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Old 26-01-2008, 02:55 AM   #54 (permalink)
doylle
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Originally Posted by mmcleo11 View Post
Wanted to make the posters somehow glow but I've no real idea how to use self-illumination maps. If any1 has any tutorials give me a shout.
I don't think we have any tutorial on SI maps in our list, but i can tell you quickly how they work. In 3dsMax a SI map is just a greyscale map, where black is not self illuminated, and white is fully self illuminated. Now, SI does not mean that it will emit light. It just means that it will not have shadows on that area. So, there are two things you need to think about when you use SI maps. One of course is that your texture has a bright color on that spot. There's no point in making a black area self illuminate. The other is that your lighting setup is good, meaning that the part that is self illuminated lies in the shadow... (it's the only way you'll see the effect of the si map).

Now, if i look to your maps, then I assume that the one in the right lower corner is the SI map. What you need to do is, make everything black, the lights white, and you can fake the light beams on your poster/glass, that would look pretty cool actaully...

I hope that's more or les understandable ^^

oh, i know max has a glow map to, but i have no clue what it does, or how it works. Either way, SI is what source engine an unreal are using (UE3 probably has actual glow though, don't know for sure), so i'm guessing that's your best bet.

cheers
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Last edited by doylle; 26-01-2008 at 02:57 AM.
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