Reality Factory

I'm doing an area that will be lit mostly by crystal shards protruding from the cavern walls, and I've run into a problem:

The shards are blocking light, causing them to be surrounded by a dark circle at the base. The shards themselves are lit, which only makes the problem more obvious.

Is there a way to make a brush so that it won't block the lighting (completely transparent to light)?

Surrounding the shard with multiple lights isn't an option because of the 30-light limit on dynamic lights.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

two words: window brushes.

marking the brushes as windows lets the light shine through.

You can also try to add some 'ambient light' with selecting the 'Light' attribute of the faces of the crstals and then having radiosity turned on.