Lighting problem - help!

Random Chaos

L1: Registered
Dec 31, 2014
25
1
So I was working on my map today, compiling periodically to test, when suddenly all my lights in-game vanished, my lights, my light_spotlights, and even my light_env (they are still in hammer!). Skybox and props are being lit; not a single regular brush is being lit. No light-related compile errors (just the standard ones that I have been having for weeks).

Here's a screenshot: http://www.vorklift.com/tf2/wip/2015-01-31_00001.jpg

Only things I added since the previous compile when lights were working were some new brushes and modified brushes, another couple dozen lights and their prop models, and worked an area where I was having visleaf issues (including adding a hint brush...I did try turning this off in case it was the cause).

Here's the compile log:
Code:
materialPath: C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Team Fortress 2\tf\materials
Loading C:\Users\____\Desktop\Mapping\pl_moondust_a41h.vmf
ConVarRef mat_reduceparticles doesn't point to an existing ConVar
Patching WVT material: maps/pl_moondust_a41h/moon/blend_moon_dust_moon_craters_wvt_patch
Patching WVT material: maps/pl_moondust_a41h/moon/blend_moon_dust_moon_craters2_wvt_patch
Patching WVT material: maps/pl_moondust_a41h/moon/blendspaceground_spaceedges001_wvt_patch
Patching WVT material: maps/pl_moondust_a41h/moon/blend_moon_dust_moon_craters3_wvt_patch
fixing up env_cubemap materials on brush sides...
0...1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8...9...100...1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8...9...10Processing areas...done (0)
Building Faces...done (0)
Chop Details...done (0)
Find Visible Detail Sides...
Merged 930 detail faces...done (0)
Merging details...done (0)
FixTjuncs...
PruneNodes...
WriteBSP...
Warning: area portal has 512 verts. Could be a vbsp bug.
Warning: area portal has 512 verts. Could be a vbsp bug.
Warning: area portal has 512 verts. Could be a vbsp bug.
Warning: area portal has 512 verts. Could be a vbsp bug.
Warning: area portal has 512 verts. Could be a vbsp bug.
Warning: area portal has 512 verts. Could be a vbsp bug.
done (1)
writing C:\Users\____\Desktop\Mapping\pl_moondust_a41h.prt...Building visibility clusters...
done (1)
*** Error: Skybox vtf files for skybox/sky_tf2_04 weren't compiled with the same size texture and/or same flags!
Can't load skybox file skybox/sky_tf2_04 to build the default cubemap!
*** Error: Skybox vtf files for skybox/sky_tf2_04 weren't compiled with the same size texture and/or same flags!
Can't load skybox file skybox/sky_tf2_04 to build the default cubemap!
Finding displacement neighbors...
Found a displacement edge abutting multiple other edges.
Finding lightmap sample positions...
Displacement Alpha : 0...1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8...9...10
Building Physics collision data...
done (2) (1463525 bytes)
Placing detail props : 0...1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8...9...10
Compacting texture/material tables...
Reduced 9544 texinfos to 4146
Reduced 352 texdatas to 269 (17634 bytes to 13302)
Writing C:\Users\____\Desktop\Mapping\pl_moondust_a41h.bsp
32 seconds elapsed



4 threads
reading c:\users\____\desktop\mapping\pl_moondust_a41h.bsp
reading c:\users\____\desktop\mapping\pl_moondust_a41h.prt
3666 portalclusters
10680 numportals
0...1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8...9...10Optimized: 780417 visible clusters (8.79%)
Total clusters visible: 8878675
Average clusters visible: 2421
Building PAS...
Average clusters audible: 3329
visdatasize:2922423  compressed from 3402048
writing c:\users\____\desktop\mapping\pl_moondust_a41h.bsp
5 seconds elapsed



[Reading texlights from 'lights.rad']
[37 texlights parsed from 'lights.rad']

Loading c:\users\____\desktop\mapping\pl_moondust_a41h.bsp
17867 faces
14 degenerate faces
12570942 square feet [1810215680.00 square inches]
500 Displacements
1008238 Square Feet [145186304.00 Square Inches]
17853 patches before subdivision
zero area child patch
zero area child patch
zero area child patch
330903 patches after subdivision
1069 direct lights
0...1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8...9...100...1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8...9...10transfers 32916185, max 1883
transfer lists: 251.1 megs
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Build Patch/Sample Hash Table(s).....Done<0.1071 sec>
0...1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8...9...10FinalLightFace Done
205 of 562 (36% of) surface lights went in leaf ambient cubes.
0...1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8...9...10Writing leaf ambient...done
Ready to Finish

Object names       Objects/Maxobjs  Memory / Maxmem  Fullness 
------------       ---------------  ---------------  -------- 
models                  81/1024         3888/49152    ( 7.9%) 
brushes               4106/8192        49272/98304    (50.1%) 
brushsides           32064/65536      256512/524288   (48.9%) 
planes               20172/65536      403440/1310720  (30.8%) 
vertexes             28814/65536      345768/786432   (44.0%) 
nodes                 8572/65536      274304/2097152  (13.1%) 
texinfos              4146/12288      298512/884736   (33.7%) 
texdata                269/2048         8608/65536    (13.1%) 
dispinfos              500/0           88000/0        ( 0.0%) 
disp_verts           33220/0          664400/0        ( 0.0%) 
disp_tris            51520/0          103040/0        ( 0.0%) 
disp_lmsamples     2134284/0         2134284/0        ( 0.0%) 
faces                17867/65536     1000552/3670016  (27.3%) 
hdr faces                0/65536           0/3670016  ( 0.0%) 
origfaces            10940/65536      612640/3670016  (16.7%) 
leaves                8654/65536      276928/2097152  (13.2%) 
leaffaces            20889/65536       41778/131072   (31.9%) 
leafbrushes          10327/65536       20654/131072   (15.8%) 
areas                   30/256           240/2048     (11.7%) 
surfedges           130002/512000     520008/2048000  (25.4%) 
edges                79183/256000     316732/1024000  (30.9%) 
LDR worldlights       1069/8192        94072/720896   (13.0%) 
HDR worldlights          0/8192            0/720896   ( 0.0%) 
leafwaterdata            3/32768          36/393216   ( 0.0%) 
waterstrips           1819/32768       18190/327680   ( 5.6%) 
waterverts               0/65536           0/786432   ( 0.0%) 
waterindices         32217/65536       64434/131072   (49.2%) 
cubemapsamples          58/1024          928/16384    ( 5.7%) 
overlays                19/512          6688/180224   ( 3.7%) 
LDR lightdata         [variable]    12821220/0        ( 0.0%) 
HDR lightdata         [variable]           0/0        ( 0.0%) 
visdata               [variable]     2922423/16777216 (17.4%) 
entdata               [variable]      345356/393216   (87.8%) VERY FULL!
LDR ambient table     8654/65536       34616/262144   (13.2%) 
HDR ambient table     8654/65536       34616/262144   (13.2%) 
LDR leaf ambient     29034/65536      812952/1835008  (44.3%) 
HDR leaf ambient      8654/65536      242312/1835008  (13.2%) 
occluders                0/0               0/0        ( 0.0%) 
occluder polygons        0/0               0/0        ( 0.0%) 
occluder vert ind        0/0               0/0        ( 0.0%) 
detail props          [variable]           1/12       ( 8.3%) 
static props          [variable]           1/168410   ( 0.0%) 
pakfile               [variable]       89870/0        ( 0.0%) 
physics               [variable]     1463525/4194304  (34.9%) 
physics terrain       [variable]      150738/1048576  (14.4%) 

Level flags = 0

Total triangle count: 50209
Writing c:\users\____\desktop\mapping\pl_moondust_a41h.bsp
9 minutes, 22 seconds elapsed

Note - I know it's not the Area Portal errors. I haven't been able to figure out where these are coming from..looks like a vbsp error...; also, all the triangle errors are from Valve models...maybe Valve will fix them!

This was all done with fast vvis, which is what I usually test with, since I don't want to wait 3 hours to test.

Any ideas on what the problem might be?
 

Random Chaos

L1: Registered
Dec 31, 2014
25
1
Solved the issue!

:thumbup:

It was the zero area child patch errors. Once I isolated the general location where they were occurring with cordon, I tried to figure out which brush was causing it with no success. The source of it was three brushes (or three faces on one brush...) on the starting cave ship for blue. Cordon sucks at finding this kind of error, because if I lost a light source that was infinitely bouncing, then the error would disappear even if the brush was still visible...

I ended up deleting the entire ship and reinserting it (luckily I had made the ship in a separate BSP, so I just had to copy it back in).

The weird thing is I made ZERO changes to the ship between when it was working and when it was broken. The only thing I did was I tried a vertex move to see if I could adjust the position of a platform, but I couldn't move the right vertex the way I wanted to, so I did an undo. My only guess is that undoing that vertex manipulation screwed up the faces on that brush.

All the lights are working now, all's good!

(well, almost all. Still need to track down a different buggy brush in that ship that is making strange render glitches due to the angle it is at. However, I know from experience turning that to func_detail will fix it's bugginess.)
 
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