global/sun light and shadows

[jerome2kph]

I want to put a global/sun light to my project and able to cast shadows.
how will I do it in C#?

[Toaster]

With shadow gen once its released or you can use stencil shadows. Do a quick search on the forums on how to use stencil shadows, its not hard.

-Toaster

[Raul]

BTW TOASTER

when will be the next version of shadowgen released?

[Gamecode]

BTW TOASTER

when will be the next version of shadowgen released?

good question

[Toaster]

Soon very soon I hope. :p

-Toaster

[Raul]

ontopic: directional lighting is what you need for "sun light"

offtopic: Toaster, we all waiting for that

[jerome2kph]

when I export models on 3ds max, it has an option to include lightmap. can I use this instead of coding the lights? and does light map include shadows. do I still need to call the light engine to enable lightmapping?

[jerome2kph]

also, i got this error when putting a directional light.

AccessViolationException




click the image for actual size

[Zaknafein]

Well you need to do that after Init3DWindowed(). Can't do most things before the engine is inited.

[jerome2kph]

thanks zaknafein... but the light doesn't seem to have effect on the models... I've tried both point and directional. can you give me a full example/demo scene using lights? and about my question about lightmaps, can you explain it to me. I'm sorry for being a newbie. hehe.

[Raul]

Do you specify to your models what kind of light do you use?

Code:

TVMesh.SetLightingMode ( .... )

[jerome2kph]

thanks. I'll try it. anyway, about my question about lightmapping. will someone explain it to me.

[asia]

Lightmaps are a second layer of textures added to your mesh. They will give you the shadows. Of course the shadow will be on the mesh itself. So you must have a lightmap for the floor or for the terrain. Lightmaps are good when the meshes are static (not moving).
There are several software for buiding lightmaps. I mainly use Giles which is free.
http://www.truevision3d.com/forums/companion_tools/lightmaps_and_giless_a_small_utility-t19575.0.html
Greeting
Fabio

[jerome2kph]

how do I set the intensity/brightness of a point light?

[jerome2kph]

here are some of my lighting settings... the scene is so dark. can anyone suggest some proper parameter settings...

Code:

IDLight = Lights.CreateDirectionalLight(new TV_3DVECTOR(0, 300, 0), 1, 1, 1, "dir light", 1);

Code:

IDMat = Mats.CreateLightMaterial(1, 1, 1, 1, 0.15f, 1, "basic material");

Code:

iit.SetMaterial(IDMat, -1);
iit.SetLightingMode(CONST_TV_LIGHTINGMODE.TV_LIGHTING_NORMAL, 0, 1);

[asia]

your light is pointing up...
The direction should be with a negative Y.
Also, because it is a direction it should be normalized (or "nearly" normalized). I suggest the following direction: -1,-1,1
Also the material stuff needs to be changed.
I think you should use creatematerial and all after al the setting like setabmient, setdiffuse etc. Try!
Also for the light you can set a lot of stuff!
Bye
Fabio

[asia]

I was thinking you may download the TV6.3. That is full of examples and many things are similar to TV6.5
Greetings
Fabio

[jerome2kph]

isn't the first three parameters of TV_3DVECTOR the position of the light? is it the position or the direction.
I also noticed that when I set the 0.15f value to 1 in the CreateLightMaterial, the scene goes bright but it makes the light pointless because it's just like setting the lighting mode to none.

[Raul]

The first parameters could be the light pos or the light direction. A DIRECTIONAL LIGHT does not have any position...

[jerome2kph]

tnx