14 réponses à ce sujet

[BloodsongVengeance]

heyas;

  i have an outdoor level i made into a cave.  so... it has sunlight.  and an ambient light, etc.  i can't get the sunlight to shine from overhead, so it is shining from the southwest.  this makes the northeast sides of the charactrers in DEEP shadow.  i mean, completely not visible.

  so i have created a character light in the level that illuminates only characters.  its on the north side, it has a range of 800, so that when i preview the level with lighting, some test characters set into it are indeed visible.  and the lightmapper thing goes off fine, etc etc.

  now i have this area created FROM the level.  that is, the original level with the really sucky lighting.  i'm finding it hard to tell, but i don't THINK the new lighting from the lvl file is being put on the area.  i hit f5 to refresh, i re-selected the lvl in the area properties, and i resaved.  in the area editor, the charcters look well lit.  in the game, it's the same old pitch-black-on-one side.

  is there a proper way to update an area if its level has been updated?  do i have to start the area from scratch?  :/

[0x30A88]

Try deleting every exported file from the level, leave the are alone for now. Then re-post it.

Keep in mind that beyond the level editor, it's the light probe that makes sure the characters are lit, because it might seem that test characters are well lit in the level editor while not in the are editor.

[BloodsongVengeance]

heyas;

  in this incarnation of the lvl, i rendered the light probe.  i rendered it under the single player module being open.  um... or at least posted to local w/ the single player module open.   i thought light probes were just for reflections?

   i did what you suggested.  deleted the local post of the lvl, and redid it.  then opened the area, wiggled one creature, saved and exported.  and tested.  no joy.

  at any rate...

http://bldsong.net/i...DAOlighting.jpg

  this is my problem. 

left: test creature in level.  lightmaps done.  lightmapping turned on and fullbright turned off.  success with character light fill lighting the dark side of the character.

center: test creature in area.  i honestly don't know if the area updated to using the latest lvl file(s) or whatever.  or how that is accomplished.  nevertheless, with shadows and area lighting turned on... character is visible.

right:  character in game.   keeping in mind this is technically an outdoor scene in daylight, i'd say the lighting is fubar.

  i don't know what else to try to do to fix this.

[Proleric]

Did you try placing an ambient light to soften the shadows?

In my exterior levels, I only have sunlight, the ambient light, and a light probe, which always seems to work just fine.

The only experience I have of making a cave is as an interior level, where PC lighting sucks unless you have 3-4 character lights placed outside the level (with sufficient radius) plus ambient light and light probe as before.

[BloodsongVengeance]

heyas;

yes, i have an ambient light. does the light probe need anything specific? size, placement, something?

i will double check the lightprobe mapping, and maybe add more pc lights.

and i dont have to do anything to my are file once i do the local posts from the lvl? just reload/refresh it?


wohoo, its fixed!

  uh, cept im not sure if it was the light probe or the 4 character lights.  but i don't care, i can SEE my ugly face....  and i guess the area updates automatically with the local posts?  still hazy on that part, but its there!

thanks guys!!

Modifié par BloodsongVengeance, 24 octobre 2010 - 03:41 .

[Proleric]

Glad this is resolved.

There's nothing very special about the light probe. Since it has to probe light, I put it in open space, and not in exactly the same position as a light. I render the light probe after rendering the lights. That's it.

In general I always use F5 to refresh the area if something looks out-of-date.

[BloodsongVengeance]

okay, if anybody is still paying attention to this thread....



my beautiful lighting is GONE. i've been doing the same thing i did to get it in the first place, but it won't come back. i have the feeling i'm not understanding what files are needed by the toolset/game. i THOUGHT the lvl and erf and all the would not be needed once the are file was created and saved. wrong, huh?



my first problem is, i have two computers. one that can do lightmapping (downstairs) and one that can't (upstairs). upstairs is where i'm building my module.

this is what i did the first time that worked so beautifully:



downstairs: i opened the lvl under the single player mod. i rendered the light probe and did the lightmapping for everything. i did a local post (all) and saved the lvl and erf, and sent them upstairs.



upstairs: i loaded the lvl file and hit 'do all local posts.' it tells me the erf has changed so to save it again, so i do.



that's it! and it worked! only, since i've deleted all the lvl files and ancillary files, i can't get it to do it again. i even re-downloaded the 'old' lvl file and did all local posts, and STILL... its black.





the odd thing... when i delete the local post of the lvl upstairs (i post it under my mod), there are 117 files in the directory. when i did the local post downstairs again, there were like 12 files.



WHAT files do i need for this thing to work? and what DONT i need?



and does doing lightmaps on one machine make any difference if i move the lvl file to another machine?

[Proleric]

As a player, you need the folder that's posted to core > override > toolsetexport, because that contains everything that plays in game - artwork, lighting, whatever.

As a level artist, you also need the source in the .lvl file (but not the .erf - I find it helps to delete those every time).

IIRC it's only the player folder you need for the area editor.

If you simply put the .lvl file on another computer, then do local posts, you're not rendering light maps. If you're not planning to do level changes on that machine, you probably just need to copy the player folder.

P.S. I've found it's better to render light maps before light probes.

[BloodsongVengeance]

heyas;

okay, so.... i'll go downstairs and...

1: render lightmaps
2: render light probes
3: save the lvl
4: post to local
5: zip the output to my upstairs computer

now... since rendering probes has to be done under the single player mod, the toolset posts the local stuff to different places than when i post it under my module. do you know the extentions i'm looking for?

posting under the SP gives me rims and stuff. posting to my mod gives me maos and dds's.

i tried grabbing everything under core/override, and there were level texture things in the texture folder... but i never found any maos and stuff. and i threw all that under add-ins/mymod/core/override/toolsetexport/areaname.

i'll try again.

step one:  okay, only having the arl and rim files from the core override is making my area pitch black and totally NOT visible. (in the toolset)

step two:  adding all the dds (not meta and not xml), and the probe mtx file... makes it appear in the toolset and... not properly lit in the game.

step three: tossing the metas and xmls in the mix, without much hope of that changing anything... same results.  also, the flame vfx i placed on the torches is appearing in the toolset, but not in the game.

step four: loading the lvl into the upstairs machine and doing all local posts.  ... FAIL.  lots of warnings about no local lightmaps.  im gonna guess that's because i didnt also transfer the erf file.


   do i need to do the lightmaps under the single player, then export the local posts under my module?  i'll try that next.

Modifié par BloodsongVengeance, 27 octobre 2010 - 03:28 .

[Proleric]

It shouldn't be that complicated.

I do all level processing in SP:


Delete old erf
Delete old output folder
Open level in Single Player
Edit
Post minimap to local
Render light map
Render light probe
Do all local posts (not "post to local")
Save
Move output to module folder

All the output is in one folder. The final step isn't strictly necessary until you want to package the module for players.

[BloodsongVengeance]

no, it shouldn't be this complicated.



according to the wiki... "This ERF file contains the last set of lightmaps that the editor obtained from the lightmapper. When you share the LVL file with other artists you should also include the ERF so that the other artists can use your rendered lightmaps without having to render lightmaps themselves. "

so that seems to be saying.... if i give my upstairs computer the ERF file, and do all local posts there, it DOES have the lightmaps. in the erf, not these other rim and dds files. maybe?



what i'm still confused on is why does 'do all local posts' give me different results when i do it under the SP campaign than when i do it under my module. you say all the output is in one folder, but i'm not finding it there.



under SP 'do all local posts': ../packages/core/override/toolsetexport/myarea =

1 .arl file

7 .gpu.rim files

9 .rim files





My Module 'do all local posts': ../mymodule/core/override/toolsetexport/mylevel =

1 .arl

42 .dds

1 .gda

8 .mao

19 .mmh

8 .msh

19 .phy

19 .rml



in fact, files that are in the SP local are not in the my-module local, and vice versa. there's nothing in common. porting all those rim files to my other machine resulted in a completely black, featureless area, so i have to figure those are not the files the area needs.



so when you say 'all the output is in one folder,' could you please tell me what files you expect to find in that folder? because i'm not understanding what this fool area needs in order to update itself.

[Proleric]

The output folder for a level in SP has the same name as the level.

A folder I examined at random contains a .arl, .rim files, a minimap folder with .dds and .gff, and a trees folder with .SpeedTreeCAD.Document and .dds files. Really, that's academic - whatever is placed in the folder in SP is what you need, period.

I wouldn't worry about what is generated by the level editor when not in SP. It's bugged. Never ever do it.

For information, though, other art tools do local posts to your addin's core override legitimately (e.g. face morphs, materials). The wiki has a list of file types which helps to identify stuff. Some of yours looks like custom content that probably should be in the addin module override, not the core override, for compatibility. I'm thinking of the 2DA (.gda) and model-related stuff.

I haven't tried sharing the .erf files with the team. They're kinda redundant - either someone is going to use the level as-is, in which case they only need the output folder, or else they're going to change the level using the .lvl file, in which case they need to do the light mapping again IMO.

Modifié par Proleric1, 29 octobre 2010 - 06:14 .

[BloodsongVengeance]

pro, you have the patience of a saint!



i'm about to give up on this. so one last question....



i'm not sure anything i'm doing with the lvl is actually translating to the area. for example, i added flame vfx to the torches, but i'm not seeing those in-game either. so... when i go to the area properties, and i open the picker for the area layout and select my level.... what file(s) is THAT reading to make the area use the level? the lvl, the erf, the rmls and junk???

[Proleric]

The area refers to the folder you posted locally. Quite a few VFX don't seem to work at all, but in my limited experience those that work in the level editor also work everywhere else. If you "do all local posts" as opposed to "post local", you should see the VFX in the area.

[BloodsongVengeance]

heyas;



its just the torch flame vfx. okay, i see the vfx in the AREA. just not in the game.



maybe my game is just an idiot.