Blocky lighting in TF2 Created 12 years ago2011-05-10 20:03:04 UTC by Soup Miner

Can someone explain this?It looks like shit. Lowering the lightmap scale only makes it less pixelated, but not any smoother.
How do Source mappers get that nice smooth light from spotlights?

Idk if vrad has some reflectivity or bouncing parameters, but you could try this.

Btw, does your compiler work fine? I mean, vrad.exe never halts?

It works fine as far as I know.

Edit: After looking at 2fort, I see a lot of spotlights that don't actually line up with the light prop. Most of them are also pointed away from the wall. I'm going to try that and see what happens.

Edit Edit: Didn't fix anything. God hates me.

Looks like rad isn't performing a full compile. You got a leak or similar problem? Rad will still compile with errors, but often produces effects like this.

No compiling errors at all.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/12995203/log.txt

What happens if you remove every other light? I've had problems with too many lights on the same face, but that couldn't possibly be the problem in this case.

Have you tried messing with the settings of the actual spotlights?

Could this possibly be happening because the light source is too close to the wall?

Post a pic of the setup in the 3D view, and select the spot so I can see what the cone helper and params looks like. Would you also mind posting a screen of what it looks like on a lower lightmap resolution?

Are those shadows coming from props? If yes, that might be the problem. You should add the "-staticproppolys" and "-staticproplighting" parameters to vrad.exe. It'll make the compiling time longer, but vrad.exe will now calculate the shadows from the actual polygons instead of the collision mesh and the props will be properly lit.

I would be with Huntey on this one if it weren't for your compile log, but it's definitely clear RAD isn't doing a full compile.. It might still be worth it to throw a cordon around the whole map and compiling to be absolutely sure it isn't a leak. You might also want to try opening both this map and a brand-new, empty map up at the same time and copying all the geometry and props over from the old to the new, in case there's some unseen bug hiding in the old .VMF.

Also, just check that the material you're using for the wall is LightMappedGeneric, and not vertex lit.

@Huntey: Definitely LightMapGeneric.

@Strider: Hammer shots:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/12995203/Images/mapping/Untitled.jpg
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/12995203/Images/mapping/Untitled2.jpg
Lightmap scale 8:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/12995203/Images/mapping/tf_dueling0003.jpg
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/12995203/Images/mapping/tf_dueling0004.jpg

@RotatorSplint: It's not a leak.

The walls also aren't displacements, before anyone asks.

The lights definitely look too close to the wall [That should not create the blocky effect though], and maybe a little too close to the ceiling.
Difficult to say, move the light too far away from the wall you won't get the sameproper effect you're looking for.

Could this have anything at all to do with the texture being used?