Annoying shadow on diagonal wall
Hi, guys. I've been trying to port Portal's levels to the Portal 2 engine (making a remake, if you will) using the Portal 2 Authoring Tools, Hammer. I'm almost done with the first level (Test Chamber 00), but there's a lighting issue that has annoying me since I started to map it.
Basically, in the second room where you must put a simple cube on a button, right after you wake up in the vault, there's a diagonally placed wall. The problem is: in the wall and in the adjacent wall (facing the door), a weird shadow seems to be coming from nowhere. I already tried to make a regular corner (two walls forming a 90? angle) and the shadows don't appear. However, I WANT A DIAGONAL WALL, since I'm remaking the test chamber.
I've already tried anything you can imagine: lights, directional lights, spot lights, brush lights, different brightnesses etc, but nothing works.
So, guys, what I haven't tried yet? And what are those weird shadows? 
Screenshots:
This is how the corner is supposed to be:
http://imageshack.us/a/img818/8715/originalportal2.jpg
This is how it's built in Hammer (with those walls selected):
http://imageshack.us/a/img526/2717/originalhammer.png
As I said before, I tried a regular corner and, as you can see, the walls look normal:
http://imageshack.us/a/img213/6724/testportal2.jpg
In Hammer:
http://imageshack.us/a/img824/3047/testhammer.png
(Sorry for the low resolution images. That's the only way I can map with my not-so-good PC xD)
Any ideas?
Do you have any yellow "too many light styles..." errors when you compile?
If not, see if the button base is causing it. Those have caused light errors before.
I get no yellow "too many light styles..." errors. Also, I removed the button and still the shadows were there. Do you have any ideas left?
Let's try to narrow things down, shall we? First off, the window frame model, disable shadows on that. If that is not it, lower the light map grid on those walls and compile again. With the lightmap grid lower, you might be able to make out what is causing the error.
Feel free to PM me for more help.
http://www.tophattwaffle.com/ - My site for Source Engine Level Design
http://therewillbescience.com/ - Portal 2, Lab Rat
http://www.moddb.com/mods/portal-2-lab-rat - Portal 2, Lab Rat (MODDB)
@FelipeCaners : from the hammer view, I can see that the angled wall is not a func_brush (that could make shadowing if you wouldn't set to "YES" its property "Disable shadows") but just a world brush you clipped to make it have that angle... the only possibility I can think of is that when you did that, you didn't watch out for the texture in the angled wall after you cliiped it. Be careful to always have your textures "Align to World" in order to avoid lighting issues. Check in below picture:
useful tools and stuff here on TWP 
[spoiler]
[/spoiler]
Thanks for the replies, guys, but nothing worked.
@TopHATTwaffle: I set all props' "Disable Shadows" and "Disable Vertex Lighting" properties to "Yes" - it didn't work. I lowered the lightmap grid to around 2, and got this: http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/5136 ... ortal2.jpg, which didn't help that much.
@josepezdj: No, it's not a func_brush. Actually, I made that angled wall by using the Vertex Tool, which is safer than using the Clipping Tool. I tried setting the alignment to "World", but didn't work either.
Well, I still have the problem. Things I tried to do so far:
- Use many kinds of lights to brighten the shadows;
- remove props that could potentially be causing those shadows ? for instance, floor button, cube dropper, window frames etc;
- put a BLOCKLIGHT brush in the door frame (avoiding any lighting or shadow coming from the other room);
- lower the lightmap grid;
- align to "World", what I knew was not going work, since the other wall (that also receives the shadow) was aligned to "World".
None of them worked. I will change those brushes to func_brush and see what happens. But, even if it works, it's not the ideal solution. They are supposed to be WORLD BRUSHES!
Please add a normal light entity about 32 units in front of your observation lab. Leave all settings stock, except for the ones that I say to change below.
Brightness: Use the SAME color as your lab, but change the intensity to "5" (Example, 233 190 213 5)
Constant: 1
Linear: 2
Quadratic: 0
Let me know how that works out.
http://www.tophattwaffle.com/ - My site for Source Engine Level Design
http://therewillbescience.com/ - Portal 2, Lab Rat
http://www.moddb.com/mods/portal-2-lab-rat - Portal 2, Lab Rat (MODDB)
I think that if the only light into that room is coming from the observation room, then the angled wall itself is causing shadows... check the angle from which the light is coming (in your last picture). Try adding another light entity in the chamber.
useful tools and stuff here on TWP [spoiler]
[/spoiler]
I tried to make those walls into func_brush and got this: http://imageshack.us/a/img689/2287/func ... ortal2.jpg. Obviously, I had to seal them and it solved the problem, but, as you know, it's not the best mapping solution (not very professional).
@TopHATTwaffle:
Hammer
http://imageshack.us/a/img171/4195/labl ... hammer.png
In-game
http://imageshack.us/a/img208/691/labli ... ortal2.jpg
Still got nothing, apparently.
@josepezdj: There are two lights in the observation room: an ordinary ligth entity, supposed to light the lab, and a spot light coming from the window and facing the test chamber, supposed to light the chamber. Both of them come with the instance (I'm using a func_instance), although I have tweaked them a little for my purposes. I already tried to change the spot light's angle to face the shadow area, but it didn't work, at all!
Following your advice, I put a default light in front of the walls, but the result looks rather odd: http://imageshack.us/a/img715/4249/defa ... ortal2.jpg.
I tried also a 100% constant light, but didn't work either. I will try some more light configurations to see what I get, or move the wall. If you guys have any more ideas or configurations, let me know. Thank you for helping me out.
Just to see what happens, did you try different lightmap scales on those surfaces? You can change them with the Face Edit Tool.