So .. I'm trying to write an article here and I realized that while I'm talking about lightmapping I literally have NO idea what the difference is between the various modes. We know:

F1 - Basic lightmapping
F2 - Intermediate lightmapping
F3 - Advanced lightmapping

The first question is - what is the difference between these three? I would *ASSUME* the difference is that they vary the quality levels of the lightmap in terms of resolution (versus what's held in the setup.ini file). Probably? Anyone know for sure? Can anyone provide a side by side picture of the same room done with a complex lightmap (3+ static lights) for each setting?

Then we get to the F4 key which is supposedly "F3 + some occlusion based stuff built in" .. however I don't understand the necessity of this. Aren't occlusion settings independent of the lightmapper? They're usually stored in the object properties (occluder/occludee) and the tab settings (occlusion slider). So what the heck does F4 do? Does ANYONE know? Lee?

Thanks

by the way i think it would be aaammaazing if when you press a lightmapper key... a prompt pops up asking if you are sure you want to run the lightmapper. Cant tell you how many times i thought i hit ESC but accident hit one of the F keys lol

No kidding. Nothing worse than an accidental F4 followed by a long hold of ESCAPE and then the editor crashes and you lose 30+ mins of work.

I think F4 is pretty much redundant now .. Lee was going to put something else there.
It did handle Light mapping and occlusion but that's not the way Occlusion is done any longer.

Ah! Well that makes sense.
Do you have any idea of the differences between F1 - F3, while you're at it?

It must do something because if you press F4 by mistake instead of F3 you wait an ice age for it to do whatever it does and your level is light mapped at the end of it.

Yes but the extra time you wait for the occlusion pretty much does nothing ..
Like I said F4 is kind of redundant ..

F1.. Is just quick
F2 .. is a basic
F3 .. Well that actually does the static lighting as well so that's the main important one at the moment
F4 .. Does occlusion as well ... Except it doesn't but does allow you more time to make tea

F1 is a quick what? Lightmapper? Does it do static lightmapping, just at a lower bitrate?
Same with F2.
F3 is what I always use, but it just makes it seem like we have 4 keys, of which 3 are pointless.

What do you want for your tea while I'm here

F1 - Quick light map, just like real time shadows. - Use this for checking rough placement
F2 - A Lightmap that will bake the textures, and mesh - Just bake the scene sun color
F3 - Lightmap for lights - Bakes the lights in to the terrain and objects
F4 - Full lightmapping and occlusion - This takes the longest, but combines the other three lightmapping modes.

So F4 is really only the pointless one ...

Hah, you act as if this is well documented somewhere.

I just did a search .

o7 well your search-fu skills are better than mine. I have searched a lot and didn't get the level of answers you provided. So thanks again!