SF's Hammer Tutorials - Optimization 3: Areaportals

[@Silwerfish]

@superdvdman That is correct superdvdman! I'm glad to hear you're still enjoying my tutorials! :D

[@ZEZgamer]

@Silwerfish I took a little peak at the trusty compile and boy did it tell a tale lol. I had so many leaks on my map that I didn't know about that it wouldn't be worth destroying the map in order to get it to work so I started over. Sometimes the best idea.

[@ThatOGDon]

NICE TUTORIAL! Saw this on MODDB and now I know both what they do and how to use them. Really helps

[@jkruse05]

To build off of this, would you mind doing a tutorial on using the func_areaportal with the fading in and out brush. I can't remember exactly the names of stuff, but it's a method you use when entering an interior space from outdoors with no door present, like when entering the bunkers on the beaches in HL2 (examining that map is how I found out about it, but I could never get it to work right myself).

[@Silwerfish]

@omnacky Yes, after compiling the level and the compiler has found the leak, press Map > Load Pointfile (or something like that) and it should display a red line in Hammers 3D and 2D views showing you where the leak is.

[@Silwerfish]

@Kazaanh You have to make absolutely sure that you can't go from one side of the areaportal to one of the other sides of the areaportal (even if you have to go through the whole map to get around to the other side). If you can you have to make another areaportal to block the player.

[@Silwerfish]

@andyroflzz Only the doors that the area portals are linked to will need to have different names so that when you open one door, an unrelated area portal doesn't open.

[@Silwerfish]

@soldierrob909 Do you mean fog? If you do then you need to use the env_fog_controller entity, in its properties there is a "Far Z Clip Plane" property that determines at what distance the map will start/stop rendering. Hope that helps!

[@Silwerfish]

@kallesbaksatt Good thing you figured it out! Yeah I'm Swedish. To enable the player to use the flashlight he needs to have the hev suit. Give this to the player by adding an item_suit entity to your level (place it on the player spawn to make the player start with it).

[@Silwerfish]

@neilb96 It sounds like you're in "solids" select mode. Check what button is pressed in the top right. If "object" or "group" is selected you should be able to select your entities, in "solids" mode you only select the brushes, not the entities. Hope that solves your problem.

[@ZEZgamer]

ok, so I have a area portal that is doing its job, it doesn't render things behind it but it is acting like a no draw because at whatever angle I'm looking at, whatever is behind the area portal isn't there. It is in an empty area, no doors just an opening, so would it be better to use hint instead? This seams to happen when there are two entrances that are completely closed off with a portal. Great tutorial btw, really helps me out.

[@Silwerfish]

@omnacky Yeah, I read that you use the technique I talked about above even for those kinds of leaks as well. So try it out and see if it works.

[@omnacky]

@Silwerfish It's not an actual leak in the skybox/map, but in this room there must be a wall/small area I can't manually find that must be a func_brush or detail I made by accident. I get the area portal leak error in the map compiler when I try to run the map after closing all the enterances to the room off with area portals. (the enterances I know about). I'm not great at explaining things :P

[@Silwerfish]

@ZEZgamer You should use area portals mostly to ensure that several expensive areas are not rendered at once, thus bringing down performance. If the room it leads to is empty, just use hint instead, yeah.

[@Silwerfish]

@Termikxs I'll add that to the request list, thanks!

[@Silwerfish]

@AguyinaRPG I'd say it'd be a very good idea to use an areaportal in that case. Because that would mean you would not have to render an entire street before you really need to. Bad places to use areaportals are when they don't block enough from being rendered. Each open areaportal takes power from the engine, so you need to stop enough from being rendered to at least cover up the cost of the areaportal to have any benefit. I use VirtualDub for the video and Audacity for the audio.

[@Silwerfish]

@IcoVir I'll add that to the request list, thanks!

[@AguyinaRPG]

Thanks a bunch for this. I'm curious though, would there be a particular situation where it would be a rather bad idea to use this? Say I'm in a building and I must break a wall in order to get to the outside which in turn is an entire town. Would that be a good idea to already have rendered or would one use this entity? By the by, what do you use to record? Thanks again!

[@Silwerfish]

@Pmmnm I'll add that to the request list, thank you! :)

[@Silwerfish]

@jkruse05 Yeah that's next in the optimization series, so that'll be coming up. :)

[@IcoVir]

can you do facial animation and also cinematic shots like a shoot out or something like that?

[@Silwerfish]

@soldierrob909 Make sure you've changed the property "fogenable" to true in your env_fog_controller.

[@poyweson]

i love your tutorials. so dam proffesional x) you explain so much... dude. ur the only person that does good tutorials!!!

[@Silwerfish]

@Zajac190 You can vote for me to make a tutorial on that in the moderator module on my channel page. If it gets enough votes I will make a tutorial on it. My optimization series is not complete yet.

[@kallesbaksatt]

@Silwerfish Yeah ive doen and its only restoring the "front" windows size.

[@Silwerfish]

@Spaggleton Have you tied the area portal brush to the area portal entity as shown in the tutorial? Do you have all sides of the brush covered with the area portal texture?

[@DIABLO258]

when i tie a brush to a door then click apply and exit out, it doesnt save to that entity, it always stays a brush

[@Silwerfish]

@N0biKn0bi That sounds weird... That texture is used on any surface that it doesn't find the texture image for. Are you sure it's the area portals that are causing this?

[@Silwerfish]

@badxmax I unfortunately have stopped making tutorials for the Source engine. :(

[@Silwerfish]

@slavotyk Hm, I haven't mapped for HL:DMS, but if it's the same as it's in most other Source games, just try using the entity tool to create a prop_physics if you want to create a physical model. If you want it to be made of brushes, create your brush(es), select them and press ctrl + t, set the entity type to func_physbox (I think).

[@Kazaanh]

Really nice tutorial. But i still have "Brush xxx: areaportal brush doesn't touch two areas " twice. I don't know why it is appearing, everything is done correctly. (its in my hotel map, one of the floors )

[@Silwerfish]

I'm pretty sure that won't work as an area portal needs the precalculated information it gets when you compile the level in order to work at all.

[@Silwerfish]

@slavotyk create a brush, select it, press ctrl + t, make it a trigger_teleport, when the player touches this he will teleport to your target. Select the entity tool and make a info_target (or an info_teleport_destination) entity where you want the player to end up, give this entity a name. In your trigger_teleport, set "start disabled" to "false", and set "target" to the name of your info_target. That should work I think, let me know if you run into any problems.

[@N0biKn0bi]

@Silwerfish Hm, the problem fixed itself after some working and recompiling.. strange thing, but I have running problems with the SDK hmpf >.< ^^

[@matecs847]

so if i decide do not use the vvis or .prt on my map, will be fine ?

[@andyrofl]

Is it necessary to rename the duplicated areaportal for the new door? One door open will still render the room right?

[@InvaGir]

What if i have many rooms with windows...but the windows are unbreakable do i need to place areaportal on the windows too?

[@Silwerfish]

If you can see through the windows they won't be blocking visibility, and in that case yes, you have to make sure the windows are covered as well or the area portal won't be touching two areas. If you are going to tie the area portal to the open- and closed-ness of the door, then you cannot have windows leading into the same room. This is because you'll then either be unable to see through the windows when the door is closed, or you'll always be able to see into the room regardless of if the door is open or not, making the area portal pointless.

[@Silwerfish]

@soldierrob909 You should be able to look in your compile log to see at what stage something goes wrong, maybe you can find out more information from there to help you solve the problem. If you want help checking the log, there are many forums out there where you can post the log and have others look at it to try find your problem. I can suggest interlopers,net.

[@omnacky]

I'm getting the leak error but I can't find the leak. Is there an easy way to find it?

[@Silwerfish]

@Someone7089 It sounds like the area portal is starting closed. Have you made sure to have it start open?

[@Silwerfish]

@soldierrob909 I don't know how to fix that, sorry. You'll just have to find out what makes your map so big and fix it I guess.

[@Silwerfish]

@slavotyk Yeah, set up an npc_maker entity in any way you want it. Should be quite easy to understand how it works I think.

[@Pmmnm]

Explain Valve's optimizing on their outdoor levels please? :)

[@soldierrob909]

@Silwerfish do you know an antitie that is used in rp_evocity that you have to walk forwards to see more of the map something like that.

[@soldierrob909]

maybe you know how to fix cclientoverflow 7 thats coming in my screen if i play my map because its so big 32mb

[@besprutad]

If the walls are func_detail, will it still work?

[@Silwerfish]

func_detail entities are not considered at all for visibility, so they will not work as they aren't taken into account when the level is split up.

[@Silwerfish]

@HUMANCONDlTION Check the compile log to make sure that everything is as it should. Also double and triple check that is ok. A lot of things can go wrong so it's really hard to give a straight answer to this.

[@Zajac190]

What about func_areaportal_window ? I tried to use them but i can't see anything throught them O.o

[@minilandstan]

Thanks! This was very helpful!

[@superdvdman]

Hey Silwerfish, I come back to your videos every time i forgot how something works in SDK [ i'm still making maps even today :D ] - So, my computer isn't a High-END PC, so if i make my maps a little TOO big or if it has too much stuff like Trees, Objects, Npc's, it will get an FPS drop once i start playing. So, if i use this, i can place doors around, and once the player goes through them, it will not render every thing behind him? Saving alot of FPS? This would be Intense for me. Thanks Silwer

[@kallesbaksatt]

Plz HELP me!! You can see a "Camera window" - "front" - "side" and "top"-window. But i can only see 1 window and that is "front" window. i got one big window. Plz help me fix it to 4 windows!

[@Silwerfish]

@slavotyk That would be awesome! :D

[@superdvdman]

@Silwerfish WOOT! Lighting Quick response, " as always " Thanks a lot man! I'm making a Scary/Action Game play. I have a zombie story, and i'm going to try to do it on Source SDK. This will help Intensely - SuperDvdman

[@N0biKn0bi]

My 3D Skybox hast purple black Texture errors when using Areaportals.. Do you have a fix for that Problem? ^^ PS: I LOVE your tutorials!!! :):):)

[@Silwerfish]

@superdvdman Good luck with your map!

[@soldierrob909]

lol i deleted the bsp in source sdk content because nothing changed while i compiled but now if i wanne compile it says cant find the file or something and that sucks

[@Silwerfish]

@kallesbaksatt Hm, but then the other three views should become visible? Ctrl + A should restore all four views to their original size.

[@soldierrob909]

@Silwerfish i think so but when i compile my map won't change lol :0

[@Silwerfish]

@Someone7089 Do that and let me know what you find.

[@kallesbaksatt]

@Silwerfish The problem was fixed in /Tools - Options - General - Window setup - Use indeblablabla but thanks anyway. Ey e du svensk? I cant use my flashlight! i mean the "F" flashlight your character have in-game! you know how to fix it? :)

[@Silwerfish]

@Dradly Yep it works with NPCs as far as I know.

[@Dradly]

@Silwerfish Thanks

[@1AoM0]

thanks

[@Silwerfish]

@idonthatethissite True, I strongly advice against doing that. :P

[@Silwerfish]

@slavotyk sweet. :)

[@Silwerfish]

@poyweson Thanks! :)

[@Silwerfish]

@jxSTARRRR @minilandstan thanks!

[@Silwerfish]

@kallesbaksatt Press ctrl + A.

[@Silwerfish]

@valvegamer4life I might actually do that soon.

[@idonthatethissite]

What if you use it somewhere you CAN see? :P things will be invisible!

[@Silwerfish]

@TF2Pyrosux I'm undeadhawk on Steam.

[@Silwerfish]

Maybe, you never know what'll happen! ;)

[@soldierrob909]

i have pm valve :P