3d Skybox problems

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Viewtiful

L1: Registered
Dec 2, 2014
4
0
Alright. So after searching the entire internet, following guides, and trying to put things together i've failed at putting together a 3d skybox. Whenever i'd try to implement it it would either print the map itself onto the skybox, cause leaks and make props disappear, make the skybox appear but above the map itself, and generally not show up anywhere in the map the entire time, and after the last one it caused so many errors that it took the map with it. Thank god hammer autosaves.

So after being basically clueless and frustrated after working on it for the last 12 hours all I wanted were some trees around This

So I just wanted to ask what the dealio was.
 
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Freyja

aa
Jul 31, 2009
2,994
5,813
Here's how I make my 3d skyboxes, this method might help for you. Make sure you don't have any leaks before this.

Choose where your map proper will end and make sure there's a cut in brushes/displacements there. Then build the brushwork/displacement work of your skybox outside of that, in full size. Make sure textures are aligned here, etc.

Once you're happy with your 3d skybox at full size, create a sky_camera at 0,0,0.

Then, select all of what you want to be your 3d skybox, and the sky_camera at your origin point. Make sure :texlock: and :texlockscale: are turned ON and drag everything you have selected off to the side of your map somewhere.

Now, with everything still selected, hit control-m and type 0.0625 into each of the x,y and z boxes under scale. This will make your skybox the proper size, while retaining the texture scale and alignment you had when building it at full size. It will keep the sky_camera properly placed too.

Create a sealing skybox brush around all of of this, place any skybox props you want, and when you go in game your skybox will be perfectly indistinguishable from your actual map (provided you have fog set up correctly).
 
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grazr

Old Man Mutant Ninja Turtle
aa
Mar 4, 2008
5,441
3,814
The trouble is there are half a dozen reasons why your 3dskybox would break/do those things. If the map renders twice and/or the skybox is displaced from the origin, this is because of a leak. People tend to overlook stuff when re-scaling work for the skybox. IE displacements shouldn't be scaled down because the vertices being too close will break the map, or even just brushwork being excessively small.

Basically, it sounds like you just have a leak; and it wont necasserily just be a hole in the map. You should try to find what is casuing it.
 

Freyja

aa
Jul 31, 2009
2,994
5,813
Displacements being scaled down in the skybox don't matter. High displacement vertex density only causes problems when it interacts with physics objects.

Provided you have no leaks, my method should work. things to watch out for are leaving a second copy of the skybox camera in your main map (this will causethe projecting of the map you described).