Shadow Resolution

[promarijan]

This is maybe the wrong place... Maybe the right one...

I got a question to the mapformat .bsp...

Or more like a request that will affect the shadowresolution...

So you can change the shadow/lightmap resolution as you want to have nice details!

Because on smaller scaled textures you got more shadowdots and so on... It just looks so nice with the crispy shadows! I tested it and its awesome!


What i wanted to ask is... If it would be possible to adjust the shadow resolution in bsp... Because it would be very very nice!!!

[jitspoe]

It's not related so I put it in its own thread.

The lightmap scale is tied directly to the texture scale.  So you CAN increase the lightmap resolution by scaling down the texture, but it will have other side effects:

- Texture will be smaller, obviously, and tile more frequently.
- Map will be "chopped up" more, increasing r_speeds.
- More lightmap patches, meaning you are likely to hit the "MAX_PATCHES" error when compiling.

[promarijan]

I know that already since a year but thank you for repeating it^^

I asked if it would be possible to apply the resolution of the lightmaps seperatly... This would need a change of the mapfiles but it would be awesome!

Would it be hard to do that? I mean you talked about developing a new mapformat... Maybe try that there... Who knows

[jitspoe]

I don't think that's possible without significant modifications to both the map format and the renderer.  What I would love to do is have automatic lightmap resolution, where it would be higher res in detailed areas, and lower res in open areas without much lighting detail.

What I might end up doing (if I ever get around to making a new map format) is have realtime shadowmaps for direct lighting, and just use the lightmaps for reflected light.

[promarijan]

realtime shadows would be awesome! So you would see the players shadow too? The own players shadow... That would be sooooo nice!


And there would be something very cool! If... If there would be realtime shadows... You should make it scaleable via cvar... So you can try to get as high as you can and not like the game is forcing it...
A free multiplier if you will so... That would be the nicest thing ever!

[jitspoe]

Not sure what you mean about scaleable, unless you're referring to the resolution.

[promarijan]

Do you know GLSLshader? Maybe in Minecraft?

There you can adjust the shadowresolution by changing a variable... Like 2048 or 4096 or whatever... Because that would allow people like me to play with the values...

I tested around a hour just with a stable but very high shadowresolution... But it offers also some unstability issues if you crank it up all the way!

[jitspoe]

Realtime shadows could certainly be configurable, and probably will be to some degree, but we'll worry about that when we get to it...