Weird 1st person weapon problem!?

    Hello,

    We have had this problem for quite some time now, for some reason our weapons are always dark when walking on the level you spawn, but when you look up the weapon gets brighter. Or if not looking up and I jump on an object the weapon also lights up. Anyone have any idea's ?

    It's the same with or without specular maps.

    [Blocked Image: http://users.pandora.be/simon.wt/shadow_problem_01.jpg]

    [Blocked Image: http://users.pandora.be/simon.wt/shadow_problem_02.jpg]

    [Blocked Image: http://users.pandora.be/simon.wt/shadow_problem_03.jpg]

    Cheers

    i know this effect from hl1 and all valve games. its not a bug you can actually fix.

    it has nothing to deal with your model oder shading.

    it seems to depend on the level. some places tend to give the player view a crappy TNL light setup, so your view gets brighter or darker for a moment. i wont care about that unless its not in absolutly fullbright areas where your model gets dark.

    maybe you are walking on a func_detail? in old hl1 days this effect appead when walking over the void. for example you had some stairs as a func_wall and under the func_wall there was nothing then the skybox or the null texture.maybe you can look in this direction to _fix_ it.

    well, underneath that street (which is func_detail) there is another brush (the main layout) but underneath that there is a void yes. If thats what you mean. If this is indeed the problem, then I don't really know how to fix that, or I would have to loose a lot of func_details, which would only be bad for the performance. I'll do some tests anyway, see if this is indeed the case.

    Thanks for the swift reply!

    I think the func_detail is blocking light from reaching the brush underneath - so when it samples the lightmap under the player's feet to light the weapon model, it chooses the dark world brush that's covered in shadow rather than the func_detail.

    My advice: Turn the street back to a world brush. Why would you func_detail it anyway?

    Quote from Campaignjunkie

    I think the func_detail is blocking light from reaching the brush underneath - so when it samples the lightmap under the player's feet to light the weapon model, it chooses the dark world brush that's covered in shadow rather than the func_detail.My advice: Turn the street back to a world brush. Why would you func_detail it anyway?

    that was what i tried to recommend with my post

    Thanks for all the replies!

    I made the sidewalks/street func_detail cause I thought it would help the performance, anyways, I compiled the map again last night, and this time beneath my feet there are no func_details anymore, sidewalks/streets are all simple brushes now. But still the weapons are so dark. Could this have anything to do with the hight of my map? Even though I placed my light_environment straight down...? What causes the 1st person weapons to light up anyway? I think the light_environment?

    Just to be on the safe side I'll also post my LOG, maybe you can see something in it that would explain things more?

    Thanks !

    I can't think of any reasons why a street or sidewalks should be func_detailed. Rule of thumb is that obstacles and small details should be func_detail, rest world brushes.

    Your log looks fine.

    A v_weapon model's lighting is determined by 2 things:

    - The light info from the lightmap patch directly below the origin/pivot of the model.

    - The nearest cubemap.

    Quote from Zacker

    I can't think of any reasons why a street or sidewalks should be func_detailed. Rule of thumb is that obstacles and small details should be func_detail, rest world brushes.Your log looks fine.

    A v_weapon model's lighting is determined by 2 things:

    - The light info from the lightmap patch directly below the origin/pivot of the model.

    - The nearest cubemap.

    there is one big reason:

    keeping vis leaf structure as simple as possible. if you have sidewalks as a regular brush it will create 3 leafs: one above the sidewalk, one above the street with the height of the sidewalk and a third leaf that is right above the last leaf.

    if you make the sidewalk a func_detail you will get everything running with only 1 leaf.

    Quote

    did you buildcubemaps?

    yea,

    Keats, the main coder thinks i could be what Zacker said:

    Quote

    - The light info from the lightmap patch directly below the origin/pivot of the model.

    This would mean that the player model casts it's shadow on the weapon(..?!..), and when you look up or jump the weapon lights up. So far it makes sense, he will do some tests on this asap. I'll let you know as soon as we got some concrete information.

    Correct Hessi, it would indeed simplify the leaf structure. It would however also require the road(or another world brush) to be extended to go below the sidewalk. I believe that those extra polygons are more expensive than a slightly more complicated leaf structure in most cases.

    Anyone who knows of some accurate tests on this subject or are willing to perform some?

    WesleyTack, I don't think that the player model shadow affects the weapon as it is not affecting the lightmap. I am not sure about this one though and your results seem to prove otherwise.

    why using extra polygons? you could use the same brush and polycount as before. nodraw backfaces and extending the ground wouldnt mean to dublicate brushes.

    Same brush I am aware of yes, but the part below the sidewalk would also be drawn and give extra polygons. Applying nodraw to that part would eliminate the problem yes, but how would you apply nodraw to one part of of a face while retaining the correct texture on another part of the same face?

    no. that wasnt what i was talking about.

    i made a quick visualisation of what i mean:

    http://www.thomashess.net/func_detail_usage.jpg

    as you can see the ground is just a little bit bigger than it is actually visible. it is true that you will waste some lightmap space and rendering time on those polygon parts (!!!!) but your polycount won't get bigger.

    i think this is a pretty good way to simplify your leaf structure to get rid of tiny leaves. steppenwolf once said: a map should not take more than 5 minutes to compile vis in full mode. (or was it 30?) anyway. what this means, that a simple leaf structure will make it easier for you to optimise visibility.

    decompile some of valves dod:s maps and you will notice that they kinda made half the levels func_details. they actually displaced some sidewalks which means a bunch of extra polygons.

    and btw: polycounts are kind of overrated. it doesnt make a big difference if you render 100 or 10 polygons.

    so i think the method i posted is pretty good for a fast compiling process and good ingame performance

    Yeah ok like that then you will get what I said, increased polycount and increased memory usage. Only slightly more I know, but still the so called performance tweak includes some performance hits.

    The gain might be bigger than the loss, I just haven't believed so so far. I will see if I can find time to do a proper test myself.

    Regarding extensive use of func_detail and maintaining fast compile times I do agree though. None of my Source maps takes more than 5 mins to compile.

    I'd make the sidewalk a func_detail personally as I'm a sucker for a neat BSP (or maybe leave it as is and use a hint plane across the "dip" in the road), but the performance benefits of cutting down on just a handful of vis leaves is not significant. I've often spent a fair bit of time neating up BSPs just to compile them and find performance is within 1 or 2 fps of the original version. Does make lovely fast compile times for VIS though

    Of course, if your BSP is complete mess of oddly angled leaves then I'm sure performance could suffer, but by leaving a few brushes as world brushes and thereby creating a few superfluous leaves, you are unlikely to be doing much, if any, harm to your performance.

    My latest compile (visleaf) took 3 seconds? as you see in the log I posted it was 4 at that time, is this possible? It's a big map though? Or do you mean for the whole compile to end it shouldn't take more than 5 min? Cause mine at full HDR at normal takes 1 hour 28 mins to compile.

    And my streets are basically how hessi posted it in his preview, I have an underneath "layout" with the street/sidewalks on top as func_detail, with those as func_detail the cuts in the bsp are a lot cleaner since I have some turns in the road/sidewalk. I'm also a sucker for a clean bsp (I check a lot in glview)

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