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paniq1337

As requested: ULTIMATE CSGO MOVIEMAKING GUIDE by PANIq - PART #1

Tips & Guides

Welcome to the first part of The Ultimate CSGO Moviemaking Guide by PANIq

In today's pretty short chapter we gonna focus on all the preparations we need to do before we start creating anything. There's nothing more disturbing in the process of making than a missing puzzle.

FIRST OF ALL: MAKE SURE THAT YOU HAVE ENOUGH FREE SPACE ON YOUR DISKS. Moviemaking requires lots of space, depends on the length and resolution of your movie the source files might take up even > 500GB. Use this if you're unsure on enough free space. Remember that all that will be shown there is approximate and represents the worst case-scenario that can happen. Usually the filesize will be smaller.

Secondly we will need some software:

You can also use any other software that let you set a desired FPS for the recording and record to a lossless/uncompressed AVI video, but I will cover only FRAPS here.

The next thing we need is Launch options for CSGO and HLAE. Unpack the HLAE and launch it through the .exe file. Click on the tools tab, then go to developer and click on Custom Loader. This should pop up: Now you have to choose a Hook DLL file, your CSGO.exe path and insert the launch options:

  • Hook DLL file is called AfxHookSource and is located in the HLAE folder
  • CSGO.exe is located in \steamapps\common\Counter-Strike Global Offensive
  • Some launch options are there by default, and you need to leave them there to ensure proper launch of the game.
  • You can try to use HLAE without -windowed parameter if you want to use 1920x1080 (or any other that is your native resolution) but I know that there have been some issues with using HLAE in fullscreen mode in the past. Otherwise it is strongly recommended to use it to prevent any image quality or aspect ratio issues.
  • The -w and -h parameters are there to set up the resolution at startup. I'm using 1280x720 so it's -w 1280 -h 720. You can basically use any resolution, but the best ones are 16:9 resolutions (1280x720, 1920x1080). To determine if the resolution you wanna use is a 16:9 one you just need to divide the 1st value by 16 and second by 9 - if both of the outcomes are THE SAME integers then the resolution is a proper 16:9 one.
  • The most important launch option is -insecure as the HLAE is technically a hack so using it in the online mode with VAC enabled might result in a VAC ban. THIS COMMAND PREVENTS VAC TO LOAD - THIS MSG SHOULD POP UP IF THE COMMAND IS WORKING

After you click on ok button you should see this in the game's console: This means that the hook has been loaded in and if you type mirv into the console you should see some "strange" commands pop up. We'll leave it right now though.

If you wish not to use HLAE you can just simply put the -w, -h, -windowed, -insecure commands into CSGO Steam Launch Options. Keep in mind that we WILL HAVE to use HLAE for creating smooths/cinematics/campaths (or whatever you want to call them), as it is the only way to make them work as we want on GOTV demos. POV demo smoothing system will still work as it should without HLAE.

The third task is to set up our CSGO to look as best as it can look. - This is how I set my game for recording

Back in the days of 1.6, the game had no options like anti-aliasing or texture filtering, so we had to force all the settings through our graphic card's drivers but in CSGO there's no need to do that and you should leave all the driver's settings on default (except V-Sync, it should be off - obviously.)

The next thing we need is a moviemaking config that will make our life easier and we won't have to type every single command into the console on our own.

This is the config I used in Kirby's Overdrive movie + some useful keybindings

Before using it make sure to set your other configs that you use for gaming as read-only - CSGO likes to mess up with them everytime you bind something somewhere or change the values.

Paste the file into the \steamapps\common\Counter-Strike Global Offensive\csgo\cfg and after launching the game type exec mm.cfg into the console. If you did it correctly this should pop up in the console

WARNING - THIS CONFIG IS DESIGNED TO CAPTURE YOUR CLIP IN 300 OR MORE FPS. DUE TO THE GAME BUG ON DEMO PLAYBACK THERE WILL BE NO SOUND. I WILL EXPLAIN EVERYTHING IN THE RECORDING PART

The very last thing we need are demos. You can simply ask your friends, ask for them on YouTube or search @ www.hltv.org.

You need to know about few things though:

  • GOTV demos usually are low-tickrate - this results in delayed crosshair motion, missing sounds and so on, but they record whole game and you can jump between the POVs. Also with the new releases of HLAE you can make very simple 3rd person camera views on GOTV demos.
  • POV demos represent the game in the most accurate way, although they tend to be choppy if recorded on average PC, they like to be bugged, and you are basically locked to one player's perspective. You can make 3rd person camera views using these demos too, but you will not be able to make one that shows the player whose demo it is - this is source engine's limitation. If you plan to record only your perspective POV's are perfect.

This is the end of the first chapter of my CSGO Moviemaking Guide. If you feel like supporting me for doing all of this job feel free to like my Facebook page, subscribe my YouTube channel, come by the Twitch stream or donate me some CSGO goodies.

If you feel like I missed something here or you have any questions ask them in the comments, I will try to reply ASAP.

PART 2

Posted Jan 1, 2015, 7:22 PM UTC · edited

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