tpw_houselights - automatic house lighting for Arma2 and Arma3

[ron533 0]

It seems to be a bug in the A3 lighting at this stage. Start an editor mission at 2030 and it will be pitch black, even the streetlights are barely visible. Start a mission at 0100 and everything looks great and well lit.

---------- Post added at 06:38 ---------- Previous post was at 06:37 ----------

I did try this in the editor always at the same time... (21:15) and it worked only once...

changed to 22:15 ans WHAM... :) look great now!

Thank you.

P.S. I'm now trying it on A2 OA, In Zargabad in the mosque the lighting looks very strange, heavy flickering, lights go on/off, look buggy... known issue? or my issue... ? Thanks!

[tpw 2315]

@ron533 it's a known issue related to light flickering. If there are too many flickering lights in a given area, some of the flickering lights just switch on and off rather than flickering through a brightness range. If it bugs you too much, I suggest turning off the flickering in the config or lowering the distance for flickering to something small like 10m. I might see if I can write a function in to only allow 1 or 2 flicker lights near the player. Thanks for your input mate.

[ron533 0]

@ron533 it's a known issue related to light flickering. If there are too many flickering lights in a given area, some of the flickering lights just switch on and off rather than flickering through a brightness range. If it bugs you too much, I suggest turning off the flickering in the config or lowering the distance for flickering to something small like 10m. I might see if I can write a function in to only allow 1 or 2 flicker lights near the player. Thanks for your input mate.

I've tried it as you suggested with 0 flickers, but I saw no change.

You can notice it easily in the western entrance of the mosque.

Thanks again!

[tpw 2315]

I've tried it as you suggested with 0 flickers, but I saw no change.

You can notice it easily in the western entrance of the mosque.

Thanks again!

It would help me if you could tell me what version you are using. Light flickering on/off can also be due to the inability of the engine to render too many light sources at once. So if there are 40 houselights the engine will be making decisions which ones to display, leading to flickering. I'm afraid there's not much I can do about that.

[ron533 0]

It would help me if you could tell me what version you are using. Light flickering on/off can also be due to the inability of the engine to render too many light sources at once. So if there are 40 houselights the engine will be making decisions which ones to display, leading to flickering. I'm afraid there's not much I can do about that.

I'm using your latest version - MP and Single player addons together (1.09) , with A2 beta (102678).

when it loads it does say it has over 800 houses calculated...

[pellejones 1]

Good stuff mate. If you PM me with the code I will see about implementing it (if you'd like to share).

The A3 lighting engine is a little strange at this point, and I hope it changes. Late at night the lights seem quite bright. Earlier in the evening everything can seem very dark. I tried experimenting with a Stratis variable which doubles the brightness of lights for this map, but then they seem too bright at certain times of night...

done!

[chrisb 196]

Add to the realism these, were great in A2 and be just as great in A3. Thanks for bringing them over..:)

[jake_krieger 10]

The thing is , Stratis is deserted and the power generators are probaly not functioning , so this is kinda unrealistic. Or is it not ?

[tpw 2315]

The thing is , Stratis is deserted and the power generators are probaly not functioning , so this is kinda unrealistic. Or is it not ?

Stratis is as deserted as you want it to be. Ambient civilians are a feature on this map just like any other in A2 or OA. The Stratis power generators are certainly running well enough to power the street lights...

[foffy 58]

I have a question if you don't mind. Do these lights come on WHEN you enter buildings, or come on for enterable buildings? :P

[tpw 2315]

I have a question if you don't mind. Do these lights come on WHEN you enter buildings, or come on for enterable buildings? :P

They are meant to come on for enterable buildings within a set radius of the player.

That said, Arma3's lighting is a bit of a moving target at the moment. When I first ported this over to A3 it worked pretty well, on a par with A2. Changes to the lighting with the various dev builds have rendered it pretty much useless for the time being, lights don't come on until you are within a few m of them, and even then they are rather faint. At some times in the evening and early predawn, they are essentially invisible.

I am holding on further development of this addon until the night/lighting stabilises to something that is actually decent, as I (and quite a few others) consider it essentially broken at present.

[chrisb 196]

A great mod/addon for arma 2, will be for arma 3, plenty of time yet..:)

[tpw 2315]

A great mod/addon for arma 2, will be for arma 3, plenty of time yet..:)

Thanks mate, I appreciate it. I have every confidence that the lighting will be sorted out, and once it is I will definitely get houselights working for it.

[bigpickle 0]

I got an error today concerning the compile process file change, I'm gathering you've seen it tpw

[tpw 2315]

I got an error today concerning the compile process file change, I'm gathering you've seen it tpw

Thanks for the heads up Bigpickle. I haven't actually used houselights for the last couple of dev builds since the lighting is so subpar. But I'm not surprised that the some of the scripting engine changes are affecting it. I will have a look into it.

[bigpickle 0]

Rgr that buddy, love this mod for sure its one of the most immersive out there for the often neglected night time environment.

[tpw 2315]

So I had a bit of a play with the SP version in the latest dev build.

It seems to be working but I had to crank the lighting values WAY up in the config

I changed

TPW_CANDLE[] = {255,127,24,160,120,80,10}; //Warm yellow/orange flame

TPW_INCAN[] = {255,200,100,160,120,20,5}; //Yellow white incandescent or lantern

TPW_TV[] = {100,200,255,160,120,100,30}; //Blue/white television

to

TPW_CANDLE[] = {255,127,24,1160,120,80,10}; //Warm yellow/orange flame

TPW_INCAN[] = {255,200,100,1160,120,20,5}; //Yellow white incandescent or lantern

TPW_TV[] = {100,200,255,1160,120,100,30}; //Blue/white television

and it actually looks pretty good. Seems the brightness values aren't 8 bit any more.

[chrisb 196]

TPW, so its worth changing this, or waiting ?

If its just going to be a config change then thats pretty straight forward, would there be anything in the pbo you have to change ?

Sorry for the questions but just wondered.:)

[tpw 2315]

TPW, so its worth changing this, or waiting ?

If its just going to be a config change then thats pretty straight forward, would there be anything in the pbo you have to change ?

Sorry for the questions but just wondered.:)

Hi ChrisB, I just changed the config, didn't touch the pbo. This is the single player version I'm talking about here.

I'll probably have to redo the actual scripts to sense whether A2 or A3 has called them, and alter the lighting to suit how A3 handles it. In the mean time the config change works ok.

[bigpickle 0]

sry nvm

Edited May 12, 2013 by Bigpickle

[tpw 2315]

Sorry to necro my own thread, just to let you know that I am dusting off this mod for Altis. Looks like it won't be straightforward for several reasons:

1 - Dynamically scanning all houses at startup freezes the game for 30+ seconds (nearobjects is a bit weird in A3). Will probably have to generate a fixed house array

2 - Most towns already have the really nice dynamic lighting from streetlights, so the houselights look a bit iffy by comparison

3 - The fact that houses don't block interior lights is really starting to grate. If I make the lights bright enough to actually look any good, they leak out of the houses and cause overlaps and flickering.

4 - Many houses in Altis are wrecks, so assigning lights into them looks shit. I will need to screen on house type.

Anyway, I will have a look into this and see what I can come up with.

[tortuosit 486]

1 - Dynamically scanning all houses at startup freezes the game for 30+ seconds (nearobjects is a bit weird in A3). Will probably have to generate a fixed house array

Thanks for looking into this. I had to hunt the problem down yesterday (I killed my A3 process always because too impatient) and finally disabled your Addon.

[fortun 14]

Would be awesome for Altis!

[tpw 2315]

Would be awesome for Altis!

Houselights is part of this: http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?164304-TPW-MODS-enhanced-realism-immersion-for-Arma-3-SP