make any difference as only the first 2 lights will be used when rendering. Using lights has no effect on the games performance.
The R, G and B values correspond to the Red, Green and Blue colour components of your light. Generally speaking you should try to avoid highly coloured lights with components greater than 2.0, as this can look very unnatural, unless that's the effect you're looking for. For example, if you want a Green landscape you would be better off making a green landscape texture, and lighting it with a softly coloured yellow light, rather than creating a strong green light. You can adjust the brightness and create interesting saturation effects if the brightness goes too high.
The Y value corresponds to the angle of the light. A Y value of 0 would mean the light was horizontal, and a Y value of 1 would mean the light was pointing directly downwards. Horizontal lights give great highlights and can make things look very moody. Lights with high Y values give good overall light but can look bland.
The key to succesfully using lights is their orientation. We spent a long time fiddling with the lights on each level in the game, getting the angles just right. To adjust the orientation of a light, click 'Select Light' in the lights dialog. Then hold down the left button in the middle of the screen, and drag the mouse left and right. This will rotate the angle of the light around the vertical axis. You can use this to create many different types of lighting. Experiment and see what you come up with.
All of the maps in the final game of Darwinia have 2 light sources. Generally speaking the first light is high up, neutral coloured, to give a general illumination to the whole level. The second light is generally low down (virtually horizontal in some cases), and coloured quite strongly, to give a glow or edge to one side of all the hills. This gives Darwinia a lot of its distinctive look.
To create lights in the map editor, click on Lights, then click Create Light. Pretty self explanatory. You can have 0, 1 or 2 lights. Anymore than that won't make any difference as only the first 2 lights will be used when rendering. Using lights has no effect on the games performance.
The R, G and B values correspond to the Red, Green and Blue colour components of your light. Generally speaking you should try to avoid highly coloured lights with components greater than 2.0, as this can look very unnatural, unless that's the effect you're looking for. For example, if you want a Green landscape you would be better off making a green landscape texture, and lighting it with a softly coloured yellow light, rather than creating a strong green light. You can adjust the brightness and create interesting saturation effects if the brightness goes too high.
The Y value corresponds to the angle of the light. A Y value of 0 would mean the light was horizontal, and a Y value of 1 would mean the light was pointing directly downwards. Horizontal lights give great highlights and can make things look very moody. Lights with high Y values give good overall light but can look bland.
The key to succesfully using lights is their orientation. We spent a long time fiddling with the lights on each level in the game, getting the angles just right. To adjust the orientation of a light, click 'Select Light' in the lights dialog. Then hold down the left button in the middle of the screen, and drag the mouse left and right. This will rotate the angle of the light around the vertical axis. You can use this to create many different types of lighting. Experiment and see what you come up with.