[WIP] Precipice

[POQPrince]

Thanks. Now if I can just get the portals to fully cooperate, we'll be all good.

Edit: I've finally gotten the background ambient sounds working, which is great. Now the last big hurdle is the portalling. I've done everything I can to try to get them working, and I'm at a total loss. I know Firescythe is too busy to physically help me with them, but might anyone else have some free time to assist? I really want to finish this project before the end of the semester so that I can play it with everyone- otherwise, I won't be able to play online again until September, when I get back to school and good internet.

How's it coming, SM?

There are some members of my clan who might be able to help get this thing done soon.

Thanks!

:cd:

[Siliconmaster]

I haven't gotten much work done on it as a result of frustrating portalling and the end of the school semester. As I've said before- if I can get the portals working right, development on this thing is nearly complete. I just need:

Portals
Fix flag animation glitch
Double-check respawn time on Splaser
(If possible) Change HUD on Splaser so it matches the default HUD instead of the CMT HUD
(Optional, but preferable) Custom lightmaps

And that's about it. Then I have a promo video planned. I want to finish it before the end of the semester so I can play it with people, but I don't know if that will happen now. :/ We'll just have to see.

[EX12693]

So any progress?

[Siliconmaster]

Nope. Lol. Finals week is next week, and college is turning into a work clusterfuck. I might be able to take a look at the portals next week some time, but no promises. Once summer hits I'll have more time, but that's when I have no good internet, so even if I finish the map, I can't play it with you guys. D: It makes me sad.

[POQPrince]

Hey Silicon...

Don't forget that there is free high speed wifi at McDonalds now.

=)

BTW, I can't wait to try this map!

*Good luck on your finals!

[Siliconmaster]

Haha- thanks for the reminder. And thank god finals are almost over- tomorrow I head home to good old New HampShire, dwelling place of Hobbits Hillbillies and Cows.

[chrisk123999]

Still need a classic version of that HUD for the Splaser?

[Siliconmaster]

Yeah, actually, I do. That and the flag animation glitch are the only two tag-related things left to fix. Can you help with that? It would be greatly appreciated.

[chrisk123999]

What exactly is the flag animation glitch? Did you add wind?

[Siliconmaster]

The glitch is related to the vehicles- if you grab the flag and get in any sort of vehicle, instead of disappearing and allowing you to shoot (if in an applicable vehicle like the ghost or banshee) the flag sticks out of your head, or sideways out of your body if in the banshee. In addition, if you try to fire the vehicle weapon, you drop the flag. It's led to some rather loud strings of expletives from ShadowSpartan in gameplay tests. :P

Edit: Also, thanks for the tag fix- I won't be able to test it until after this weekend, but hopefully it will work.

[chrisk123999]

Are you using the stock biped? The only map I know of that does that is Coldsnap. As I think that was on purpose. Might be in the flag.weapon tag, look around in there to see if its different from the stock one.

[Siliconmaster]

I'll check around the same time I can test the splaser tags. Too much going on at the moment to do much now. Thanks for the tips!

[Donut]

this may have been addressed, (idk iv just been skimming, mainly for pictures) but this map looks enormous for gameplay. youre definitely either going to need another long range weapon or sniper rifles up the wazoo

[Siliconmaster]

The splaser pretty much rapes banshees, and there are enough snipers to keep things interesting. At this point it's got decent gameplay, it's more the technical side that's failing.

Update:

I have a secret.

Red base is portalled.

:neckbeard:

Stand by for more updates.

[Con]

Did you finally get some help with the portals or did you do enough experimenting yourself to git r done?

[Siliconmaster]

Did it mostly by myself, with some advice from Firescythe. I sat down, and for the past 3 days I've been compiling and recompiling the map. During compilations, I've been playing Red Dead Redemption. Pretty nice combination.

Update update:

...and now so is blue base. Holy shit.

[DarkHalo003]

I'm liking the sound of this progress. Since the map calls for portals, I'm assuming it's a LOT larger than it appears in screenshots, making vehicular warfare an intricate part, correct? Also, I'm in the process of making some of my own maps and I want to know about how large a map HAS to be to where it calls for portalling.

[Siliconmaster]

Basically you should portal stuff anyway, but necessary portals are related to poly count, not size. You can have a massive 6 sided cube for a map, but you'll hit the default engine render distance before the game will start complaining about portals. And vice versa, you can have a really small, detailed map that MUST have portals. It all depends on how much stuff there is in your map.

For Precipice, most of my exterior stuff has no portals whatsoever, because it's fairly low-poly. However, my interiors have a lot more detail. My big problem has been my bases- optimized, each one has 20,690 faces. That's right, all in one room. 17,000 of those are on one wall. And you wonder why I've been struggling to get that room working right. However, now all I have to do is tweak the portals in red base to fix one very small problem, and then all the portals are done, thank god. Then I can move on to fixing glitches like the flag animations, figuring out why the spartan laser fix didn't work as planned, and tweaking spawn points and weapon spawn times. The end is near.

Oh yeah, and I still want to do custom lightmaps. Might as well go all out on this thing.

[Higuy]

20,690 faces
wtf.

[Siliconmaster]

wtf.

http://img37.imageshack.us/img37/857/precipicebasepolies.jpg

That. And believe me, that's optimized- I just spent quite a few hours cutting out a few more thousand polies the other day to make sure none of it was poly waste. The entire map is now optimized.

[Dwood]

Add trees now so you can add lightmaps via 3ds max at high quality.

[Siliconmaster]

There are trees. And bushes. And stuff. But lightmaps come last- I want to make sure everything is where I want it first. That means a playtest, which I might be able to do next week at my friend's house.

Edit: Finally- fixed the last stubborn visual error. Precipice is now (as far as I know) 100% portal-error free.

[DarkHalo003]

Basically you should portal stuff anyway, but necessary portals are related to poly count, not size. You can have a massive 6 sided cube for a map, but you'll hit the default engine render distance before the game will start complaining about portals. And vice versa, you can have a really small, detailed map that MUST have portals. It all depends on how much stuff there is in your map.

For Precipice, most of my exterior stuff has no portals whatsoever, because it's fairly low-poly. However, my interiors have a lot more detail. My big problem has been my bases- optimized, each one has 20,690 faces. That's right, all in one room. 17,000 of those are on one wall. And you wonder why I've been struggling to get that room working right. However, now all I have to do is tweak the portals in red base to fix one very small problem, and then all the portals are done, thank god. Then I can move on to fixing glitches like the flag animations, figuring out why the spartan laser fix didn't work as planned, and tweaking spawn points and weapon spawn times. The end is near.

Oh yeah, and I still want to do custom lightmaps. Might as well go all out on this thing.
Okay thanks. I think this advice will become greatly in handy, since one of my maps is completely an interior and the other has a part of the a30 BSP interior (2nd part by the cliff), which is beyond an astronomical amount of faces.

[Siliconmaster]

http://img684.imageshack.us/img684/9503/redbasewip4.jpg

Been doing some custom lightmap prep work. Got a lot of the outdoor stuff lit, and working on red base now. I think it looks pretty damned good so far. Of course, it's taking a shitton of lights to replicate the look of Halo's strip lights, and just to render a frame it already requires more than 4 Gb of ram. Thank god I upgraded to 8 Gb and Windows 7 64 bit.

Of course, I won't actually be able to render or import the lightmaps until I'm sure the bsp is finalized, which means a new beta test. No idea how I'll pull it off, but I'm sure I'll find a way.

[Inferno]

That looks... ominous... I like it a lot.

[PopeAK49]

I like how you are being original with the lighting.

[Higuy]

That looks really nice!! Keep up the good work.

[Siliconmaster]

http://img532.imageshack.us/img532/193/redbasesniperroost.jpg

Finished the red base sniper roosts.

Edit: And the flag room:

http://img176.imageshack.us/img176/7725/redbaseflagplatform1.jpg

http://img210.imageshack.us/img210/5444/redbaseflagroomwip5.jpg

http://img535.imageshack.us/img535/9738/redbaseflagroomwip3.jpg

[jcap]

That lighting is crazy.

[DarkHalo003]

Looks very classic. I hope it is perfectly legit for gameplay. You wouldn't believe all of the pretty maps that don't play out well.

[Dwood]

That's insanely awesome lighting silicon my man.

[Siliconmaster]

Looks very classic. I hope it is perfectly legit for gameplay. You wouldn't believe all of the pretty maps that don't play out well.

It might not be the best map ever, but people in the playtests say that they enjoyed playing on it, so I'd call that a success.

Glad everybody is liking the lighting. Do remember that these are just renders- no clue what it will look like ingame once it's imported.

[Con]

I like how you can't see the entire cave, just the ring around the platform. It makes it look even more epic because you don't know how deep it goes or where you are.

[Siliconmaster]

I'm finally able to pull off some of my original ideas for the lighting- I just couldn't figure out how to do it in Halo because the trial and error process is so slow. Here, I can throw something together, render it in 15 seconds, and then modify it as I see fit. It's wonderful.

[FireScythe]

Just stay aware of the limitations of Halo's lightmaps. There is a limit to the amount of bitmap data that can be stored in a bitmap tag so most of your lighting will look blurier than it does when rendered. You can do test lightmaps for a single area if you want to get a rough idea of how things will actually look (using Halo's UVs that is).

[POQPrince]

Looks fantastic!

I can't wait to play it. Any estimation on the DOR?

:woop:

[Siliconmaster]

When it's done. :downs: Hopefully not that long.

[Vadam930]

I'm getting really excited for this now, I have no doubt it will be hosted on one of my Clan servers. I'll help spread the word about the map.

From someone in the education of graphics design (Hai Stormy!):


I'd say it is on par with, if not better than, official Bungie maps.

I totally agree with the statement!

You're nearly there, keep it up!

[Con]

*delays release by convincing silicon to redo parts of the base*

muhahahah take that

http://www.modacity.net/forums/images/customavatars/avatar4_66.gif (http://www.modacity.net/forums/member.php?u=4) (http://www.modacity.net/forums/member.php?u=4)

[Siliconmaster]

*delays release by convincing silicon to redo parts entire back half of the base*
Ftfy.


Bastard.

[Vadam930]

Ftfy.


Bastard.

That!? (http://img684.imageshack.us/img684/9503/redbasewip4.jpg) Why!?

And, Con. That avatar was extremely appropriate. ;)

[Reaper Man]

Looking awesome, the outside better be lit to the same standard~

[Siliconmaster]

That!? (http://img684.imageshack.us/img684/9503/redbasewip4.jpg) Why!?

No, I told him there was no way in hell I was messing with the front of the base. More like this:

http://img46.imageshack.us/img46/6949/telebridgeconceptmodifi.jpg

Don't ask. I'll have a mockup done in a few days, and maybe then it'll make sense, and we can see if it's worth the change.


Looking awesome, the outside better be lit to the same standard~

How's this for a start:
http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/205/outdoortest2.jpg

[Dwood]

moar - You could try a precipice during the night, which would possibly look beast.

[Con]

<-- would have to make a new sky

[Siliconmaster]

Yeah, I personally like the current lighting scheme- topside it's a late cloudy afternoon/evening, and in the canyon it's much darker, so all the lights look brighter. Basically below the canyon level it is nighttime.

[Reaper Man]

I hope you plan on lighting the canyon a bit better, lights running down the wall or something vOv

[Siliconmaster]

Remember that a lot of lights are missing from that render. Anywhere that the player will be will be well lit- the base platforms, the lower land bridge, etc. I'm contemplating ideas for making the canyon more interesting/well lit, but it all depends on how many free polies I have after the new restructuring. I also have to try to estimate how much tag space the custom lightmaps are going to take up.

And as for the mockup, here it be:

http://img80.imageshack.us/img80/6318/newplatform5.jpg

[Vadam930]

I just thought of something. See how you have the bridge damaged near the centre? Maybe create some damage on one of the canyon walls. For example in this sort of area:

http://i49.tinypic.com/oho1tl.jpg

It just seems a little strange to me that there is a gaping hole in the middle of the bridge (looks like something has cut clean through it), and there is no damage sustained anywhere near it.

Just my 2c.

Though, that jump looks like it's going to be fun! =)

[Siliconmaster]

Some damaged areas would be good- I have a list of stuff that I want to add in for detail reasons if I have enough poly space after the new base modifications. That's definitely one of those items. Maybe not right there though- might be more on the main canyon walls- those need to be broken up a bit more.

[Vadam930]

Awesome. :woop:

[EX12693]

Updaet?

[Siliconmaster]

Fine, only because I haven't updated in a while, not because I give in to beggars. :P

After the last playtest, Con and I sat down for 3 hours and argued debated over certain elements of the map that were either not working for gameplay, were destroying gameplay, or just downright sucked. As a result, I took a few weeks to massively revamp sections of the map to try to put gameplay more in line with what it needed to be. A short, and not necessarily comprehensive list of changes is as follows:



Removed the tunnels/landbridge teleporters as well as the tunnels themselves- they were a useless gameplay path, and nobody ever used it- the few who did got lost and couldn't find their way back.



Completely redesigned the rear of the bases- now much closer to the base entrance, and featuring a delayed teleporter: Players come in, drop down to the flag, and cannot get back to the teleporter unless they run all the way around the walkways on the sides of the base. This fixes the "grab the flag and escape" problem, and it also puts escaping players directly in conflict with home defenders.
The broken bridge now sags realistically as it goes toward the broken middle section- Con's idea- a nice touch, subtle, but not over the top

http://img822.imageshack.us/img822/5951/saggingbridge.jpg


The old "credits tower" has been removed, and instead there is a credits room located where the energy beam emerges from the control room tunnels. To get there one must take a banshee, and time it right so as to reach the entrance before the next beam kills you. Makes it sort of fun to get there, and once you're there, if your banshee respawns, it effectively removes you from gameplay, preventing Yoyorast style secret room hunts.
The rear-most center tunnel behind the control room has been removed. Now players driving/flying through the tunnels must pass via the control room, not only making that room far more important, but putting them at risk of being shot with whoever is controlling the spartan laser. Now the control room is a viable option for stopping an enemy on vehicle from getting far with the flag. Before, enemies could bypass the control room completely via the rear tunnel.
The spartan laser HUD has been fixed, thanks to chrisk123999. However, the flag/vehicle glitch is still present and a major issue.

Custom lightmaps continue to be prepped. Very soon I hope to run some render tests and see if I can get something ingame. For now, however, here are a few lighting test renders to tide you over:

Adding in the hologram lights
http://img293.imageshack.us/img293/1181/alcovehologramsfixed.jpg

Blue base flag test render
http://img707.imageshack.us/img707/4313/bluebasetest1.jpg

And red base as it looks now, with Con's suggestions and the current custom lighting. The more precise shadows make every little bsp error show up, so ignore the weird shadows that pop up in places. I'll fix them eventually.
http://img697.imageshack.us/img697/856/redbasecurrenttest.jpg

Now back to lighting work.

[n00b1n8R]

must spread rep ><

Looking great, hopefully we can get a gamenight on once this is done :o

[Siliconmaster]

Thanks, and I'd love to have a gamenight or three. Main issue is that I can't play online until I get back to school in September. So, assuming I finish this thing long before then, we might have to have 2- one at release, and one when I can actually join in. :P Or I could just wait to release it until I can play it. :evil:

[Inferno]

I'm in. Your lighting looks great. And if we do a gamenight why not throw in my old map pack that we were supposed to gamenight on as well? I've been meaning to make a thread about it...

[EX12693]

I'll go for a gamenight. I have yet to play Inferno's maps on any (decent) server, and I'd love to try Precipice.

[n00b1n8R]

I'm in. Your lighting looks great. And if we do a gamenight why not throw in my old map pack that we were supposed to gamenight on as well? I've been meaning to make a thread about it...
do this.

fake E: hell, why not just make it a Modacity gamenight and put all the good maps that've been pumped out of this forum over the years, I'd love to nostalgia all over myself with you guys :-3

[Con]

Yes yes very very gamenight want!!

[Inferno]

Fucking do it. Use the modacity server too. If that still works.

e/ and give me Rcon so I can rotate the maps.

[Siliconmaster]

You bastards, wait until September for this epicness! I can't join in! Ever! I've always missed the gamenights- I refuse to miss the one my map is part of as well. Lol.

Also, lightmaps: wtf. Got some basic ones imported via aether. First there was all this random red- confused the hell out of me. Until I realized it was max telling me that every red place was a glitched render spot. - _ - So I fixed the red by turning the glitch test off, but then you can just see all the glitches. And tool's fail lightmap uvs are now incredibly apparent- shadows start on one lightmap, and just stop on the next one, shading fades in and out from object to object, it's bizarre. So I decided screw it, I'll render every lightmap at 2048 by 2048. I'll be back tomorrow explaining just how much the game hates me now.

Edit: Okay, after some frustrating trial and error, I'm finally getting the hang of this. I managed to render one lightmap without any red errors, but the shadows are still doing odd things. Still, it's progress. We had a short-lived and laggy playtest today, which basically confirmed that the new layout seems to work well enough to forward with it. I'm leaving for 2 weeks on vacation with my family, but I'll be back after that, and ready to work on finishing up the bsp with the last of the poly space, and getting those lightmaps fixed up. I've talked to Inferno about fixing the phantom geometry as well, so that shouldn't be an issue for long. Let's finish this damned project, shall we?

Edit Edit: Before I leave, I wanted to make sure everyone understands that although the lighting looks great in Max, I have no idea how good it will actually look in the engine. At the best it will be lower res- at the worst it will be all pixelly and fugly looking. But I'm going to do my best to make sure it looks as good as possible. If that means rerendering a bunch of times to get the settings right, and reuving half the lightmaps, so be it. Also, it looks like a few of the lightmaps still have errors- I'll have to fix that after I get back. Still, better than before.

Edit Edit Edit: Okay, this is getting ridiculous. More people need to post so I don't have to do this so as not to double post. :P

I was heading out the door when I realized the lightmaps had finished rendering- took a screenshot from generally the same angle as one of the renders on the last page. Should provide a pretty good comparison from render to current ingame lighting. It's pretty darn rough, but tool uv and rendering errors aside, it looks better than Halo's lighting did.

http://img823.imageshack.us/img823/5954/bluebaseingametest.jpg

[Con]

What's with the weird lines on the wall?

[Siliconmaster]

Those would be the aforementioned uv errors. They're everywhere- will be quite the undertaking to try to fix them all.

[DarkHalo003]

This stuff looks not only vastly improved, but incredibly well done! Once again, I can't wait till this is released.

[LlamaMaster]

I pray for your lightmaps, but the shear size of your map makes me lose hope. I really hope you can work this out, because I was practically creaming myself over those previous renders. Good luck to you, and godsend.

[Siliconmaster]

Haha thanks. Im hoping to get them looking better as well. I've heard that setting all the shaders to "simple parameterization" forces tool to make them less retarded- is this true? If so, I'll change them all to that, and even if they look bad in Halo radiosity, the uvs might be better for max lightmap rendering.

[neuro]

dont suppose anyone can make a way to import custom lightmap-UVs into halo eh?

[Sasc]

FireScythe's UserTool has a command that can import new UV's from an .obj file. More information is here (http://www.modacity.net/forums/showthread.php?19855-UserTool-OpenSauce-command-line-tool&p=519512&viewfull=1#post519512)

[Siliconmaster]

Yep, I know Firescythe's stuff can do it- it's that Halo has happily split entire areas into two separate bitmaps- even by fixing uvs you can't fix that. So half the platform will be on one bitmap, and the other one will be on another. I can try to line the bitmaps up as best I can, but it still still look weird until I get the entire platform together on one bitmap. I was wondering if simple parameterization forces tool to put larger sections together. Idk- might not.

[Inferno]

Oh god yes. Simple param is important. Simple param means "Not Retarded Lightmaps" mode.

[Siliconmaster]

Hey everyone,

I'm back from vacation and working 40 hours a week, but in my small amounts of free time I'm doing my best to wrap this project up. Lightmaps are temporarily on hold until I finish the last bsp touches (which by all rights I should have done in the first place). In an attempt to make the canyon a little more interesting, I've added a sort of conduit running sideways at about the level of the beam. My plan is to have a scrolling energy shader or something cool behind the grate/glass. Since I don't know a whole lot about shaders, I decided to use the b30 waves shader as a standin so I could get a feel for direction, speed, etc.

http://img228.imageshack.us/img228/9254/wallenergy3.jpg

http://img155.imageshack.us/img155/7826/wallenergy4.jpg

It's sort of hard to see in the second pic, but the waves ended up coming down the glass from the top, which is absolutely surreal, and makes it look like water is pouring down the inside of the glass. Obviously needs some tweaking. On the other hand, why the hell hasn't anyone used a version of that shader to make it look like rain is cascading off slanted surfaces? That would be so cool! Precipice has more of a light mist than a heavy rain, so using that might seem overkill. But to any of the remaining CE mappers: use this. Would look awesome.

[DarkHalo003]

:allears: Awesome. Pure awesome.

[Siliconmaster]

9E8eX1uHcSM

There- both the temp water shaders and Con's sky in motion. The video file is in HD, but it doesn't quite seem to have processed it quite yet. I'll set it as youtubeHD anyway- maybe it will be at full quality by the time most people watch it.

Who knows a lot about shaders? I need to get a cool looking energy shader, and I honestly have no clue how I'd do that. Doesn't need to be too complicated, but nice-looking would be great, if possible.

Edit: Fixed the youtube link. Sorry about that.

[Inferno]

Very nice.

[ghk]

dude...nice.....love the weather

[sleepy1212]

how do you lighting?

[Siliconmaster]

how do you lighting?

Uh- what? Rephrase please.

I've added some cool flood-related AI off behind some glass, but I've run into a problem: they refuse to spawn. Every other ai spawns- the few infection forms near the banshee pads, and the bipeds I'm using to kill off the new infection forms before they multiply. However, the new infection forms themselves are nowhere to be found. They show up in sapien, leading me to wonder if there's some setting somewhere that I'm missing. Any suggestions?

[Timo]

Looking very cool.

[EX12693]

I am SO making a promo vid for this. Tell me when there's a beta or gamenight so I can film some combat.

[sleepy1212]

Uh- what? Rephrase please.

lulz....how did con do the lightning?

[Siliconmaster]

lulz....how did con do the lightning?

Oh haha. As I remember, he said he used shaders with a long strip of single pixels. A few of them were white, and the rest were transparent. He set them to scroll, and when you have a few of them in the sky, it makes really nice random lightning flashes.

[sleepy1212]

Oh haha. As I remember, he said he used shaders with a long strip of single pixels. A few of them were white, and the rest were transparent. He set them to scroll, and when you have a few of them in the sky, it makes really nice random lightning flashes.

Awesome, wanted to do almost the same thing but i wasn't sure how good it would actually look. Now that i see it looks really great i think i might give a go.

[Con]

There's one map that's static and doesn't move. That's the mask for the plane itself so just make its alpha a fuzzy blob. Then add a new map and this will be the long skinny scrolling texture. It only needs to be 4 pixels tall and have the alpha have vertical strips of white every once and a while. You can even put a fade on them by adding grey pixels to either side. Then you just need to adjust the horizontal scaling of this map so it's 1/width in pixels. Set its alpha to multiply and its colour can be next map or current, depending on which of the two maps you want to use for the colour of the lightning. What you can do is for each plane in the sky you map this to you slide the UV mapped polygons over a number of full texture lengths in the UV editor. This means they won't all flash at the same time but rather have a delay or a pseudo-random look.

The planes were placed above the cloud layer and I made the clouds slightly transparent in the areas of the the lightning. This makes it look like it's happening inside the cloud instead of in front of it.

If you want to make visible lightning bolts all you need to do is change that first maps alpha from a fuzzy blob to a lightning bolt.

[Siliconmaster]

It's 3:45 am EST, and thanks to some help from Firescythe, I've just made a major breakthrough with Precipice lightmapping. Not only are the uvs only mildly screwed up in this build, but the lightmap rendering actually seems to be running fairly smoothly for once. I made some test renders with only the sun and its skylight counterpart, and then another few for one of the banshee pads.

http://img841.imageshack.us/img841/3092/workinglightmaps7.jpg

http://img842.imageshack.us/img842/5049/workinglightmaps1.jpg

http://img834.imageshack.us/img834/1649/workinglightmaps2.jpg

Blue Banshee Pad (In Shadow)
http://img835.imageshack.us/img835/1923/workinglightmaps3.jpg

Red Banshee Pad (In Sunlight)
http://img827.imageshack.us/img827/667/workinglightmaps4.jpg

Red Banshee Pad (Lit)
http://img831.imageshack.us/img831/7861/workinglightmaps5.jpg

Red Pad Teleporter Room
http://img834.imageshack.us/img834/9707/workinglightmaps6.jpg

I'll run all the lightmaps with all the lights on overnight and post the results tomorrow. For now, time to crash.

[Con]

woo, looks good so far

[Reaper Man]

Looking awesome man!

[sleepy1212]

beautiful, that is all :clap:

[POQPrince]

FANTASTIC!

:woop:

[Siliconmaster]

Glad you guys like it. However, I have some more eyecandy for you: The full lightmaps just finished, and I have to say, for the first real test, these are gorgeous. They definitely need some work, but hell, this is far better than I had hoped for.

http://img690.imageshack.us/img690/2649/workinglightmaps8.jpg

http://img340.imageshack.us/img340/8910/workinglightmaps9.jpg

http://img693.imageshack.us/img693/8691/workinglightmaps10.jpg

http://img843.imageshack.us/img843/4894/workinglightmaps11.jpg

http://img101.imageshack.us/img101/6509/workinglightmaps12.jpg

http://img844.imageshack.us/img844/7664/workinglightmaps13.jpg

http://img231.imageshack.us/img231/9099/workinglightmaps14.jpg

http://img35.imageshack.us/img35/7241/workinglightmaps15.jpg

[ghk]

awesome...lets play :-)

[EX12693]

Hmmm....
Where is here: http://img693.imageshack.us/img693/8691/workinglightmaps10.jpg
in relation to here: http://img690.imageshack.us/img690/2649/workinglightmaps8.jpg?

[Lateksi]

Gorgeous, indeed. I've never seen a Halo map that good looking.

[Siliconmaster]

Hmmm....
Where is here: http://img693.imageshack.us/img693/8691/workinglightmaps10.jpg
in relation to here: http://img690.imageshack.us/img690/2649/workinglightmaps8.jpg?

The first one is outside, looking toward blue base. The second one is inside blue base, looking generally back toward the camera of the first picture, but at an angle.

As nice as these look, there are a lot of uv errors, and a few places where it looks totally bizarre. However, those are relatively few and far between, and won't be all that hard to fix, assuming the final build has similar lightmap uvs (I can only hope). Also, it looks like there is a difference between Max's rendering and the way Halo displays the lightmaps. If you look at the render with the blue tunnels, where the blue light is the brightest, it fades into a sort of offwhite color. I think that's Halo overexposing it, so I need to go experiment in Max to tone down the intensity of that blue. The same issue shows up in a lot of other places where the color is so bright in Max that it looks faded white in Halo. In addition, some colors are more or less intense than they looked in Max, so I need to adjust those.

Edit: Oops, looks like imageshack somehow missed one in the batch upload, and then I accidentally doubled some of the images. Fixed.

[EX12693]

Oh okay. So there's a whole other structure inside the canyon walls... now it makes sense..

[neuro]

you didn't unwrap your power-cables things right btw.
looks pretty neat though!

[Siliconmaster]

Which power cable things are you referring to? The energy cables holding up the bases, or the pipes/cables underneath the broken bridge? The ones under the bridge only look odd where they bend out of shape, but I decided that would make sense if they were all melted and such.

[sleepy1212]

pretty sure he meant the blue energy ropes, i noticed that too but it looks intentional

[Siliconmaster]

Ah- yeah, the are textured differently than Bungie did it, but I sort of like the way this looks. It's nicer to look at, instead of a very long blue gradient.

Edit: Alright, got a silly question: anyone have the fixed tags for Guilty Spark? I was thinking about playing with the AI a little, but I can't even do that since HEK+ corrupts the animations. I know Masterz put up a fixed version ages ago, but he's not sure where it is and I can't find it on halomaps.

[DarkHalo003]

Tried the CMT tag release? I'll upload the tags if anyone really needs them.

[Siliconmaster]

GS343 isn't in their latest tag release- not sure about any others. All I need are working animation tags- according to sapien that's what's crashing it. Of course, having a full working folder would be nice just to make sure.

[DarkHalo003]

http://cmt.h2vista.net/main/index.php?option=com_content&task=blogcategory&id=50&Itemid=80

Here you go.

[Siliconmaster]

Beautiful. Very much appreciated. As a reward, you get this entertaining screenshot:

http://img191.imageshack.us/img191/3298/hurrguiltyspark.jpg

[Vadam930]

LOL!

And, Silicon, it is coming along wonderfully!! I think this will be the most beautiful CE map in the history of CE. I get those same feelings of wonder, awe and excitement when I look at these images as I did when I first walked out of the Bumblebee pod onto Installation 04's surface for the first time, many years ago...

...And it's FANTASTIC!!!! Keep it up!! It's an amazing job so far, and I'm sure with your talent, come the release date, it will be absolutely awe-inspiring!!!:woop:

EDIT: Will 343 hum/say amusing things? =)

[Siliconmaster]

Thanks! He does indeed hum to himself and say entertaining things, and he'll say hello to you sometimes as well. I won't give away where he'll be in the map, but it will be near the credits, and you'll have to look for it/them.

[.Wolf™]

I think this will be the most beautiful CE map in the history of CE.



I will have to disagree with you there. It does look good though. Good job man.

[Siliconmaster]

Haha yeah, there are some pretty darned nice looking maps out there, and right now mine still has some issues to fix. Portent comes to mind as a beautiful example of forerunner architecture.

[EX12693]

3 days later.. how's it coming along? And... why is there ai in the map?

[Inferno]

3 days later.. how's it coming along? And... why is there ai in the map?
:expost:

Don't just bump to ask if there has been progress after 3 days. He's working on the map in his spare time.

[Siliconmaster]

Inferno's right- 3 days is a little short to be asking for an update.

However, this is me we're talking about- barring unforeseen complications, which does happen often, a lot can happen in 3 days with me working in my free time. I've screwed up the lightmaps, fixed the lightmaps, installed some pretty fun easter egg ai, and am now slowly fine tuning all the light settings. This involves turning on each bank of lights one at a time and rerendering the lightmap, then tweaking, then rerendering, etc. Will take a while, but it's totally worth it. It already looks far better than it used to.

And as for the ai, it won't be interactive- scenery purposes only, and in relatively unobtrusive parts of the map.

Edit:
Just about tweaked the control room to the way I want it. Ignore the obvious lightmap uv errors- those I'll fix last. This applies to all renders from here on out.

First, compare this, from last week:
http://img35.imageshack.us/img35/7241/workinglightmaps15.jpg

To this:
http://img834.imageshack.us/img834/3410/lightmapcalibration2.jpg

Here's the reverse angle:
http://a.imageshack.us/img695/839/lightmapcalibration1.jpg

Eventually I'll get the whole map calibrated to my liking, but that might take a bit. Worth the wait, I say, and I'll keep updating with screenshots as I progress.

[staticchanger]

Very nice. Good lightmapping is always worth the patience and effort.

[SnaFuBAR]

Gorgeous. Simply stunning.

[Vadam930]

Very, very nice!

I'm curious. Do you have a description for the map? If not, I may be able to help. =)

EDIT: I bet that comes last, anyway.

[DarkHalo003]

At first I was like: :raise:

But now I'm like: :woop:

[Siliconmaster]

New update time!

Today's focus has been the banshee pads:

Compare this old render:
http://img831.imageshack.us/img831/7861/workinglightmaps5.jpg

to this:
http://img834.imageshack.us/img834/8876/lightmapcalibration4.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img517/5773/lightmapcalibration5.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img190/5318/lightmapcalibration6.jpg

I also turned the skylight waaaay down, so it no longer washes out the shadows from the hard sunlight:
http://a.imageshack.us/img685/9088/lightmapcalibration3.jpg

Then I realized the shadows didn't quite line up with the sun ingame. I personally like the shadows, so I tried to move the sun. It refused to budge, so I tried a trick which has worked before- I doubled the sun and tried moving the second one. That failed too, but instead I ended up with something cool- what looks like a normal Halo sun, but when you look directly at it there's an enormous amount of bloom. so BEHOLD, SUNLIGHT:

http://a.imageshack.us/img36/5246/lightmapcalibration7.jpg

Overkill? Maybe.

Damned epic? Absolutely. I'm keeping this accidental bit of awesome unless people don't like it.

[n00b1n8R]

How directly do you have to look at the sun for that to kick in?
I could see it getting really annoying when you're trying to shoot a banshee (but then you can see the tactical application of it too :p)

[Siliconmaster]

Yeah, it's pretty much only straight at it, and a little to either side. And if anything goes across the sun, the flare stops, just like the normal sun flare. Also, the sun is at such an angle that the odds of you flying up in that direction are fairly slim. I'm flying around in circles with the dev cam and the sun really doesn't disrupt sight unless you're midway down the canyon and possibly trying to hit someone on the rim. But in that case it's sort of cool to be blinded by the sun. :P

[POQPrince]

Yeah, it's pretty much only straight at it, and a little to either side. And if anything goes across the sun, the flare stops, just like the normal sun flare. Also, the sun is at an angle that the odds of you flying up in that direction are fairly slim. I'm flying around in circles with the dev cam and the sun really doesn't disrupt sight unless you're midway down the canyon and possibly trying to hit someone on the rim. But in that case it's sort of cool to be blinded by the sun. :P

FANTASTIC!!!

Can't. Wait. Silicon!

[Siliconmaster]

I'll record a short video f me flying around in a banshee tomorrow to show the flare and how big it is. It seems a lot smaller then you're moving around compared to that still image, which was picked for the emphasis on the overepicness.

[staticchanger]

Keep it. No matter what. I think that totally rocks. I'm definitely seeing the tactical application http://www.modacity.net/forums/../images/smilies/tongue.gif

[Dwood]

I'll record a short video f me flying around in a banshee tomorrow to show the flare and how big it is. It seems a lot smaller then you're moving around compared to that still image, which was picked for the emphasis on the overepicness.

Open Sauce postprocessing + Bloom = ?

[Siliconmaster]

Haha- that would be insane. This is just with normal Halo graphics, no OS used. God, with bloom you wouldn't be able to see anything if you were looking in that direction.

[Dwood]

Haha- that would be insane. This is just with normal Halo graphics, no OS used. God, with bloom you wouldn't be able to see anything if you were looking in that direction.

Do it.

[Lateksi]

Yeah dude keep the sunlight as it is, looks epic :D

[Vadam930]

Yeah dude keep the sunlight as it is, looks epic :D

Let there be light!!:iamafag:

[Siliconmaster]

Got that sunlight test uploaded to youtube finally. Might still be processing.

I'm not running OS at the moment, so excuse the stretched HUD. Also, I had SCII running in the background, hence the lag. That game is eating my life lately.

TpFvmTTqAEs

[POQPrince]

Got that sunlight test uploaded to youtube finally. Might still be processing.

I'm not running OS at the moment, so excuse the stretched HUD. Also, I had SCII running in the background, hence the lag. That game is eating my life lately.

<drooling>

Again...this looks FANTASTIC!

</drooling>

Can't. Wait.

:woop:

[Inferno]

Hey SM when I get to work on the scenario is it cool if I bolster the default FOV to 85? I can't stand how "zoomed in" halo looks by default.

[Lateksi]

Use a fov mod then. I use 90 degrees. I had to change the fov to "75" for TLMP maps in order to retain it xD

[Siliconmaster]

Yeah, I suggest using a FOV hack- according to Con, if you bump the FOV up by much, the portal errors start to get more noticeable due to more being rendered at once..

[Inferno]

:saddowns:

Oh well. I guess I'll have to find a FOV hack to play this on the gamenight.

[ODX]

Oh well. I guess I'll have to find an FOV hack to play this on the gamenight.Here, let me help you with that:
1.07- http://hce.halomaps.org/index.cfm?fid=2645
1.08- http://hce.halomaps.org/index.cfm?fid=4049
1.09- http://hce.halomaps.org/index.cfm?fid=5267

These are, of course, just the simple app ones and not Yelo or anything OS related.

[neuro]

tbh, you need more light inside, it's all really dark, and being forced to use a flashlight isn't really cool in multiplayer games.

[Siliconmaster]

That build had more than half of the lights turned off. I'm still calibrating them all, so the only ones that were turned on were the ones I had finished working on.I was telling ShadowSpartan that the base was actually brighter than it theoretically should have been because of the fog and an odd red glow that was coming from nowhere and everywhere. That won't be noticeable once all the lights are turned on in the base, but it struck me as fairly odd. Some of the lights were probably instances to lights I had already calibrated, so when I turned them on in the banshee pads they must have turned on in the base- same thing for the teleporter.

[Llama Juice]

Also, I had SCII running in the background, hence the lag. That game is eating my life lately.

You heard it here first kiddos.

RIP Precipice.

Looks smashing though sir, nice work, nice work indeed.

[Siliconmaster]

I've been working on blue base this weekend, trying to calibrate all the lights to my liking. Still haven't gotten to the flag room, but the rest of it is essentially done.

Compare this:
http://img693.imageshack.us/img693/8691/workinglightmaps10.jpg

To this:
http://a.imageshack.us/img830/5580/bluebasecalibrated8.jpg

I've fixed almost all the overexposure problems and mixed up some of the blue hues.

http://a.imageshack.us/img27/5118/bluebasecalibrated1.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img33/3083/bluebasecalibrated2.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img444/8699/bluebasecalibrated3.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img27/531/bluebasecalibrated4.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img256/3586/bluebasecalibrated5.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img530/9202/bluebasecalibrated6.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img266/9/bluebasecalibrated7.jpg

When I have time, probably tomorrow, I'll start on the flag room.

See neuro, lights! :P

[Cagerrin]

Don't really like some of the geometry(that inset in the last two pics), but daaang, that's some good lighting.

[POQPrince]

Wow...again!

:shocked:

[staticchanger]

Very Nice. You've outdone yourself.

[Dwood]

Just fix those insets. they don't look like Forerunner.

[Vadam930]

Just fix those insets. they don't look like Forerunner.

What do you mean by that? If you mean the blacony-type-thing (at the walkway with the Banshee teleporters) looking out into Blue base... I'd a agree. They just look like plain, square windows from inside the base. Everything else looks amazing!! That is some great lighting!!

[neuro]

add an ambient light.

only has to be a power of like 0.15 or something, and set it to a faint purple hue.

trust me.

[sleepy1212]

looks great but what's with those funky lines on either side of the door in the first pic? is that the lightmap UV or do you have a seam there?

also i like the insets...but then again i don't give a shit about FOARUNNR11!?>!

[Dwood]

What do you mean by that? If you mean the blacony-type-thing (at the walkway with the Banshee teleporters) looking out into Blue base... I'd a agree. They just look like plain, square windows from inside the base. Everything else looks amazing!! That is some great lighting!!

That thing where the banshee outline is.... is an inset.

[Siliconmaster]

Yeah, that inset was never really forerunnerish ,but nobody seemed to mind through all the betatests. - _ - I blame you for not pointing it out haha. Would be pretty easy to fix- I'll do it when I do my last uv error check on all the texturing.

As for the ambient purple light, neuro, how are you thinking? For the entire base? Just the sniper roosts? The issue with adding an abient light is that all of a sudden there are no more shadows, and part of the fun in the base is having areas of light and dark- I don't want to be able to see the bottom of the base, where the pit falls into sahdow. Wouldn't be too hard to stop the light before it hits that, but I'd like to know what your concept is before I start messing with stuff.

Also, I want to point out that Bungie has, from time to time, used odd-looking little indents in their levels to make blank walls look more interesting. Here's an example, from GS343:

http://a.imageshack.us/img192/5867/guiltysparkindent.jpg

I took my initial inspiration from that little doodad.

[n00b1n8R]

The inset looks fine IMO.

[Dwood]

I never did notice that inset... but it's just the overall shape... also, no one ever sent me any maps to do a beta test. You have me on xfire for pete's sake! (Saint Peter, lawl)

[LlamaMaster]

That inset was in Halo? My god, what were they thinking?

[EX12693]

Forerunners do insets I guess.. look fine though. Plain walls are... plain. :|

[LlamaMaster]

Forerunners do insets I guess.. look fine though. Plain walls are... plain. :|
Plain walls are always better than vomit-inducing "detailed" ones.

[Dwood]

Plain walls are always better than vomit-inducing "detailed" ones.

But that was a non-detailed vomit-inducing inset.

[EX12693]

Acutally it's a non-detailed non vomit-inducing inset. Though I actually like Silicon's better. The angles in Bungie's inset dont match the surroundings.

[Llama Juice]

It looks fine, you guys just like to nitpick over pointless little shit.

OH GOD THOSE FOURTEEN POLYGONS PISS ME OFF

This post was made on medication.

[Inferno]

It looks fine, you guys just like to nitpick over pointless little shit.

OH GOD THOSE FOURTEEN POLYGONS PISS ME OFF

This post was made on medication.

The inset is actually 26 tri's.
(http://a.imageshack.us/img192/5867/guiltysparkindent.jpg)
http://palmgoon.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/the_more_you_know2.jpg

[Siliconmaster]

And mine are 22 and 28, respectively. :downs: Also, +rep for Reading Rainbow.

[LlamaMaster]

It looks fine, you guys just like to nitpick over pointless little shit.

OH GOD THOSE FOURTEEN POLYGONS PISS ME OFF

This post was made on medication.

HEY FUCK YOU THIS IS MODACITY IF WE DON'T COMPLAIN ABOUT EVERY FUCKING THING THAT PISSES US OFF IN MAPS WE MIGHT RELEASE THINGS.

FUCUKFCUKFCUKK!!!

[Siliconmaster]

All right, after much messing around with alcoves and indents from TSC, I decided the originals were good enough, but I fixed the angles on the one by the ladderwell, and retextured both so they look a little more interesting. The whole border is now all pretty looking if you get up close to it.

http://a.imageshack.us/img831/8153/finishedteleindent.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img225/903/finishedrearindent.jpg

Before I compiled the level again, I also added some lights near the tunnel entrances- before, they were almost impossible to see before your warthog fell into them. Please excuse my portal geometry.

http://a.imageshack.us/img571/7209/newlights.jpg

[DarkHalo003]

In terms of performance (as in FPS etc) and navigation, how well is it to play the level? I'm asking this because I have been in a ton of maps that I play often, but it takes me playthroughs to figure out where everything is when the locations should be obvious. What I mean is, will we know where to go and will we find what we seek by just playing the level (as opposed to having to explore it in LAN first)?

[Siliconmaster]

I can run it fairly fine, but it would be hard to give an accurate estimate because I usually run it with a lot of other tools going during development. Next time I restart my computer and free all my ram I'll let you know. If any beta testers want to add their own experiences in here, that would work too.

As for figuring out where everything is, the lighting tells you pretty blatantly what side you're on, and I've done my best to label the teleporters so you know what each one does/where it goes. It might be beneficial to have a run around the map before playing, since it is pretty large. However, at this point player movement has been made far more linear than before, so you shouldn't get too lost.

Edit:

Progress continues!

I have a 3-way comparison for you tonight.

Compare this render:
http://img707.imageshack.us/img707/4313/bluebasetest1.jpg

To this old WIP ingame screencap:
http://img823.imageshack.us/img823/5954/bluebaseingametest.jpg

To this current sapien screencap:
http://a.imageshack.us/img716/8656/flagroomwip.jpg

Definitely getting there, but I'm going to attempt to get the colors looking a little more vibrant, like the original render. It's a pain though, because the render pulled it off by slightly overexposing the colors into the white. However, try that in Halo and it just goes all splotchy. So I'm playing with the colors themselves to make them brighter without actually modifying the intensity of the lights.

And just for good measure, here are the modified insets in sapien:
http://a.imageshack.us/img197/3290/newindent.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img51/8679/newindentreverse.jpg

A little dark, due to (more detailed?) lightmap uvs. Before, the light bled a lot more. I probably need to brighten up that area, just a little, so players can see better.

[Dwood]

Those insets no longer make me gag.

[Vadam930]

Lookin' awesome!

[BobtheGreatII]

Those insets no longer make me gag.
I agree, the lighting really fixed it up.

[EX12693]

I dont like the texture on the 1st inset. Doesnt quite match...

[Con]

LEAVE THE INSETS ALONE

http://img826.imageshack.us/img826/3425/chriscrockercries.jpg

[POQPrince]

LEAVE THE INSETS ALONE

http://img826.imageshack.us/img826/3425/chriscrockercries.jpg

*shivers

[Siliconmaster]

Hahahaha must spread rep before I can rep you for that, Con. I'm a perfectionist, but there's only so far I'll go. The indents have been discussed to death- they're staying the way they are. You won't notice them that much. Really.

[EX12693]

Fine! Keep the inset textures. :mech:

[Siliconmaster]

Yeah, yeah- as a consolation prize I have 3 sapien screenshots that show the sort of fine tuning I'm working on at the moment:

Two days ago:
http://a.imageshack.us/img716/8656/flagroomwip.jpg

Later that same day:
http://a.imageshack.us/img43/6021/flagroomwip2.jpg

Yesterday:
http://a.imageshack.us/img267/5113/flagroomwip3.jpg

Progress continues!

[Lateksi]

I dig the colours.

[EX12693]

What happened to the purple things in the 1st pic?

[Siliconmaster]

Oh- that's part of the ceiling- the camera just happened to be slightly lower in the second two pics.

[EX12693]

Wait that's part of the cieling? But the purple things go down the walls... unless depth perception is screwing me up...

But yea, the lighting is much better. Keep at it!

[Siliconmaster]

I point you to these old test renders:

http://img210.imageshack.us/img210/5444/redbaseflagroomwip5.jpg

http://img535.imageshack.us/img535/9738/redbaseflagroomwip3.jpg

It's a chandelier-type structure coming out of the middle of the ceiling extending a little ways down into the room. Generally unrelated to the blinky light (aka panel_generator) strips on the walls.

Dammit those old renders looked nice. I'll keep doing my best to make the ingame stuff look as close as possible.

[annihilation]

That looks really cool.

[Siliconmaster]

All right, daily update time. Heh, this is starting to get like it was last summer.

I've been working on the base entrances, as well as checking to make sure the canyon lighting is still set correctly. As such, I've finished both. Note that in the two base entrance shots, I accidentally turned off the skylight, so in the final there will be a very small amount of extra ambient light. The shot of the canyon lighting, however, has the skylight turned on, as I did that beforehand.

Also take note that since the skylight is turned off, there should be NO LIGHT AT ALL in the canyon in those two shots. In fact, there isn't. It's totally pitch black. But Halo's amazingly retarded fog system manages to boost the gamma of anything in its influence. - _ - Wreaks total havoc with my lighting and shading.

http://a.imageshack.us/img693/8036/baseentranceblue5.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img686/6742/baseentrancered3.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img51/7821/canyonlighting1.jpg

[n00b1n8R]

So lower the fuck out of the fog level?
At the least it'd be interesting to see :)

[Siliconmaster]

Yeah, I was thinking about turning off the atmospheric fog for the time being so I could work on lightmaps without trying to guess what's shadow and what's not. Unfortunately, without the fog the map ends up looking rather plain- it's unrealistic for there to be no fog at all in the air, but I'll experiment with that later.

Update:

What's that? Urk released the Bungie weekly update a day early, and it's full of awesome?





Well, I can't let that go without challenge:

http://a.imageshack.us/img408/6958/epiclighting1.jpg


Fog is totally off for the time being, and a lot of lights are off, mainly the banshee pads and the tunnel entrances.

[Llama Juice]

Lookin sharp sir, is there a way to just lower the intensity of the fog? Wouldn't that solve your problem for ye?

[Siliconmaster]

Yes, there is, and I'll probably do that. But this way I can calibrate the lights to the actual level, instead of the fog-related view. Before, they looked all washed out, and now they're awesomely-saturated. I'll keep the fog off from here on out until the very end.

Edit: Lightning pointed out that the purple blinky generator lights down by the energy port are a little pinkish. Turns out that entire section of lights was still using inverse decay, and was therefore messing with the color closest to the light. Fixed, and rendering out a new version to test it.

Edit:

BUT WAIT:

THERE'S MORE!

http://a.imageshack.us/img571/4044/epiclighting2.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img34/373/epiclighting3.jpg

[Vadam930]

Wow!!:woop:

Also, funny how you mentioned Urk's early update, I saw as it just before I read your comment.

EDIT: I just realised. The main bridge has more red lights than blue(underneath). Maybe that last lot of red lights before the gap should be purple/white/none? Just sayin'. =)

[Siliconmaster]

Update time again:

I turned on all exterior lights and calibrated them. Teleporters now give off green light, the tunnel entrances (here seen in the lower left corner) have new lights, and the neon pink light issue near the energy port has been fixed. The banshee pads are turned on, but for some bizarre reason they had weird settings- I'm working to recalibrate them, and that shouldn't take long.

http://a.imageshack.us/img842/3094/epiclightingupdate1.jpg

The energy port lights are also a little dimmer than before- I decided the old version was less realistic- some blinky lights wouldn't light up 20 feet on either side. Also, the purple glow in the first image was from the beam- in this new one the dynamic light simply wasn't illuminating the wall at the instant I took the picture.

[Amit]

My god that's beautiful. I shuddered when I saw Con's impressive skybox for Lumoria, but this tops it for me. You actually have built the most beautiful thing I've ever seen in the Halo engine. Scenery, geometry, lighting. You got it all.

[Siliconmaster]

Here, have a wallpaper, because I love you all and I'm tired and I feel like doing cool stuff.

http://a.imageshack.us/img213/3462/precipicewallpaper1.jpg

[Inferno]

Looks great. Your lighting quality is amazing.

[n00b1n8R]

Can you post the wallpaper without the words?

[Siliconmaster]

Sure.

http://a.imageshack.us/img401/5521/precipicewallpaper1nowo.jpg

There you go.

A pity I don't have a screen higher res than that, so I can't take larger screenshots. But hopefully that'll do.

Glad everyone likes the lighting- I'm really happy with it myself. Next step is to make sure the banshee pads look good again, then start copying the settings from blue base to red base. Will take a while, but this time I won't have to do a hundred test renders along the way, so should go faster.

[FireScythe]

Beautiful work going on here :). I had a look at fixing the bitmap in use problem for you, new executable here (http://cid-d439194bef5aa58e.office.live.com/self.aspx/Aether/Aether.zip?lc=2057). It's not tested so i'd keep a hold of the original. Let me know if it's still not fixed.

[Siliconmaster]

Awesome! Works like a charm. You are the man.

For reference, the issue in question was that once a scenario file was open in Aether, sapien couldn't open it because Aether was using the .bitmap tag. As a result, every time I wanted to test a render I'd have to close and completely reopen Aether, which includes finding the scenario path, finding the bitmap render path, etc. etc. Now that this is fixed, I can open it once, and just keep updating the files without having to ever close Aether. It'll save a lot of time. Thanks dude!

[Rentafence]

Well shit, this came together really well.

[BobtheGreatII]

Yeah it did. I mean, the modeling of the level could be a touch better. Not saying the layout is bad or anything, but just have someone go in there and touch it all up. But that mixed with this amazing lighting, would make a kick ass map. But even so, I think it's going to make a great map anyway.

[AAA]

Truly Amazing. You're doing wonders on touching this up with beauty. :) I look forward to this release.

[Siliconmaster]

Haha me too.

I transferred all the settings from blue base to red base today, but based on the 5-hour rest render, it still needs some touch ups. A few places are overexposed, and others are too dark. Still, a nice step forward.

[NotZac]

Wow, I haven't taken the time to revisit the H:CE community in a long time. I'm thrilled that there is still some incredible work being done here. The map is beautiful. I deeply look forward to playing this map for myself.

[Llama Juice]

Haha me too.

I transferred all the settings from blue base to red base today, but based on the 5-hour rest render, it still needs some touch ups. A few places are overexposed, and others are too dark. Still, a nice step forward.

I called it. :P hahaha

[Siliconmaster]

Hey, I now have red base essentially done except for the uvs, and I'm fixing up the credits room lighting. Unfortunately I'm gone this weekend, so doing last minute lighting tweaks will have to wait until Monday afternoon.

Edit: But before I go, I just finished the credits room, or at least as much as I could before the low-res lightmap in this area prevented me from making it any more precise. It became "is this wall lit, or is it dark" after a while. Blegh. Wish there were more room in the lightmap bitmap tag.

Note that I'm not going to tell people who don't already know where it is, only show off the basic look. Also, there are, or will be, if I can get it working right with Inferno's help, some fun little things in this area.

http://a.imageshack.us/img18/8068/creditroomlit.jpg

[Vadam930]

Sweet!!!:iamafag:

[Siliconmaster]

I was almost heading out the door when I was hit by a bit of inspiration, resulting in this:

http://a.imageshack.us/img9/8783/floodtunnellight.jpg

Creepy green flood light anyone? Ignore the rest of the base- I didn't render all the lightmaps, just the flood tunnels.

[EX12693]

Ok. That. Looks. Epic.

Bit too green though? Maybe make it SLIGHTLY more yellow? But not as yellow as the light at the top of the pic..

[Vadam930]

Yeah, that does look epic!

[neuro]

what looks epic? THERES FUCKING NOTHING TO SEE except for a few dots.

[Cagerrin]

That would look so much cooler if it was all TRON-lighting.

[Llama Juice]

what looks epic? THERES FUCKING NOTHING TO SEE except for a few dots.

This.

[Siliconmaster]

...The focus was the new green lighting inside the flood tunnel. I made it clear the the rest of the base lighting was off due to rendering. But I had the camera a ways out to get a little bit of perspective. Jeez. Nothing too impressive, just cool.

And Tron. Lul.

But the word epic is far too overused in this thread. Needs to stop. Isn't always an accurate description.

[Vadam930]

The word "epic" has many different tiers...

I think we're overusing the word here because the map in general is epic.:downs:

[n00b1n8R]

No, epic is a teir of it's own and anybody who thinks otherwise is 14 <:maddowns:>
/derail

[Dwood]

Tron up your map bro.

[Cagerrin]

It's funny how TRON already looks forerunner-ish.

http://www.majhost.com/gallery/TalonX/randomstuff/53.jpg

[Vadam930]

No, epic is a teir of it's own and anybody who thinks otherwise is 14 <:maddowns:>
/derail

Or 17... I don't know, too much sugar earlier, made that up on the spot.

Back on topic...:golfclap:

[Warsaw]

Holy Jesus's shit and a half Batman, this doesn't look like the test map I played a lifetime ago...

Looks extremely good.

[POQPrince]

It's funny how TRON already looks forerunner-ish.

http://www.majhost.com/gallery/TalonX/randomstuff/53.jpg

It would be interesting to have a TRONesque map in Halo CE! I suppose that someone could take an existing map and TRONify it!

:tinfoil:

BTW, this map is looking better with each report, Silicon!

:woop:

[Siliconmaster]

Alright, I'm back from vacation, and while I was gone I had my computer render all 21 lightmaps with all 5717 lights turned on. Took 2 and a half days, according to the latest modified lightmap. It's really nice to be able to see the entire map lit at once, so I can really see the transitions between areas and whether there need to be changes.

http://a.imageshack.us/img816/3589/fullrender1.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img441/1743/fullrender2.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img704/778/fullrender3.jpg

[Reaper Man]

Looking good man

[DarkHalo003]

I saw it and if i wouldn't have been awe-struck my jaw would have dropped.

[Siliconmaster]

I'm headed back to college, so I won't be able to work on this project for a few days. However, I hereby proclaim the bsp to be finalized, unless for some reason people find something game-breaking and drastic that absolutely requires fixing. Con and I tested how easy it was to get out of the map, and I added player clipping to compensate. And even though my continuing issues with usertool prevent me from importing new lightmap uvs into Halo, I've been methodically fixing them in max. I've now finished fixing 8 out of the 21 lightmaps, and once I have time again it won't be all that long until I finish them all. However, if for some reason I have to recompile the bsp, all that work will be wasted, hence the bsp finalization. After that it's weapon placements, minor fixes, and bug tests.

See you in a few.

[POQPrince]

I'm headed back to college, so I won't be able to work on this project for a few days. However, I hereby proclaim the bsp to be finalized, unless for some reason people find something game-breaking and drastic that absolutely requires fixing. Con and I tested how easy it was to get out of the map, and I added player clipping to compensate. And even though my continuing issues with usertool prevent me from importing new lightmap uvs into Halo, I've been methodically fixing them in max. I've now finished fixing 8 out of the 21 lightmaps, and once I have time again it won't be all that long until I finish them all. However, if for some reason I have to recompile the bsp, all that work will be wasted, hence the bsp finalization. After that it's weapon placements, minor fixes, and bug tests.

See you in a few.

Congratulations on a new year of school! I get more and more excited for this map each and every day!

Woohoo!

\o/

[EX12693]

Looks more epic every time I see it!
Would love to betatest this with you guys...

[Siliconmaster]

Thanks to Skarma, usertool now works on my computer. The first import tests have been very successful, but I've been seeing a few very odd glitches. I think the importer may be modifying the level uvs as well, resulting in bizarre uv errors that were NOT there before. I managed to recover it from the ingame build, but just barely.

Edit: Confirmed. Prior to the import, the uv error was not there.

Edit 9-2-10: The uv issue is totally messed up. I'm putting it on hold until I can talk to Firescythe about it. However, I did manage to remove the branches from the pine tree collision model. Now vehicles won't bounce off the smallest branch, but will brush through them. Much more enjoyable for all involved.

[Siliconmaster]

All right, I don't care about double posting, because this is a big deal. The issues I was having with the lightmap import process seem to have fixed themselves after 5 days of experimenting, and I'm going forward as fast as possible trying to fix all the remaining lightmap uv errors. Here are some screenshots of the fixed areas. Nothing is final, and I'm always seeing little glitches here or there that I need to fix. Hopefully these will be good though.

Half the time it's not just fixing errors, it's raising the resolution and making important areas higher-res than areas of lower importance. Take a look at the shadows and shading for examples of this.

http://a.imageshack.us/img685/8796/fixeduvs1.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img835/5303/fixeduvs2.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img838/7126/fixeduvs3.jpg

Look, shadows! And shading!
http://a.imageshack.us/img693/1060/fixeduvs4.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img709/5716/fixeduvs5.jpg

http://a.imageshack.us/img265/5538/fixeduvs6.jpg

[Vadam930]

:iamafag:

[Timo]

That's amazing. I've never seen halo lit that well ._.

[POQPrince]

*salivating

This map is beyond fantastic! You might give this a show to Bungie. Who knows? You may have a job opening once you finish school!

:eng101:

[ThePlague]

*salivating

This map is beyond fantastic! You might give this a show to Bungie. Who knows? You may have a job opening once you finish school!

:eng101:I doubt it, because this engine is nothing like what they're using now.

Map is looking good though dude, keep it up. You have something good going here.

[Vadam930]

I doubt it, because this engine is nothing like what they're using now.



That's not what matters, though. Not every employee at Bungie had access to the sort of equipment they have now, before being inducted.

[Siliconmaster]

Honestly I'm doing this for fun- my film work is my job direction. Glad people like the screencaps though. I hope to get the other 50% of the uvs fixed within a week or so, hopefully sooner. We'll see depending on my school work and other plans.

[EX12693]

If only you did the lighting in Reach...

[Siliconmaster]

I think Bungie can handle its own lighting :P Do remember this is current-day lighting style in an old engine. The lighting I've seen in Reach via trailers and stuff looks pretty darn nice.

[EX12693]

Reach trailers vs. Reach ingame.. ehh.
Still, if you can put out this kinda work on an engine as old as halo's, I'd like to see some of your work on newer games..

[Amit]

Reach trailers vs. Reach ingame.. ehh.
Still, if you can put out this kinda work on an engine as old as halo's, I'd like to see some of your work on newer games..

Remember, just because you become proficient at one engine, doesn't mean you will instantly be a genius in another engine. It takes a lot of time to become good at something and a hell of a lot of practice, so really, if the average person spent enough time and dedication that Silicon does, they would have similar looking pieces.

[EX12693]

Meh. Opinion is opinion. I still say Silicon is better at this than many others I've seen, engine aside.

[DarkHalo003]

Remember, just because you become proficient at one engine, doesn't mean you will instantly be a genius in another engine. It takes a lot of time to become good at something and a hell of a lot of practice, so really, if the average person spent enough time and dedication that Silicon does, they would have similar looking pieces.
In addition, considering what they've had to left out, the Halo Reach engine seems very different than our beloved HCE engine. For example, ambient life, which is very easy in HCE, is not possible if animations aren't right in Halo Reach because it messes with other systems, which animations do not do in HCE. Or at least, that's what I've heard.

[Siliconmaster]

I agree with Amit- all someone has to do is keep at it and you'll eventually get good at something. This map might be taking forever, but if it weren't, it wouldn't look as good as it does.

Also, dammit Halo, why do your uvs suck?

http://img255.imageshack.us/img255/7414/precipiceuvswip.jpg

That square of tiny little pieces is Halo's uvs, and the shapes around it are my WIP fixed uvs. And I need to fit them all in a single uv map. Blarg.

[stilts]

Looks awesome man

[Siliconmaster]

Took me 4 hours, but I finished lightmap 16. And this morning, after finally getting the 7 on the 7th achievement, and therefore Recon (for the hell of it), I also fixed lightmap 17. Looks like 19 is another horrible one, but 18, 20, and 21 appear fairly easy to fix.

[ThePlague]

Took me 4 hours, but I finished lightmap 16. And this morning, after finally getting the 7 on the 7th achievement, and therefore Recon (for the hell of it), I also fixed lightmap 17. Looks like 19 is another horrible one, but 18, 20, and 21 appear fairly easy to fix.
Pssh, I got Recon sooo long ago :p

Nice work on the lightmaps though. Can't wait to see them.

[TEMPTii]

Took me 4 hours, but I finished lightmap 16. And this morning, after finally getting the 7 on the 7th achievement, and therefore Recon (for the hell of it), I also fixed lightmap 17. Looks like 19 is another horrible one, but 18, 20, and 21 appear fairly easy to fix.

You got Recon one week before Reach is released.

[Siliconmaster]

You got Recon one week before Reach is released.

Correction: I finished off Halo 3's important achievements one week before Reach is released. Therefore, satisfaction.

Also, Lightmap 18 is done.

[n00b1n8R]

You got Recon one week before Reach is released.
$5 says there's a special hat for people with recon in reach

[TEMPTii]

$5 says there's a special hat for people with recon in reach

I bet the font on the hat will be comic sans.

[Siliconmaster]

GLARGALARBLE

http://img828.imageshack.us/img828/355/ihateuvs.jpg

4 Hours. Of moving around faces. I now have carpel tunnel from these damned lightmaps.

Also, they're now done. All of them. Pics once they're rendered in about..... 30 hours.

[Rentafence]

I'm curious how this map plays. I couldn't help but notice it looks LOLhuge.

[Siliconmaster]

It plays decently, more so after the (semi)recent layout changes. Once the weapon layouts have been redone it should play even better.

Also, you just noticed it's a huge map? :P

[Rentafence]

No, I just didn't want to hurt your feelings. :(

[Siliconmaster]

Haha no worries- between Llama's modeling critiques and Con's layout comments, someone pointing out the size of the map isn't insulting at all. I probably redid 60% of the map due to those two. :P

[Llama Juice]

:D

Also, the map looks awesome now, so quityerbitchin.

[Siliconmaster]

Good news: the lightmaps are all rendered, and they look gorgeous.

Bad news: somewhere along the way the map picked up 3 phantom bsp errors.

So now I get to embark along a little project i like to call "yell and panic and then start fixing the errors and hope to god when I import the bsp the lightmap geometry doesn't change too much."

Tuesday now seems so very close, and there is so much to do.

[DarkHalo003]

Do the phantom BSPs affect gameplay too much? That honestly sucks. Is there any reason why Phantom BSPs pop-up in the first place?

[Dwood]

Do the phantom BSPs affect gameplay too much? That honestly sucks. Is there any reason why Phantom BSPs pop-up in the first place?

no one knows.

[Siliconmaster]

Unfortunately they're right where a lot of banshee traffic would be. My hope is that because the bsp has only changed ever so slightly, the lightmaps will still be (almost) the same, meaning I'll be able to transfer the uvs over. If not, idk. We'll see.

Really, I'm annoyed at myself, because I should have run a check for phantom bsp before I started on the lightmap work. Unfortunately, at the time I assumed that because I hadn't changed much, there wouldn't be any new occurrences. Apparently I was wrong.

Edit 9-20-10:

Alright, Reach has totally eaten my life, and I now have a girlfriend, so things have been a bit hectic where Precipice work is concerned. However, the damage from the phantom bsp errors is now apparent.

After chasing bsp errors around the map for at least 8 compiles (I'm convinced it was just trolling me) I managed to get it to move where very few people will ever encounter it. And I now have 5 out of 22 lightmap uvs redone. Yes, I actually have to redo every single lightmap. A total pain, but w/e- if I do one a day, I'll be done within a few weeks- if more than one, a lot sooner. Theoretically Inferno is still going to do some work on the tags, and then when all is fixed up we'll go from there.

[Rentafence]

and I now have a girlfriend

MY GIRLFRIEND

[Siliconmaster]

K, new update- I've managed to get lightmaps 1-13 fixed and rendered. It's going at a decent pace, but I'm quite busy. Screenshots are useless at the moment seeing as half the map is a dull gray, and the other half looks like a christmas tree on shrooms. Eventually all the lightmaps will be rendered and imported, and then there shall be a new batch of screenshots. And hopefully soon after that, a map release.

[POQPrince]

FANTASTIC NEWS! Keep it up, Silicon!