Mapping for Dummies Tutorial #2

shadowkid342 · Posted: Nov 16, 2007 - 05:35 AM

Welcome back! This tutorial will describe the basic tools of relation to a skybox and how to make them.

Idea

Getting to know your tools Idea

This will teach you the tools you use and what they do. You will need to know: How to make a room and adding actors (tutorial 1). Now, you may be wondering, "Whats a skybox?" It is a room cut-off from the rest of the map that is small, but looks huge when your playing in another room. (Like in DM-Phobos and CTF-FacingWorlds.) There is also a thing called surface properties, it is a window that pops up when you doubleclick a surface. You will need to know this for making a skybox.

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Making a Skybox Idea

Ok, first make a room, then, move the brush by clicking on it, then while highlited in red, hold down shift+click left (hold down) and move your mouse to the left or right. This should make the RBB move. You can move it in other directions, example: Shift+right click (hold down) will move it forward and back. Shift+both clicked (hold down) will move it up and down. Make sure its pretty far away to avoid the brush's shadow in the other room. Once finished,use the texture browser to pick a texture. Then subtract the room as in tutorial 1.

Then, go to the actor menu, go to info

zoneinfo

skyzoneinfo and click it once. Close the actor browser and right click a surface in whichever room you choose to be your skybox. Then from the dropdown menu, select "add skyzoneinfo". It should now put a sprite in there that looks like this:

Now whatever you have in that room will appear a LOT larger than normal in another room, WAIT! Before you build all, right click a surface in the skybox room and click select surfaces

matching brush. That should highlight all the surfaces in the skybox room. Then right click one of the highlighted surfaces and click surface properties at the bottom, this will open up a box with a bunch of empty check boxes with choices next to them. Check the empty box that says "Unlit" next to it by clicking on the box. This will make all the walls light up so you don't have to put a light in there, (you can also do this with the other room if you want.)

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Bringing your Skybox to Life Idea

Finally, go to your other room you created in the very beginning, select surfaces that you want to see the other room in. Then right click and from the dropdown menu, select surface properties, this will open up the box again. Just check the "fake backdrop" box and close it.

Now, add some lights in your non-skybox room, click build all at the top, and once again, click the Controller button at the top to play it! This is how a skybox would look.

Keep on fraggin!