Avoiding the Black-Hole of Darkness
Wrong-but-more-right-than-black-holes-way:
Spam torches, candles, and lamps everywhere until the game (and level editor) lags from so many fire and smoke particle systems. Seriously, if you wanted to make a larger level, say, like a 10-floor library, you would crash your computer.
The way I think is right but may not necessarily be right:
Boxlights. Even on your indoor environments, they can be a huuuuuuge help. Seriously, make it something like 0.019, 0.019, 0.016 (RGB - what I used to fix your first map's lighting) 0.196, 0.049, 0.000 (RGB - Deep Red, probably a sunset environment) or 0.017, 0.060, 0.092 (RGB - Blue, probably moon-lit environment) or 0.290, 0.149, 0.035 (RGB - Purple-y, dawn or dusk simulator) or even 0.150, 0.035, 0.074 (RGB - very purple, something to add contrast to a yellow theme). Did you put a boxlight in? Great! Let's start deleting all - I mean most of those torches you threw in.
Windows and Their Spotlights
I know you know how to change light colour. I saw it on several of your maps so there is absolutely no excuse to be using a pure white light
anywhere - ever. Of course, there are going to be exceptions to every rule, so when I say "don't use white lights ever", I mean "don't use white lights unless you have a really good reason for it". For example, communicating the sterility of an environment (just type "chemistry laboratory" into google - lots of black, lots of white, lots of light) or to indicate a dream-like state, in which case I would recommend using white fog, and a white boxlight as well.
Aside from just the pure
whiteness of these lights, they were also really, really unnatural looking. First, I would recommend decreasing the FOV (Field of View) on the spotlights and increasing the Aspect for wide, rectangular windows. If you have a gobo that's super large and covers the entire room in white light, it's going to look like the sun is sitting right outside the window. Instead, try using a colour similar to what you would imagine the exterior environment's light to look like. On your Beginning of Horror map, I used 0.19, 0.19, 0.16 - the exact same values you used for your exterior boxlight.
After you have the spotlight adjusted so it looks a bit more natural, add a pointlight with a radius between 1.5~3 in front of it in a colour about 80%-100% of the spotlight's colour. Place a second one slightly in front of this one; it should have a radius between 2~6, depending on the size of your previous pointlight, the size of your room, and the size of your spotlight, and set the colour between 50%-80% of the original spotlight's colour (based on what looks good and what your previous values were). Finally, place a third pointlight of radius 6~11 and set it between 15%-30% of the original spotlight's colour.
Example:
Spotlight - 1.000, 0.897, 0.618
Pointlight 1 - 0.792, 0.728, 0.564
Pointlight 2- 0.396, 0.364, 0.282
Pointlight 3 - 0.198, 0.182, 0.141
Boxlight - 0.099, 0.091, 0.072
These colours work best for grey-yellow lighting
Choosing a Colour Palette for Your Map
I brought this up in my storm of criticism about your "Intro" map. You can't just use white light for everything. Ever. Please don't use white light. It makes grown men weep (imagine what it does to this poor girl writing all of this for you). I've broken this down into steps for you because I'm a nice person and I don't want to overwhelm you with information.
1.
Decide what time of day it is and what the weather is like
Sounds easy because it is. Is it the middle of the day, sunrise, sunset, dusk, midnight? Are there a lot of clouds in the sky, is it raining or sunny or is there a meteor shower? If your map has windows, the external environment is going to be the greatest influence on your map's lighting.
2.
Create an appropriate boxlight based on your decision for step 1
This means that your boxlight can't be white or grey or non-existent. Seriously, don't do it.
Dawn/Sunset
- Purple-grey if the sky is completely covered in clouds
- Blue-grey if the sun is visible (I'll explain later)
Middle of the Day
- White is OKAY for noon on a cloudless day
- Pale yellow or grey-yellow works for clear skies as well
- Blue-grey for cloudy skies
Night Time
Indoor Environment with Nothing but Torches
- Green-yellow for overgrown environments
- Red-brown for bloody enviornments
- Brown-yellow for dusty
- If none of those work, match the colour of your walls and make it darker
3.
Choose an appropriate colour for your spotlights
What colour does your light source appear to be? Base your spotlight colour off of that
Sunrise/set
- Golden-yellow, almost white
Mid-day
- Cloudy, use grey-blue or grey-yellow
- Purely sunny, pale yellow or white (second time I've approved white), gets more yellow the closer to sunrise/set the time is
Night Time
4.
Expand your colour palette
Start making colours from your boxlight that are closer to the colour of your spotlight and start making colours from your spotlight that are closer to the colour of your boxlight until you meet in the middle of the two colours. Divide the middle ground into 5-6 sections. These will be the colours of your pointlights. The closer to boxlight colour, the larger the light's radius and the further away from the light source it is.
5.
Choose where your light is coming from
Based on the time of day you chose, make an educated decision as to how the light would be shining through your window and
which side of the map the light shines directly on.
Windows facing each other should not have the same lighting.
This is an example of what I mean - it would look weird if billboards were shining straight down from the ceiling and straight through the window on the left-hand wall as well, right? That's why you choose one direction and stick with it.
Colour Palettes That I've Used
I figured I could add some of my own examples to make this a bit easier for you. The far left is always the boxlight and the far right is always the spotlight. Depending on what I need, I cut out some of the middle colours.
Grey-yellow Suitable for overgrown areas and cloudy mid-day lighting. This was used in the third and fourth image of the above post
R 0.099 -> 0.198 -> 0.396 -> 0.792 -> 1.000
G 0.091 -> 0.182 -> 0.364 -> 0.728 -> 0.897
B 0.072 -> 0.141 -> 0.282 -> 0.564 -> 0.618
Blue Suitable for night time, don't use all the middle colours - only some
R 0.017 -> 0.053 -> 0.061 -> 0.105 -> 0.034 -> 0.122 -> 0.282 -> 0.282 -> 0.551
G 0.060 -> 0.058 -> 0.082 -> 0.116 -> 0.119 -> 0.165 -> 0.690 -> 0.741 -> 0.741
B 0.092 -> 0.071 -> 0.106 -> 0.141 -> 0.184 -> 0.211 -> 1.000 -> 1.000 -> 1.000
Vibrant Orange-y Yellow Good for sunsets if you light intense and dramatic lighting. The boxlight is blue because it looks cool and I'll explain more under a different heading. This is what I used in the second image from my above post
R 0.105 -> 0.196 -> 0.392 -> 0.920 -> 1.000 -> 1.000
G 0.116 -> 0.049 -> 0.133 -> 0.472 -> 0.558 -> 0.660
B 0.141 -> 0.000 -> 0.051 -> 0.121 -> 0.138 -> 0.293
Very Purple-y Background with Cream Lighting Suitable for Cloudy Dawn/Dusk lighting
This is the lighting I used in that first image in my last post. The very first value was used for the billboards, second was boxlight and the last three were spotlights. The rest of the values were distributed in pointlights varying from a radius of 1.5 to 7 around the room.
R 0.099-> 0.150-> 0.198-> 0.197-> 0.300-> 0.396-> 0.500-> 0.500-> 0.750-> 0.750-> 0.847-> 1.000
G 0.078-> 0.035-> 0.148-> 0.156-> 0.121-> 0.364-> 0.311-> 0.379-> 0.569-> 0.659-> 0.694-> 0.845
B 0.064-> 0.074-> 0.141-> 0.127-> 0.189-> 0.282-> 0.369-> 0.299-> 0.449-> 0.518-> 0.564-> 0.618
A Little Lesson on Colour Theory
Follow this link:
http://www.apartment-ideas.com/resources...rwheel.png
Of course, the colour wheel could be split up many more times, but that's not necessary to get the point across. Most of the time, split complimentary, complimentary, or just analogous, is the best way to go for lighting in Amnesia. The single colour should be the boxlight and the other two are your light source/spotlight colours if you use split complimentary. If you want a "cold" environment, the intermediate colours between your complimentary colours should shift around the blue side of the wheel. For "warm", shift red.
If you choose green or purple lighting, do not mix the two. It just looks terrible. I've tried. If you're really stuck, google an image that looks like the atmosphere you're trying to create, then go to the colour palette generator (link at the bottom of post).
A Couple of Things to Keep in Mind
1.
Don't cross the spotlights with shadow-casting on
This will absolutely
destroy even the hardiest of computers. The Amnesia engine is capable of casting multiple shadows on one object, but you should never have a reason to do so and attempting to do so may explode some computers, making your game less playable/enjoyable for any potential players. It's kind of like crossing the beams in ghost-busters except there's no marshmallow man.
2.
Alpha
Alpha enhances the specular maps. Translation: it makes things shiny and more 3D-ish. You can put it on 1.000 for certain spotlights and important pointlights, but leave it at 0.000 for boxlights and ambient lights. I usually don't go above 0.300 for the alpha on lights unless I want an object to look wet or really focused.