Light flickering on/off on certain textures (meshes?)

[Arkngt]

I'm working on a mod which turns lamps into "real" lights and disables the "fake" lights that are placed by them. This mostly works fine and I think it looks rather cool as well, but certain textures (or, I guess, really the mesh?) don't handle light correctly, so when you approach a light, it will turn from black to lit abrubtly, like this:

 

Black stone texture

Same texture lit when moving closer

 

This is rather ugly and immersion breaking. I've noticed the same thing with certain rubble textures under the lights in Fallout Street Lights. Is this something that can be fixed somehow, by some setting in the mesh or by how the texture is saved or something?

[chucksteel]

The issue is caused by to many lights hitting the tile in question. It could be from your new light or even the ambient lights in the cell. I haven't looked into trying to fix the textures or meshes because there are so many. I have always adjusted the cell lighting until I got rid of the issue.

 

If I remember correctly RoyBatterian was looking into a fix for this problem so maybe he will have some insight

 

Is this a mod for FO3 or FNV?

 

I ask because in FO3 there is a vary useful lighting test in the render window property which can be found under "Shader". Unfortunately for some odd reason the lighting test was removed from the FNV GECK.

 

Sorry I couldn't be more helpful but if this is a FO3 mod try the Shader # of lights test. Red is "Bad", "Purple", is on the edge and "Green" is good! (There are more color warnings but I can't remember them off the top of my head. I think there is a blue and yellow, with blue being closer to good!)

[Arkngt]

Thanks. Yes, it's Fallout 3. I'll check out the lighting test. Technically, it shouldn't be caused by too many lights as I disable a bunch of fake lights and swítch to one light source, so there are less light sources than in vanilla. But I suspect it might be caused by the "initially disabled" lights somehow - I've had initially disabled stuff "ghosting" stuff before. On the other hand, I've seen the same issue with Fallout Street Lights - and I don't think it disables any light sources.

 

Thanks for the tip about light tests. I didn't even know about right clicking > render properties... I've been trying to avoid working with the renderer as it drives me insane just to navigate in it, so I'm stumbling around like a drunk.

Edited June 2, 2015 by Arkngt

[mindboggles]

I don't think the lighting test was removed from the FNV GECK, but just plain broken.

[chucksteel]

I don't think the lighting test was removed from the FNV GECK, but just plain broken.

Yes, Yes! You are correct! It is still there just broken! I Just used the wrong wording. :wallbash:

Edited June 2, 2015 by chucksteel

[Arkngt]

As said, you get the issue with Fallout Street Lights as well. For example:

 

the ground is flickering in front of GNR I think this mod is causing it

 

Might be caused by too many light sources perhaps but as it only affects certain textures (meshes), I suspect that the meshes might have different properties for how they deal with lighting perhaps? But it's beyond me really so no idea.

[chucksteel]

the meshes quite possibly do have different properties for dealing with lighting. I'm no expert when it comes to 3D models, I can tweak them, do mash-ups but it's mostly messing with vanilla stuff. The only way I've ever been able to fix this issue was to adjust the lighting.

 

You may want to try to load the cell up in GECK and hit the "L" key, this will show the light radius and you can start to see where lights may be overlapping too much.

 

again sorry I can't be more helpful.

[RoyBatterian]

I've tried to understand what causes this issue, but it depends on where the camera is, how many lights there are and the type of light it is. There seems to be an issue also with alpha channels.

 

The rendering engine just acts strange sometimes for no apparent reason. Perhaps rickerhk or sesom would know what the cause and fix is.

[Arkngt]

I'll experiment around a bit on my end with the light source from the lamps. I've tried with different FOVs but that doesn't help. The more I check out lighting in the game, the more I realize how "fakey" it is. It's a bit like trying to save a not so beautiful face with lots of makeup.

Edited June 4, 2015 by Arkngt

[Arkngt]

Just an up that I found out what was causing the issue - and that it is fixed in the Unofficial Patch. It was this:

 

 

Fixed wood, edge trim, street litter, suburban rubble normalmap causing the texture to change color between normal\dark depending on the lighting and view angle (Altered Texture: wooddetails_n.dds, edgetrim01_n.dds, streetlitter01_n.dds, suburbanrubble01_n.dds).

 

Awesome. Now I'm a believer in the Unofficial Patch (I had issues with a previous version so I was a bit wary about it).

 

EDIT: That was a bit premature. I still have the issue in places.

Edited June 10, 2015 by Arkngt