water elevator

I guess ill just repost this, sorry for the spam.

Alright, I have been trying and trying to get water
right but its not working. I get invisiible water surfaces and I
can see through them. I think it may have something to to with
the lod control settings, the default settings dont seem to make
sense. It says that the process ends before it begins. It
says it starts at 1000 cms and ends at 2000, does that make sense to
anyone but me? Ive tried fiddling with it, but I have no clue
what im doing.

My goal is to get a huge pillar of water that you
can swim up to. I guess it would be more of a ladder. I was
told to put the Env_cubemap above the water, but I'm not sure where the
"top" would be. I want 3 surfaces showing, because its against a
wall. Top, and the two sides. I know this is alot to ask,
but this is driving me insane. Thanks for your help.

(Just remembered, where would you put the nodraw textures on a pillar like that?)

Water in the source engine can only be flat you cant have it on any slope. If you want a water pillar you would have to use a "fake" water texture.

Could you elaborate, I dont quite understand.

i think he is right... the engine can only render water horizontally, not vertically like you want.

ive been messing around with it for a while, ive been able to get the water to "work" right, just that the textures are all messed up.

only way i see of getting this to work correctly, it to put some kind of water-looking texture on the 2 vertical sides

Would I use the nodraw texture on any sides?

you would want to put NODRAW on the sides that cant be seen (i.e. the two sides against the wall, and floor), as for the sides that can be seen, i have no clue

What should I set the lod settings at? I have never fuguired those out.

ive messed around with them a bit, default seems good for regular water... but as for trying to get vertical water to work, havent noticed any improvements

are you compiling fully with RAD and VIs. Make sure that your water brush is not just a brush but a func_water