How Does One Make Brightmaps?

[Outtagum]

I would like some fancy brightmaps a la SBrightmaps (fullbright monster eyes etc) but for Chex Quest and Heretic. However, I have absolutely no idea where to start. Looking around, I gleaned from previous forum posts that it's fairly simple but very laborious. Sounds like my kind of project (I'm a simple person)!

Would someone be kind enough to give me a couple of pointers to get started?

[Nevander]

Basically every pixel becomes representative of that pixel's brightness in-game. You can use colors but ideally black and white. Take the first frame of the Imp facing the player for example, to make his eye's fully bright even in complete darkness, simply edit the sprite so that his eyes are full white and everything else is solid black. The black can be anywhere, it only maps brightness not showing though in-game. Save that as a new lump and then you can use GLDEFS or the brightmaps folder to map them.

Sometimes though full white doesn't look too good. This is where image editing tools can come in handy. I use MS Paint because I am a noob so the process for me is very tedious. With image editing tools you could change it to grey-scale and you are already pretty much set, then tweak the overall brightness of the image to preference.

[phantombeta]

One thing to note is that you can do coloured lighting (at least you could, last time I checked) by using colours instead of black and white. I imagine this is probably easier to make with an editor that shows you the colours' luminosity/brightness, though.

[Rachael]

If you want a quick-easy preview of the brightmap over its corresponding sprite/texture and you're using Photoshop or GIMP, simply set the brightmap to use the multiply filter.

[Nevander]

Does the auto directory still work for brightmaps? I notice the default brightmaps.pk3 does not utilize it and instead maps them all with doomdefs.bm. I tried using it and it didn't map it automatically to the same named lump.

[Kappes Buur]

... but for Chex Quest and Heretic.

Maybe this will provide you with some help.
Further on in the linked DrVenom8 thread he also has brightmaps for HERETIC.

[Blue Shadow]

Does the auto directory still work for brightmaps? I notice the default brightmaps.pk3 does not utilize it and instead maps them all with doomdefs.bm. I tried using it and it didn't map it automatically to the same named lump.

That is a GZDoom 3.0.0+ only feature.

[Nevander]

That is a GZDoom 3.0.0+ only feature.

It's lovely that the wiki does not mention a version requirement.

[Rachael]

That's because it shouldn't need to. It's implicit that the only version of GZDoom that is currently supported is the latest one, and currently that's 3.2.0.

[Nevander]

That wasn't the point of my comment. It's nice to know from what version a feature becomes supported and available. Otherwise you end up with this exact situation of trying to use a feature that is for a newer version and you sit there wondering why it's not working, then it turns out said feature was added in a recent version and the wiki failed to mention it. I thought wikis were meant to hold all information relevant to the subject matter. Omitting an important detail of when a feature was added is a big deal to me. I always track changes and additions with everything I do and it really helps me remember when I did something.

EDIT: There's also no easy to find changelog for GZDoom anyway. I don't want to spend forever looking around github for changes and the one on zdoom.org is tedious to check. A page with a full list format of changes would be very nice. If this already exists please point me in its direction.

[Graf Zahl]

Simple solution: Do not use old versions!

The moment a new version gets released all preceding ones will be considered outdated and unsupported.
The assumption here is that modders will target the latest version, not something from last year! I know it runs counter with your update-phobia but that's solely your problem.

[gwHero]

The assumption here is that modders will target the latest version

True for me. I feel much more comfortable by switching to new versions immediately than postponing it. Also I think it's important for the dev team that most people will switch asap to get potential bugs discovered.

[Arctangent]

I have been annoyed by the lack of version listings on the wiki, but that has less to do with any of the mainline ZDooms themselves and more the fact that the Zandronum wiki doesn't have a copy of the ZDoom wiki with all the future version features shaved off.

[Nevander]

Simple solution: Do not use old versions!

The moment a new version gets released all preceding ones will be considered outdated and unsupported.
The assumption here is that modders will target the latest version, not something from last year! I know it runs counter with your update-phobia but that's solely your problem.

I understand the assumption and I am not arguing with that. I am simply trying to explain how from a technical standpoint the importance of documenting feature additions on the wiki. It's always helpful to know when something changed.

I'd make the change myself but I feel like it would be wikipedia all over again where I spend 40 minutes revamping a page and fixing errors and innacuracies only to find the next day all my changes were reverted.

[Rachael]

I'd make the change myself but I feel like it would be wikipedia all over again where I spend 40 minutes revamping a page and fixing errors and innacuracies only to find the next day all my changes were reverted.

With as little action as the wiki has been getting in the first place, something like that happening is HUGELY unlikely.

If you want to at least mitigate it, you can store all your data in a forum post first so you don't lose it.