VBGamer

I'm a newbie at DirectX7 programming. I'm using DirectDraw for my top-down action game. I would like to know if it is possible to add lighting effects to the game. I think that one possible way of doing this is to have a surface just for effects. So I would be able to make a fire as one effect, and then make the ground light up around it by using a bitmap which gradually gets lighter toward the center of the image. Please help... -Simon