The Light Sourcing Mode

Light sourcing allows you to place environmental lighting around your level. 

Mode

Mode > Exit

Exits Light Sourcing and returns you to Control Mode.

Mode > Save Intensities For Game

Saves all light data, for AvP.

NOTE: This must be done before exiting Light Sourcing after having placed environmental lights. It will calculate vertice intensities for all affected vertices. Not doing this will cause your lighting to behave odd.

Mode > Save Intensities For Tools

Saves all light data as defaults for tool.

Doors

Doors > Open

Opens doors

Doors > Close

Closes doors

Lights

Lights > Hide All 

Hides all light cones

Lights > Unhide All

Unhides all light cones

Lights > Toggle On/Off 

Select a light and click this to turn the light on and off

Lights > Switch All On 

Turns all lights in the level on

Select

Select > Object

Lets you select placed objects such as Placed Lights

Select > Lights

Lets you select lights

When selecting lights, press the < and > keys to switch between light properties. Press the - and + keys to edit the properties. If you are editing a Placed Light you can press "P" to edit special properties of the light (flickering, strobing etc.).

Edge
Edge > Soft
No effect
Help
Help > General
Brings up a small help screen explaining features and controls
Screenshot
Takes screenshot

Light Properties

Brightness
The light's brightness. Differs from 0% (dark) to 200% (complete whiteout).
Spread
Controls the light's spread-angle. Differs from 0 to 180 degrees.
Range
The range of the light in meters. Having several lights that overlap might look bad so use this with caution.
Attenuation
If enabled, the light's brightness will be affected by range.
Spread Attenuation
If enabled, the light's brightness will be affected by the angular distance.
Red
Determines the amount of red color in the light's color. Ranges from 0 to 255.
Green
Determines the amount of green color in the light's color. Ranges from 0 to 255.
Blue
Determines the amount of blue color in the light's color. Ranges from 0 to 255.
Runtime
If enabled, the light affect objects that appear within it's reach. There are several combinations one can do to get different effects:

- Runtime: Affects only objects (HUD, Placed Objects, NPCs, Players).
- Runtime+No Prelighting: Affect both modules and objects (HUD, Placed Objects, NPCs, Players).
- Neither: No affect. Will be stored for prelighting (for lighting vertices).


All Runtime lights automatically have Attenuation and are treated as Omni lights.
Omni
If enabled, the light will ignore Attenuation/Spread Atten and work in all directions.
Specular
Adds specular lighting.

If a polygon was affected by lots of non-specular white light, then the texture would be drawn in full brightness. If the lights are made Specular, then the texture will be drawn completely white.
Shadows
No effect.


Colors


Finding the right colors can be hard sometimes, but here are some common combinations of colors.

Red+Green: Yellow
Red+Blue: Magenta
Green+Blue: Cyan
Red+Green+Blue: White

The amount of color is also an important factor. Taking 255 Red, 255 Green and 255 Blue will make the light's color completely white. If all the values are lowered to 28, for example, then the light will be grey instead. The tools are auto-updating the color on-screen as you decrease/increase the colors to give you a view of how it will look in-game.


Controls

B Toggle headlight on and off.
S Switch selected light on.
X Switch selected light off.
D Create a light at current position.
V Paste clipboard light to current position.
R Remove selected light.
L Toggle Fly-mode for selected light.
<,> Select light property to change.
+,- Change the selected property.
C Copy the selected light.
O Paste clipboard light's properties to selected light.
I Toggle selected light's visibility.
U Update intensities in selected light. Should always be done.
T Toggle up/down color (Placed Lights only).
P Edit special properties (Placed Lights only).