Using a Consistant Light Value System

[Burktross]

Am I the only person the lights according to a strict set of conditions as opposed to doing it on the run? If so: what do you guys use for what conditions?

Here are my "rules":
--96: Super dark, used in special circumstances (light flashing light mazes)
--112: Dark rooms / cramped hallways
--144: Rooms and Hallways with heights bellow 128
--128: Large rooms or hallways with heights above 128
--144: Subtle lighting on monitors and such
--160: Fire created light
--192: Outdoors, Artificial Lights
--255: Very special circumstances (highlighting a telepad or key podium)

[Da Werecat]

I don't see much point in limiting myself in such a way. The amount of light in a room can depend on a number of things: the quantity and "quality" of light sources, desired mood, et cetera. Different brightness levels also help to break the monotony.

[wesleyjohnson]

A little standardization on this does not hurt. Otherwise players would have to be adjusting their gamma for each wad.

60: can only see one wall in front of player

90: really dark, can barely see

120: dim indoor, candle light

144: standard bright indoor

192: standard outdoor

200: exposed sunlit


Anything else are highlights and special effects, and those do not force changes to gamma settings, so you can adapt to what looks best.

[Tarnsman]

128 and 144 are dark, they should never be "normal seeable light levels" Also anything below 112 is basically 0 and is only useful for light fadding/frequency for glow effects and blinking (just like negative light values and 256+ light values). 160-192 is still "dim". 208 is as wasted as half the colors in the doom palette are. Also using a constant light level for certain applications is not a very intelligent mapping decision as the Doom colors in the default palette do not fade equally so how you light rooms with reds and how you light rooms with lots of greens, should be drastically different.

[Da Werecat]

Perfection is unachievable. Especially with Doom palette. Sometimes sacrifices must be made.

[wesleyjohnson]

Seeing 128 as dark is what happens when you do not adjust your gamma.
If 144 is dark then you are way off on gamma.

Those that like a dark effect, and leave the gamma at a dark setting on purpose, should realize that making the level lighting be even higher runs counter to what they want.

Most of the Doom lighting level should be usable. Adjusting the monitor gamma is necessary to make the doom lighting levels display evenly.
I have used light down to 40 and can still see walls and monsters (barely). This is with a gamma that makes 192 seem like a spring day outside.
Getting too much higher than 192 for outside makes it difficult to have bright lights and highlights (lack of headroom).
Going much lower than 60 makes it difficult to have good blacks, or really dark low lights. Even if a room is not at 60 some smaller areas might get lower light, and there is the effect of distance to consider.

[Gez]

Gamma makes everything washed out and ugly on my LCD. And 96 is very dark in the software renderer. (It's a different issue in OpenGL where you can get very different lighting models, in some of which even a low value like 64 is still bright enough.)

[Xegethra]

wesleyjohnson said:

Seeing 128 as dark is what happens when you do not adjust your gamma.
If 144 is dark then you are way off on gamma.

Those that like a dark effect, and leave the gamma at a dark setting on purpose, should realize that making the level lighting be even higher runs counter to what they want.

Most of the Doom lighting level should be usable. Adjusting the monitor gamma is necessary to make the doom lighting levels display evenly.
I have used light down to 40 and can still see walls and monsters (barely). This is with a gamma that makes 192 seem like a spring day outside.
Getting too much higher than 192 for outside makes it difficult to have bright lights and highlights (lack of headroom).
Going much lower than 60 makes it difficult to have good blacks, or really dark low lights. Even if a room is not at 60 some smaller areas might get lower light, and there is the effect of distance to consider.

I use the distance thing sometimes. In my current set of levels, in the sewers I split the blocked off paths into sectors each with a decreasing light level so it can get dark quickly so I don't have to make a really long tunnel that you never go down.

And yeah I've noticed that difference in OpenGL and software too....in OpenGL even 0 light can be bright, but I have never adjusted any gamma settings, in game or on monitor....so if I'm making a blocked path that is still too light at the end, I'll just corner it off so you can't see around that corner so you can imagine it trailing off.

For me all the default gamma settings seem fine, mostly I can get the light I want. I guess different monitors are different for everyone...so if you have to adjust, you have to adjust.

I also like to give the illusion of light gradient from light fixtures or bleeding in sunlight and so on. Unless I want the room to be really bright or dark then I don't.

Another example would be how I did the torchlight in one of my levels. I made it look like the wall torch was emitting light not just by making a bright sector around it, but by also putting other gradient sectors around the light until they match the room light levels, then I made them flicker....so it looks like flickering torchlight. Was quite happy when I figured out I could do that. Since then I have adapted that method to other sorts of torches too if needs be.

Mixing up light levels and not being too strict on it really gives rise to a lot of freedoms and alternative methods to achieve the mood you want to give a room/area. Holding back on exploring with too many rules means you'll never really make anything as outstanding as you otherwise might do.

[purist]

Tarnsman said:

128 and 144 are dark, they should never be "normal seeable light levels" Also anything below 112 is basically 0 and is only useful for light fadding/frequency for glow effects and blinking (just like negative light values and 256+ light values). 160-192 is still "dim". 208 is as wasted as half the colors in the doom palette are. Also using a constant light level for certain applications is not a very intelligent mapping decision as the Doom colors in the default palette do not fade equally so how you light rooms with reds and how you light rooms with lots of greens, should be drastically different.

I agree with this if you deduct 32 from all the light values stated

[TimeOfDeath]

Tarnsman said:

Also using a constant light level for certain applications is not a very intelligent mapping decision as the Doom colors in the default palette do not fade equally so how you light rooms with reds and how you light rooms with lots of greens, should be drastically different.

Agreed. Lighting depends on the textures/flats and how I want them to look.

Also, 96 isn't very dark in tight corridors. :)

[Phml]

128-144 is dark for me too, in GL mode. If I raise the gamma level in Doom, the end result is washed out rather than bright. The gamma on my screen is calibrated correctly for the hundreds of other video games and applications I use.

edit: just to clarify, dark != too dark. 112 and below used on entire rooms is definitely too dark as far as I'm concerned though.

[Graf Zahl]

The starting area in Doom's E1M1 is 144, and if that's too dark, something is considerably wrong.

[Burktross]

Graf Zahl said:

The starting area in Doom's E1M1 is 144, and if that's too dark, something is considerably wrong.

Yeah; looked over the E1 levels to get a sense of classic lighting.

[wesleyjohnson]

Back a few years I implemented an improved Gamma for DoomLegacy. Did some extensive research into Gamma to ensure that it was done using the right curves and constants. I tested using a G96 IBM Graphics CRT monitor, which I trust as a high quality standard.

The Doom gamma levels are tables that approximate a standard gamma of 2.2. This is the ideal CRT standard, which is only approximated by most real CRT monitors. Macs use a system gamma of 1.4 instead.
Gamma is a curve, which curves more or less depending on the gamma setting.

An LCD monitor will not display realistically using CRT gamma settings unless it is specifically designed to emulate a CRT.

Because of the variations and LCD monitors, in DoomLegacy I created 32 levels of gamma, including a black level adjustment. There are separate gamma methods to choose from. For LCD monitors I created a gamma adjustment that adjusted light levels using a piece-wise linear curve instead of the gamma curve.

The black level adjustment is important. If the black level is not set first then low light levels are highly affected. The black level on your monitor may be the problem, which a black level adjustment in Doom can correct. Otherwise you would have to find a compromise adjustment on your monitor that works for Doom and everyday use. I had difficulty with that as good Doom settings badly affected the standard 16 IBM colors (especially brown and yellow).

OpenGL was a problem. I turned down one of the constants in the OpenGL gamma adjustments to match it better to the software renderer.
After implementing the new 32 level gamma adjustment, I was able to turn that constant up some again. It is likely a similar problem with other ports and their OpenGL gamma settings.

I think that OpenGL implementation problems with gamma should not be affecting the range of lighting used in level wads. The ports should be fixed to provide a similar lighting to vanilla.

If you test your monitor with some of the free gamma setup programs you will likely find that your OS/monitor combination is adjusted badly. Dark or washed out display is symptoms of a system gamma adjustment problem. Please make sure your system and monitor is adjusted to some standard before assuming that your setup should be a reference affecting community standards. We cannot adapt to all kinds of random monitor gamma setups, as they are incompatible.