Reflection Maps

[desty]

Hello, I need help with a small issue: how does reflection and dynamic lighting work in half life 2?

I have a gun model, and I'd like it to look shiny, like polished metal. In the old days, you used to do a flat skin, which looked like it had reflection on it, but how does it work now, with dynamic lighting? And if this isn't possible, how do specular maps work with the dynamic lighting?

thanks in advance,

desty

 

[The Dark Elf]

A reflection map is basically a grayscale image that tells the engine what should be reflective and what shouldnt be, and by how much. Eg: white is 100% reflective, black is 0% reflective, and the shades inbetween are varying amounts of reflection.

Specular maps are exactly the same method, only instead of telling the engine how much reflection the shades have, it tells it how much specularity it can have.. Which is basically how bright the specular effect is..


I don't know yet how Source or other engines handle specular gloss (low gloss, large dull specular effects, high gloss, small bright specular effect) eg: plastic is low gloss, metal is high gloss.

So you'd use those maps to tell the engine what can and can't be reflective/specular. They don't actually create the effect, since its created depending on the angle you view certain objects. Just where the effect happens. So for a wall made of tiles, you'd have the tile area's with brighter pixels for reflection and specular maps, and the grout between them would be darker shades. Then in the engine you'd see the effects limited correctly rather than uniformly over the surface.

You can also use these maps to fake shadow in creases aswell. While not accurate, the actual end result does look more realistic in current engines/rendering apps.

 

[desty]

OK, gotcha, so half life will handle all of it, which means I just draw out the maps as separate tga's, and once the SDK comes out I will specify which tga represents the reflection map, bump map etc... and the SDK will output the finished product. Am I correct?

thanks,

desty

 

[The Dark Elf]

OK, gotcha, so half life will handle all of it, which means I just draw out the maps as separate tga's, and once the SDK comes out I will specify which tga represents the reflection map, bump map etc... and the SDK will output the finished product. Am I correct?

thanks,

desty

Should be something like that yeah. Some little program that converts all the files to the correct forum. Shouldn't be very complex and they are pretty simple to do, don't often need to be super accurate, not in a games engine anyway.

 

[desty]

Ok, thanks a lot for your speedy replies Dark Elf, I'll get working :thumbs:

desty

 

[The Dark Elf]

No worries, and good luck

 

[mindless_moder]

u can also test out ur reflective and specular maps in max there are material ummm channels for them