I know this topic has likely been talked about ad nauseum (although a search surprisingly returned few results), but just wondering if anyone has better insight on this. I can do a typical Unreal style outdoor lighting that looks fairly good, but I stumble when attempting to do an ONP type version using cylinder lights/zone lighting/non-incidence lights. I tend to get a bunch of overlap from the cylinder lights, which looks uneven, and I can't quite get the shadows to look decent. Falling back on the Nyleve type of outdoor lighting feels like a cop out.

Anyone care to share more techniques?

Will probably get slapped around for saying this but...227 sunlight actor

Used it once before and worked great surprisengly...other than that though my skillz in outdoor lighting are pretty fail. Once tried setting up floating invisible cubes against the lights in order to direct the rays once (why didn't i just use spotlight?? what was i thinking?!) but lights pass through invisible geometry...so I had to make them 'fakebackdrop', which would look great when you looked at something else through the cube haha

If you're talking about the Light ->DistantLightActor ->Sunlight, it doesn't appear to do anything.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/63kxg5

made a testmap a while back...though i had to re-edit it just now...don't ask why it's snowing O.o

But yeah...basically you place the sunlight actor anywhere in the level, and it's directional so you have to aim it the way you want. You set color normally i believe, and there's a new option for a new lgiht radius. Apparently I made one of the suns in this have a corona effect too...though I did not position the sun in the skybox from where the light is coming from lol...so it'll look off.

The sunlight actor is above the vortex rikers ship.

Thanks...but...Can't find file for package 'MMLXmas2Tex'

I tried that sunlight actor just in a big box, but it didn't seem to do anything.

*facepalm* http://www.sendspace.com/file/3eyy4v

sorry lol...i just realized and was uploading as you replied haha...also...did u rebuild lighting?

Dunno, still doesn't seem to do anything in a test map. Just build a 6K box and put it in there, rebuilt, and everything's just black.

strange...im wondering if the sunlight actor depends on a fakebackdrop texture to know where to emit light from possibly? try setting the ceiling texture to fakebackdrop and see what happens

You MUST have the fakebackdromp faces on the BSP to make sunlight actor working.

So what happens when you have a skybox then?

Ah ok, haven't tried it in a map that actually has a skybox yet, was just trying to see what kind of light it produced...which was none.

Short of depending on a borrowed actor concept from UT2KX, I've always dealt with this issue by using multiple lights. It's easier with Na Pali as a setting because the skyline is so rich with different colored sunsets and midday anomalies that you can have a deep vermillion dawn on the tip of the highest peaks around your canyon and balance the rest with other colors. Setting is of course important, but also scale. Depending on the map you are using and the size of your outdoor terrain, you'll have more or less options. Larger is always harder and you often have to balance lighting with the complexity of your outdoor buildings. So normal light actors for me have always been sufficient.

The sunlight actor is useful in concept, whether it be the one in 227, the one featured in the Uengine 2 and up titles, or a version included in some other Unreal project (RD).If your outdoor area is way bigger than Unreal intended, you might need one for sure. But I find that while it casts a big "master" light, I often end up placing normal actors around anyway. So for the reading impaired, the short answer is this; never rely on just one actor to make your skylight

Also, is there a way to view the skybox by clicking the realtime preview button in the 227 editor? It seems to be turned off by default.

Nm...showbackdrop

Spotlight actor seems to be my friend now.

I used a matrix of spotlights up above all pointing at the same direction.The main thing that goes wrong is if you have a tall building it will be bright at the top, but the ground will be too black if you move the light up, max radius.I had like 12 or 16, didn't seem to bog things down.

But you could contour the placement, enough to give off shadows, use other lights on the ground at spots.Also use the cone setting, 128 now, but scrunch it down to 30 or 40 to show light in between buildings but not show on the sides of the light on the buildings them self.