Problem with "3D Lighting Preview" in Hammer Editor Thread

So, basically, whenever I select "3D Lighting Preview" in the 3D View in Hammer, I get a black and purple checkerboard. It's really weird.
I really feel like Hammer is working, but that it's glitching with lot of things right now.

Here's what I mean:
Gyazo.com

It happens every time, in every file. I honestly have no idea why this is happening.
If anyone can help, it'd be appreciated!

May i ask why you want to use this 3D Lightning preview?
Because when you use that other one that says something about textures, then
it works just fine, (have Hammer not open now so i don't know the exact name of the
one that is working.

please just test and let me know if your still having troubles,
a fellow level designer.

Leon

I like to get a rough sample of what my lighting is going to look like, That's all basically. It's just odd because this has never happened before. Even if it's a feature I don't really need, I still want it to work. Because the fact that it doesn't means something is broken, and that does not make me happy.

Sorry for the late response by the way.

So, you have been able to get that lightning future to work in the past?!?!
I am amazed, because i am mapping with Hammer for 6 years now, daily, and i have
tried to get that to work severel times but it never did.
Always thought they added the button but never really made it functional.
Would be nice to see shadows etc before a compile, although best way to check
you map is through walking through it in gameplay, that is my believe.
But i understand why you want to have the option,

greetings,
Leon

Really? Oh wow. I didn't realize it didn't ever work. It used to for me. Odd... But then again it's been like two years since I've opened the program. The 3D lighting preview doesn't really give you that much detail. It's a preview after all. It doesn't really render shadows or anything. It's more or less just uh, a sample of where/how light will emit, and how bright it will "Kind of" be.

Still, really silly if you ask me!

Yes, would be nice if Valve did add this to hammer. Because lots of other
engines do have it, for instance the IDTech engine (doom3, quake4, etc) has it
and there it works super. You really can see your level with lights and shadows as
how it will look in the game when played. And that makes placing light entities so
much easier.

Am not surpriced by the way, when you haven't opend Hammer for 2 years or so because
there have been so many large updates that changes so much. That this now doesn't work
anymore.

a fellow mapper,
Leon

It use to work now I used the ray traced preview option which pops open a window to view a really bad rendering of the lighting.

Close to the way lighting preview use to work. I assumed it had to do with 3.0 shaders since i have 2.0 but who knows.

Let me know how that works for you CreativeKitty.

Use the Alien Swarm SDK. It's really useful, because the 3D Lighting Preview works there for me, and it looks quite good. Of course, it's just a preview, but it makes the Source engine look a lot more like Unity or something, and it really helps with mapping.