Tutorial Radiant Basic

Introduction

Before starting, some hints on of the motors 3d and on that of q3 in particular are necessary. Despite the method of modeling and the tool are more or less similar to a program like 3dmax (even though more' "raw"), the creation of a level is very different for various reasons both technical and theoretical.
In the games in subjective, that are completely focused on the sense of immersion of the user, the important element is that the animation must be the most fluid and realistic, not to interrupt the illusion to be inside a likely context.
To get the optimal effect about 60 to 120 frames are necessary per second (unlike the TV, for which 25 fpsec are normally enough, the rendered images by an engine 3d are deprived of motion blur and therefore as a rule the more the frames per second are elevated the more the vision will result fluid to the eye).

Now, what the graphic engine does for every frame on screen is more or less this:
- reading the inputs of the player (movements, actions etc.)
- calculating its new position
- calculating the position of eventual bot or other players
- calculating the collisions and eventually giving way to the appropriate animation
- drawing the frame basing on the preceding conditions
- syncronizing the all in real time

To this in a video game a lot of other things must be added (such as the handling of artificial intelligence, of the sound aspect and so on ..), thus producing a massive amount of calculations to be carried out in the shortest possible time to guarantee a number of suitable fps.
From this derives the demand to find a compromise between the complexity of the environment and its lightness in terms of calculation.
Demand that, with the introduction of graphic cards and always more powerful processors, is gradually disappearing.
There are many other things that can influence the heaviness of a scene, as particular shader (multiple or animate texture) curved surfaces etc., but for now we can avoid to hold them into account.

As first thing, download the manual http://www.q3radiant.com/manual/Q3Rad_Manual/index.htm, set the program as indicated, and define the way of visualization (I feel comfortable with the quad view, but on small monitor it is better to use the split and to alternate the different views according to the situation).

Start to take confidence with the shortcuts (some are essential, others very useful) and the various functions here
http://www.q3radiant.com/manual/Q3Rad_Manual/appndx/sskey_dl.htm.

In the tutorial I will refer to the parallelepipeda as brush, to the view in 3d as v3d, and to the keys of the mouse as M1 M2 M3, the other abbreviations are easily comprehensible.