Lens Flares/Coronas
by David Münnich
Choice:
First
let me clear up the typical novice mistakes in
terms of lensflares.
Don't use flares that look cool on pics, they will make
you vomit once you play the map and watch them.
And don't use colored ones.
White ones only, because of the hue and saturation values of the light actor
it will have the right color.
That's all the lensflares from GenFX.utx.
RED - Don't use them under any
circumstances.
BLUE - Use it only for candles.
GREEN - They can be used
EVERYWHERE. Especially flare '3'. It's the best imo.
YELLOW - They are ok, but actually
a worse version of flare '3'.
I remember, the first flare I used was '2', it
looks good on that pic, but in game........blaaargh.
Now decide for yourself, which one do you like more? Pic1 (flare
'3') or pic2 (flare '2'). If your answer was 'pic2' imagine some
cruel insults here (Hint: right answer is 'pic1').
pic1
pic2 
Settings:
Drawscale is the size. 0.1-0.2 is ok there. Default is 1 and waaaaay too big.
Skin, enter the flare texture here (3).
Brightness: 0, because the flare
itself shouldn't give off light.
Hue & Saturation: same here like for
the light that gives off the light that is supposed to come from the lamp. So
the flare gets the right color.
Corona: true! NOT LENS FLARE! I have no
idea what lens flare is for, but you don't need it!
Radius: 255 means that
you always see it, from every range. But that would look stupid, 48-64 is ok.
Alignment:
The alignment is often very awful.
The flare
appears in the middle of the light actor. This is somewhere in that red circle.
The brown glowing/selected brush is the lamp from pic 2 and 3 of that
tutorial. Now align the light actor with the flare settings in the middle below
the lamp.
Don't place it inside a brush. It won't be visible any more
(except it's a non-solid brush).
Alignment in Fire:
Seems to be a hard thing too. No idea
why that happens so often, but I see it all the time.
Here one of 1000 wrong
examples. (No, I did not manipulate it!)
Place it in the center of the heat, at the brightest point, not on the top or
somewhere else!
You may say: 'but in real life I see a corona on the
top'......well, look at this pic, it looks so damn retarded, and it doesn't work
like in real life.
Just place it where I told you and it looks perfect.