Overview

CRYENGINE supports volumetric effects for Point Lights without the need for additional geometry, simply by applying a material to the light entity and setting it up as a projector.

Setup

Add a light into the scene via RollupBar -> Entity -> Lights -> Light

Open the Material Editor and select the following material: materials/lights/light_beams/lightbeam_floodlight.mtl

Make sure the Light entity is selected, then right click on the material in the Material Editor and "Assign to Selected Objects".

You should see the Material appear on the light in the RollupBar:

Last step you need to do is apply a texture to the projector settings in the light.

In the light properties, scroll down to the "Projector" section and then in the texture slot select a texture, something like: textures/lights/softedge.dds

If all was done correctly, your light should now be projecting volumetric effects via the LightBeam shader:

Fog accepts light diffuse color and also casts volumetric shadows:

It also functions with light styles and in conjunction with some settings in the LightBeam material, you can create some funky setups!

Video Example

Tips and Info

• If the volumetric effects do not appear, try switching from Very High -> High (or High -> Very High), or use Tools -> Reload Textures/Shaders. This should only be needed once to fully initialize the shader effect.
• Currently this feature is supported in High / Very High specs. Alternatively, you can enable it in Low / Med by setting r_Beams to '1'.
• The requirement of a Projection Texture currently rules out the possibility for AreaLights to project volumetric effects, as AreaLights don't use the Projector Texture slot.
• The requirement of a material with the LightBeam.LightBeam shader rules out the possibility for the light to also use Lens Flare effects at the same time, as the special Lens_Optics material is required for Lens Flare enabled lights.