How to make a skybox?

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Kato

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Hi, I'm making the first map of my new mod, a spaceship. Outside the windows, I want there to be space. I tried making a spacey texture and putting it on the inside of a box, but that made everything on the inside black, even with like 10 env_lights in the same area. I belive the problem would be solved if my space texture was actually a skybox, but I have no idea how to make skyboxes. I used the Vtex GUI, but if there's an easier way without command lines (or if you can walk me through the command lines...)...please let me know.

Thanks.

-Kato
 
Kato said:
Hi, I'm making the first map of my new mod, a spaceship. Outside the windows, I want there to be space. I tried making a spacey texture and putting it on the inside of a box, but that made everything on the inside black, even with like 10 env_lights in the same area. I belive the problem would be solved if my space texture was actually a skybox, but I have no idea how to make skyboxes. I used the Vtex GUI, but if there's an easier way without command lines (or if you can walk me through the command lines...)...please let me know.

Thanks.

-Kato
Click to expand...

:dozey: whoa, don't need that many, yeah check out the tutorials its not too hard
 
just six nice large brushes, make a cube out of them... then select them to have the skybox texture (the plain blue one.. not a sky texture) then go to the skybox options thingy (i can't remember which menu it is off) then choose your skybox texture.

:bounce:
 
I KNOW HOW TO MAKE A SKYBOX.

I just don't know how to make textures to put on the sky.

The 10 env_lights was just to test the lighting cuz I couldn't see, I know that many aren't needed.

On topic, thanks for the tutorial link. I will read it soon and update.

-Kato
 
Its in teh Map Properties:

next to File and Edit there Map > Map Properties
use the skybox property field

hope thats what youre looking for :|
 
I don't get Vtex. I have no idea how to use it, and the GUI gets me nowhere. There was another GUI one time (I use the Steam-green colored one). I remember one with a white background, and a checkbox that would be useful here..."Skybox." I had it, but I dunno what I did with it. Can anyone provide a link if you know what I'm talking about?

-Kato
 
In the clearest form, can someone tell me how to put a sky texture on a sky_box. i read the tutorial and i dont get anything he said i got every thing els on making a sky_box but the look. when i just had the sky_box and played it it didnt look right.
 
Just to clear things up for those who didn't read his original post: He wants to create a new texture and have that texture available as a skybox texture for his map.

I wish I knew, mate. Do some searches you'll probably find something. I'd edit all your images first. Each skybox set is a series of six images: front, back, left, right, top, bottom. first step would be to edit these into a seamless image. Since it's a starry sky, this should be simple if you have access to decent image-editing software.

I just thought how awesome it would be to have your 3d skybox be, like, a huge planet with rings and moons and shit. :E
 
-=podamf=-sniper said:
In the clearest form, can someone tell me how to put a sky texture on a sky_box. i read the tutorial and i dont get anything he said i got every thing els on making a sky_box but the look. when i just had the sky_box and played it it didnt look right.
Click to expand...

to answer your question: Go to the menu Map > Map Properties and fill in the sky name in the box. I know you'd like a list of all standard sky names, and I would like to post it, but I can't find such list anywhere. So what I always do is take a look at the skybox textures in Hammer's texturebrowser and that gives away the name.
 
sky_borealis01
sky_day01_01
sky_day01_04
sky_day01_05
sky_day01_06
sky_day01_07
sky_day01_08
sky_day01_09
sky_day02_01
sky_day02_02
sky_day02_03
sky_day02_04
sky_day02_05
sky_day02_06
sky_day02_07
sky_day02_09
sky_day02_10
sky_day03_01
sky_day03_02
sky_day03_03
sky_day03_04
sky_day03_05
sky_day03_06
sky_wasteland02

:cheers:
 
I got one of the textures working last night, but it wasn't one I wanted. Now everytime I boot hammer I see the NAMES of the textures, but their purple checkerboards. Weird.

-Kato
 
*REDKETCHUP*
are those the sky names for counter strike source or just halflife 2?

thank you everyone after i find out if those are the right names then i got it down. Thankyou again for all ur help.:D
 
AHH!! I am literally going crazy over this. WHAT am I doing wrong? I've compiled different sky textures at least 8 times and they're still...all...purple...CHECKERBOARDS!!!

If this doesn't pan out, could someone PLEASE direct me to a skybox texture of stars?

And can you PLEASE tell me what I'm doing wrong? This is really hindering my development cycle!

-Kato
 
So you've made, named, and compiled a set of six images, and placed their properly-named VTFs in the <mod>\materials\skybox folder?
 
Open your map in Hammer, open the browse texture pannel, click on the browse button. At the bottom of the new window, there is a Filter textbox, type in: skybox. Look at the path under each of the texture preview. The one that starts with skybox/ are good sky textures to use. Take the name after the slash e.g.: sky_borealis01rt and remove the last 2 characters. This is what you'll get: sky_borealis01. If you are mapping for HL2, the names RedKetchup listed are good sky textures names. Maybe you won't see those, if there are no sky textures then your gcf are corrupted or Hammer is not correctly configured. If you can see some sky textures then use the name of the texture (minus the last 2 characters) in the "Skybox Texture Name" textbox in the "Map / Map properties" menu.

The actual texture you have to use in Hammer for your sky (the big brush that englobes your level) is the toolskybox (its blue with dark blue lines and skybox is written in the middle of the texture. Apply that texture to your skybox. The surfaces that has the toolskybox texture applied to will look like the texture you set in the map property options when your map will be compiled.

So, compile your map with the 3 radio buttons set to Normal. Test your map. If it doesn't work then you'll have to give us some screenshot of your map in Hammer and in the game or give us the vmf.

Don't try to put a custom sky texture for the moment (a sky you made or downloaded). We'll help you to make one when those included with HL2 will work.
 
he's said he knows how to make default skyboxes work. we're past that. It's time to move on to step 2:
We'll help you to make one when those included with HL2 will work.
Click to expand...
 
If he did succeed to compile a map with a sky then the next step would be to compile a common LightMappedGeneric texture. There is a wizard with my VtexGUI utility so that shouldn't be a problem. After that he has to name the tga files correctly with the ft, bk, lf, rt, up, dn suffixes, add the "skybox" "1" line in the text files, compile the 6 textures, change the texture type in the vmt file to UnlitGeneric and add the line "$nofog" "1".
 
If you see the CHECKERBOARDS then it's because the path in the vmt is wrong or you didn't put the textures to the right directory or a param in the vmt is wrong or missing or you didn't put the good skyname in the skyname property in Hammer.
 
Ti133700N said:
or you didn't put the good skyname in the skyname property in Hammer.
Click to expand...
What? I don't get that sentence. You mean I put the wrong name in the Skybox Texture field on map properties? No, because the textures are checkerboards in the Texture Browser, too.

-Kato
 
Good, so there are less possibilities. Just to be sure because I asked the question but I didn't get a clear answer : Did you successfully compile a normal texture (lightmappedgeneric)? Did it appear correctly in Hammer? Did it appear correctly in the map? Sorry to ask it again if you answered it.

If you did all that then show us the vmt files for the skies please.
 
Here is my exact proccess:
  • Saved image from the Internet.
  • Copied six times and named them all correctly.
  • Created 6 text files with the "'skybox' '1'" line in them, named the same as the textures.
  • Created 6 VMTs with the UnlitGeneric and nofog lines.
  • Compiled textures. The skybox line ("'skybox' detected. Treating skybox like a cubemap for edge-matching purposes.
    implicity [sic] disabling nice filtering") showed up.
  • Placed compiled VMTs and the VMFs in the Materials/Skybox folder.
  • Checkerboards in texture browser. Checkerboards in map.
I will post the VMTs and VMFs tomorrow.

-Kato
 
Ok that was pretty clear thanks but I think my question wasn't clear. I'm not talking about sky textures : Did you managed to successfully compile and see in your map a standard (LightMappedGeneric) texture (let's say for a wall for example, or ground, not a sky or anything special) ?

Cuz if you didn't then maybe you save the tga to 32 bits (it should be 24) or maybe you use the rle compression (you should not).
 
Yes, I have successfully compuled a standard texture before.

I resaved all the images as 24 bit without RLE, just to be sure, then recompiled. Still checkerboards.

Should I still post a VMT?

-Kato
 
VMTs are so short that just the contents of one of them would be enough.
 
Ugh, sorry it took me so long, I've been sick in bed. Here are the contents of the basic VMT. They are all the same, except named respectively to their textures.

Code: 
"UnlitGeneric"
{
"$basetexture" "skybox/sky_c17_02"
"$nofog" "1"
}

Please help :(

-Kato
 
Looks like you didn't name the VTF/VMT pairs properly... Remember that you'll need six VMTs and six VTFs, totalling two files for each direction (up dn lf rt ft bk), and that you'll need to declare the proper VTF inside the VMT.
 
Raeven0 said:
and that you'll need to declare the proper VTF inside the VMT.
Click to expand...
You mean the Base Texture in the VMT needs to be the name of the VTF??? OOOOHHHHH. That helps!

-Kato
 
Well, yeah, that's the point of the VMT ;) Hammer and HL2 see the VMTs, not the VTFs!
 
OOOH thank you so very much :) I redid them, and it worked.

There are screenshots here.

It didn't come out exactly the way I would've like it to, it's a little too...blown up. I'm going to work on it more tomorrow.

-Kato
 
Making a skybox is easy ;) Just kidding, I'm glad you finally got it working. Tweak the texture and It'll look great. Gj
 
Well, after about 20 minutes with the clone tool and manual copying/pasting/rotating in Photoshop, I created a 2048x2048 skybox texture with LOTS of stars. See how it looks here.

I like how it turned out :)

-Kato
 
Is it supposed to be in space? If it is then you should add more stuff like nebulas and colors. If it's on earth you should reduce the size of the "stars" and add a moon.
 
Yeah I plan to do all those things and yes I will eventually have a 3D skybox with maybe some...space...stuff..., and some of the stars will be colored.

Yes, it is in space. A part of space that's supposed to be near no planets. It's a spaceship. (the fugly glass box around it is supposed to be a SPHERE but the spheres hate me)

-Kato
 
There used to be a tut on doing skyboxes with Bryce out there. It was for HL1 but the basics will be the same. Just add the 'making the textures HL2 compliant' bit on the end.

Early versions of Bryce are probably available on the net free and legal. It will make a much better job than you and a paintbrush.
 
Oh, really? I use Bryce nearly daily and have the latest version :)

Where is said tutorial? Or do you know?

-Kato
 
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