Its basic lighting 
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He is currently online, I’ll make a group chat if you come online.
DAMN BUMP
I’ll take a look at the map. Which one is it?
I got this PM today:
"Hey TehB0xN00b,
First and foremost I want to say that you and you’re team are doing a great job. I think your 1st room is looking good and pretty similar to the 1st room from half life, regardless of what the commenters were saying. With that said, I just wanted to just give you some feedback regarding the first room to get your creative juices flowing. I don’t know how far you want to stray from the original Hazard Course 1st room but from your latest posted image it looks like you don’t want to stray too far. Architecturally speaking it appears you want to remain true to the original half life version of the 1st room so kudos if that is your main attempt. However it looks like lighting and texture wise you’ve been experimenting with various configurations and want to stray from the original. For example, the room is more dimly lit and pushed towards the center. Another big change is the removal of the large “Black Mesa Training Facility” sign above the door. Also the room is not just a smooth hollow box, which I’m glad is not the case in your latest image.
Regarding these differences I think you want to ask yourself some key questions. Firstly, I think you should ask yourself if the lighting flows from this room into the next room. In other words, if the next room is brightly lit and this room dimly lit it is likely the player blinded by the transition the 1st room to the 2nd room. From what I remember the 2nd room where you get the HEV suit wasn’t too brightly lit but you should coordinate with the mapper of the second room.
Secondly, I think you need to ask yourself if you would like to use any lighting cues to direct the player anywhere. From the half life hazard course I seem to recall that lighting was used to direct the player to notice the large “Black Mesa Training Facility” sign behind the hologram. Also, I believe a light was triggered once the door opened directing the player into the second room. As obvious as these things are to hand hold the player I think it was made deliberately since this level was used as a tutorial level.
Finally, I think you need to ask yourself what is the purpose of this room. As you know, this question directs many design decisions. On its face this room appears to be used for nothing and is merely an empty room. Although you are absolutely correct looking at this room as a whole one can assume this could be some sort of briefing room or waiting room for black mesa workers. It could have also been used for a preparation room for workers to get ready prior to entering a missile silo.
If I were to recreate this room with full reign here are some things I would test out, which may turn out horribly bad or might actually work, but you’ll never know until you give it a try. I’d definitely see how the room looks with the large sign on it and push the lighting to the outer walls just to get a feel of how it would look compared to the half life counterpart. If I were to go crazy and just stray from the original design I would look at images of briefing rooms for amusement park rides and government facilities. (Here are some image links that I might consider https://images.wikia.com/starwars/images/7/7c/Jedi_Briefing_Room.JPG and https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-vz_PRd6HLZU/Tw1gi5Mcy5I/AAAAAAAAHsI/AJwDlEWw7Mk/s1600/Epcot+Test+Track+Queue216.jpg) I’d probably also ask myself is this a hazard course that they intend for one individual to go down there at a time or would they lead a group of trainees to enter the hazard course? If more than one trainee would go down there should other trainees have seating or would they wait standing? Also if they were to stand would they be lined/cued up waiting for their turn to enter the hazard course? I also think I’d examine the possibility of having a door for scientists to access to get to the monitoring areas in the crouch room and the jump room. If you really wanted to you can make a scripted scene of scientists conversing then entering the door. Finally I’m a big fan of adding monitors and cameras so I may try out putting monitors in this room showing off other trainees moving through the course in different stages of the hazard course. Please remember these are by no means things that should be done but things to test to see if they actually work or make sense.
Once again good job so far. Don’t let the trolls discourage your work. At the end of the day not everyone will be happy with what you decide to do, so you should only be focused on making yourself proud of your own work. If you need any more feedback or inspiration don’t hesitate to ask."
Should I take into account or not?
shrugs
It’s good feedback, well reasoned and thought out. We should definitely make sure the rooms without observation booths have security cameras in them, and trying to think up pre-Black Mesa uses for the rooms is a good idea.
Do whatever feels right.
I was thinking of a Portal-esque system in which the cameras follow you. If someone (possibly Lars?) can make us a camera prop with associated brackets, it’s not all that hard to do.
It can’t be done with the BM camera mostly because that one includes the brackets.
I would suggest a series of industrial areas (hallways, tunnels, warehouses, canals, etc) that have been crudely modified for testing. By crudely I mean it should feel kinda like the area was carelessly constructed over rather than carefully renovated. So basically you’d have different coloured / textured concrete (or metal) from what the original walls and floors are made of, bricked or cemented off passageways, doorways that appear to have been tunneled through, etc
Box, check my \mapsrc folder. You’ll know it when you see it.
Don’t. Break. Anything.
I need to study all day so don’t worry about that lol.
I don’t know about careless… it’s a training course for a high-tech suit, after all. But definitely I think it should retain many remnants of its past self… only renovated just enough to make the new system work just well enough autonomously. As a general guide, we’re trying to make it look mostly like a converted industrial area, like the original. That means slightly worn pipes and supports and such, but not so worn as to be falling apart. I like the idea of closed off passageways though… that could definitely be worked into the environment in quite a few places.
Careless might have been the wrong word, but you seem to have the right idea as-is. I look forward to your progress.
I made a small start on the physics room.
No idea if its still going to be included though, but just made it for shits and giggles 
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I really had a lot of fun making this
The red light is there because I wanted to see how it would look like.
Removing them later though.
Interesting. It’s not bad, atmosphere-wise. Keep the red light, actually.
I’d make some thematic changes, myself. But overall it’s not bad. Maybe it should look more like a maintenance hallway.
I’m not done with it yet though, still experimenting with textures.
Anyway, I’m still having problems with this map.
Even though everything is sealed and details got func_detail’d and all the brushes are on the grid, BSP says the entities are leaking even though they are in inside.
I ended up making a hollow’d nodraw brush around the whole map just to compile it lol.
You gotta stop with the hollowed box container, that drives vvis up the walls. Have your Dropbox’d the map? I could take a look, though chances are you’ve got brushes really awkward or something.
Sigh Box. The best way to prevent leaks is to avoid them in the first place. Never add detail until you’re done blocking out the basic box shapes that contain your room. If you somehow get basic box shapes to leak, then you did something horribly wrong… but if you kept it simple, it would be really easy to fix because it’s very basic. Also, as a general rule, try to build your rooms along the highlighted white lines. It really helps when it gets to the point where you need to start stitching different rooms together.
Also, try to avoid crossing the highlighted red and blue lines in the grid, if possible. And if you must cross them, make it so that the lines are even with your brush faces. That’s because those lines are the lines along which VBSP automatically splits visleaves… crossing your rooms with them could make things weird if you do it sloppily.
Only after you confirm that your VERY basic box shapes are not leaking, THEN you may add detail brushes. NOT until then.
Anyway, I’ve uploaded a more optimized version of the physics room hallway, orangemapped. It has no leaks, unless you do something weird and break it. The dimensions of the room are far easier to optimize, and I’ve aligned it to the grid in such a way that the visleaves are nice and even.
You’ll find it under my folder, as hc_physicsroom_var1.vmf. It’s only basic orangemap, but I’ve gotten the entities working in a pretty cool way that you guys would probably like to see.
Since I like the aesthetics of your room, Box, I was thinking, could you dress it up the way you did your version? Your lighting and pipes and decorations and such, I mean.
No need for doors or connecting it to any other parts of the map or anything like that yet… I’ll get to that at a later time.
EDIT: double post…?
Good job.
I think you should use darker textures for the walls. The red would stand out a lot more.
I think a pale yellow could also work instead of red.
There are a number of lighting schemes that could work, depending on what mood you want to set for the room.
True, but we’ve been using pale yellows freakin’ everywhere. The red adds some more vibrant color to the area.