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RED+
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Lighting

Glowing Liquids

Liquid Glow makes the liquid in a room give off light when you bake, like lava or glowing water. You set it on the Room Effect in the room with the liquid. The light is baked into the lightmaps of the surfaces around the liquid, which every client shows.

Where to find it

The Liquid Glow (RED+) group near the bottom of Room Effect Properties, above Caustics (RED+).

How to use it

  1. Select the Room Effect in the room with the liquid and open Room Effect Properties.
  2. In Liquid Glow (RED+), tick Emits Light.
  3. Set Bright and Range. Click the Color swatch if you want a colour other than the liquid's own.
  4. Click OK.
  5. Choose Level, Calculate Lighting (Shift+L).

Settings

ControlValuesDefaultWhat it sets
Emits Lightticked or clearedclearedWhether the liquid gives off light
Bright1 to 400 %100How much light the liquid gives off
Range0 to 1000 m0How far the light reaches
Colorany colourthe liquid texture's average colourThe colour of the light
  • Bright left blank or at 0 means 100. A Bright over 400 counts as 400.
  • Range 0 uses the level's emissive range, 30 m on a new level. A Range over 1000 counts as 0.
  • Click the Color swatch to pick a colour. Tex goes back to the liquid texture's own colour.

What the bake does

  • Every liquid surface in the room that holds the Room Effect gives off light.
  • Both the top and the underside of the surface give off light, so the glow lights the room above and the space under the surface.
  • The light spreads in every direction in front of the surface and fades smoothly to nothing at the Range.
  • The light is even along the whole surface. RED+ divides a large surface into cells about half the Range wide (at least 4 m), and each cell gives off light like a small pool. A surface that fits in one cell gives off light as one.
  • Like an emissive face, a cell gives off more light the larger it is: 1x at 4 square metres, rising to 4x at 64 square metres and more.
  • Without a picked colour, the glow takes the average colour of the room's liquid surface texture, across all its animation frames, or the room's Liquid Color. If that reads as nearly black, the liquid glows white and the log says so.
  • The liquid does not block light and does not shadow itself.
  • The level's emissive strength scales it, as it does every emissive face. See Emissive Light.
  • Relight Changed Lights skips it. Run a full Calculate Lighting to bake it.

The liquid surface itself does not change. The game draws liquid surfaces fullbright, and no level setting changes that.

In the viewports

View, Show Emissive Ranges (RF+) shows the glow of every glowing liquid. With it off, the glow shows while the Room Effect is selected. The wireframe outlines the liquid surface and repeats the outline pushed out from the surface to the Range, in the picked colour or in cyan.

Good to know

  • The bake log reports LIQUID GLOW lines: how many rooms glow, and how many liquid faces give off light from how many cells.