HDR skybox creation?

[Wesley Tack]

Hello,

Quick question, after 4 / 5 hours of messing around I'm stuck...

Has anyone here ever created a working HDR skybox for source?

I used that tutorial on wiki, and for some reason it wont work the way it's described.

http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki ... x_Creation

(this one)

So, I put all the .tga files together into one big .tga add in the sun with HDRshop, save it as one big .pfm format.

This all so far seems to work. Then I create the shortcut for "splitskybox.exe" and drag them in (this crashes, does not work)

And there is mention of a "splitskybox.bat", and for some reason I don't find that anywhere in the source dir.

Then I tried cutting up the .pfm manually, and save it in Photoshop. But then when I compile each .pfm separately it gives a completely different look in .vtf? Even though when I compare my files with the cobble HDR files from CSS everything seems to be correct, except that for some reason it wont compile correctly or split up my .pfm file...?

Anyone here with HDR skybox creation experience that is willing to help out with this would be super cool!

thanks

[hessi]

i made several hdr skyboxes.

1. the splitskybox tool is just plain valve bullshit. never worked and probably will never work.

2. you have to use hdr shops crop function but be carefull with the bounderies

X boundaries: [0-511][512-1023][1024-1535][1536-2048]

3. to compile a pfm to vtf you have to create a specific parameter in the textfiles you throw in vtex.exe

"pfm" "1"

"pfmscale" "1"

into each txt file. mysky_hdrdn.txt, mysky_hdrlf.txt, ...

4. and then you have to hook up the vmt files:

"sky"

{

"$hdrbaseTexture" "skybox/sdk_sky_example_hdrbk"

"$nofog" "1"

"$ignorez" "1"

"$basetexture" "skybox/sdk_sky_examplebk"

}

[Wesley Tack]

Thanks for the swift reply!

Whenever I press "crop" in HDRshop my image disappears, I don't have the option to enter the boundaries or anything?

Does this work with HDRshop v1?

Also, when you save the files (do you keep the HDRshop exposure to -3 stops or do you put it back to 0 (or doesn't this matter?)

After adding the sun in Photoshop.

Thanks!

[hessi]

you can/must draw a selection in hdr shop and when you have an active selection crop will remove the rest. WARNING: there is no undo! so always keep a backup that you can re-open to crop out the rest.

edit: in the status bar there are some numbers indicating where your cursor is pointing. so it is pixel work to get everything 100% matching

[Seldoon182]

Having a look on the HDR 2D Skybox package from mokie.gc helped me a lot...

>> here.

[skdr]

I'm having problems with my HDR skybox too. It's all pure white. Anyone know what's the deal with this?

[hessi]

i can create the hdr skies without problems D: you guys should stick to the source sdk wiki "hdr sky creation" page