FSDreamTeam forum
Products Support => EuroAirport Basel => Topic started by: Brittanix on January 12, 2020, 08:04:25 pm
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Im experiencing noisy ground textures (at night with taxi lights on) on several sections of the taxi ways and partially in the paved parking areas.
I would post pictures, but you cant tell in the screenshots.
I can post some images of the areas concerned. Its where the taxi way ground textures change appearance.
Anyone else having this problem?
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You are not using SSAA antialiasing, and you probably haven't read the manual for Basel, which at page 6 shows, with two screenshot, the difference between MSAA and SSAA, suggesting to use SSAA to prevent this problem.
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I am actually using 4x SSAA ...
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I am actually using 4x SSAA ...
Is your screen looking like the MSAA example in the manual ? If yes, then you are probably not using 4.5 HF2, since before this version, SSAA didn't really work.
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Yes, its looking like in the manual. Certain parts of the taxi ways has much more shimmering than the paving shown in the picture.
And yes, I am using the latest version of P3D4 (4.5.13.32097), which includes HF2.
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Yes, its looking like in the manual. Certain parts of the taxi ways has much more shimmering than the paving shown in the picture.
You mean it looks like the MSAA screenshot, even if you are at SSAA ? So, to be entirely clear, doesn't look anywhere close to the SSAA screenshot in the manual ?
And yes, I am using the latest version of P3D4 (4.5.13.32097), which includes HF2.
Have you updated with the Client only ? It's possible this is another thing requiring a Content update too.
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Yes Umberto, looks like the MSAA picture, although I’m using 4x SSAA.
It’s a complete and new install of 4.5.13.32097, not just an update.
I’m using Nvidia Inspector which is enhancing the AA. I can't imagine that NI is interfering, but I will disable later to see if it makes any difference.
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I’m using Nvidia Inspector which is enhancing the AA. I can't imagine that NI is interfering, but I will disable later to see if it makes any difference.
It is likely interfering and, when you use the inspector to change AA settings, you cannot be sure anymore the AA settings you read in the sim are really the ones which will be used, and it's not even always clear if it's really "enhancing" or "replacing" or what the end result would be.
In your case, it seems the inspector has reverted back to MSAA. Try to use the additional mode available with the inspector, like "Enhance the application setting" AND "8x sparse grid super sampling"
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Its not NI either, there is no change. I have compared MSAA and SSAA and do notice a huge difference, but I still get shimmering with SSAA.
I have re-installed the LFSB scenery and noticed something which is interesting. Before, large parts of the taxi ways were fine, with only a few sections in between doing the shimmering.
Now that I have made a re-install, its excatly the other way around. Now a large portion of the taxi ways are shimmering and only a few short section in between are fine.
You can see the texture differences in the screenshot. Any idea whats going on here?
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I have the same issue. In my sim I chose to use '2x Sparse Grid Supersampling' (a mix of MSAA and SSAA), when using MSAA it is *killing* performance at night with dynamic lighting.
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Its not NI either, there is no change. I have compared MSAA and SSAA and do notice a huge difference, but I still get shimmering with SSAA.
As I've said, the screenshot in the manual shows the difference between MSAA and SSAA. This is what you are supposed to see with a properly configured video card settings. You said yourself your result looked more like the MSAA example so, if you cannot see what you are supposed to see with normal SSAA settings ( the SSAA example in the manual ), it's clear that something is not set correctly, most likely in the inspector, so you should try different settings, because it should be possible to obtain with the inspector at least the SAME result one would get with *NO* tweaks whatsoever, meaning everything default and just SSAA enabled in the sim, which is how I took the screenshot.
I have re-installed the LFSB scenery and noticed something which is interesting. Before, large parts of the taxi ways were fine, with only a few sections in between doing the shimmering.Now that I have made a re-install, its excatly the other way around. Now a large portion of the taxi ways are shimmering and only a few short section in between are fine. You can see the texture differences in the screenshot. Any idea whats going on here?
I have no idea how this could possibly happen, since we surely haven't updated any textures in the meantime, and our installer will not touch ANY of your graphic settings.
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I have the same issue. In my sim I chose to use '2x Sparse Grid Supersampling' (a mix of MSAA and SSAA), when using MSAA it is *killing* performance at night with dynamic lighting.
Are you sure you are referring to MSAA to killing peformances at night ? MSAA is what you shouldn't use, because it causes shimmering but, it's usually a bit better for fps.
In any case, there's no point discussing this anymore. With no tweaks, SSAA WILL look like in the screenshot at Page 6 of the manual, and that's how the scenery is supposed to look like.
For those that tweaked their system and for any reasons ( compatibility, personal tastes, performances ), so they are unable/unwilling to set the proper antialiasing mode as suggested in the manual, we'll shortly release an alternate set of textures with toned down textures, like we did with KORD V2. It will look more flat, even at day when the problem doesn't exists, but it will surely reduce shimmering at night.
No, we won't make it to switch automatically from PBR to PBR-less from day to night, even if we could, because dynamic texture switching has some performance cost associated with it, since a LUA script should be used for these textures, and scripts are evaluated at each frame, for each material that has one, so we want to use them only if strictly necessary.
So, with the next Live Update, you'll find an alternate set of ground textures which will be more flat, but they will have to be enabled manually.
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In regards to taxi ways there are obviously two different sets of textures. As you can see in the screenshot, a section is absolutely fine, then comes a section which shimmers, then follows another section which is fine etc etc.
Is that supposed to be a mix of textures? If the taxi ways were completely as in the top half of my screenshot then it would be perfect.
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Is that supposed to be a mix of textures? If the taxi ways were completely as in the top half of my screenshot then it would be perfect.
Of course there are, there several kind of materials, which is how the real airport is made. All of them are physically correct ( that's what PBR is all about ) but, again, depending on your antialiasing settings, some of them might show less or more shimmering, depending on the quantity of high frequency content they have. High-frequency is basically the amount of the smaller details. Something that has lots of tiny specks or thin lines is more subject to moire/shimmering.
You must understand moire effects in PBR cannot removed ENTIRELY, this is not even possible with the most modern graphic engines, like Unreal 4, see this explanation here
https://answers.unrealengine.com/questions/121845/moire-problems.html
And UE4 have far more advanced settings that might help reducing this, like Temporal Antialiasing, yet it cannot be solved entirely, if you want PBR ( which simply doesn't work without normal maps at all), it's just that you have been so accustomed to old style flat sceneries, that you are starting to see this only with the more recent PBR releases.
Now that I hope you finally understand the issue, and we clarified it's NOT a scenery problem or a bug, please refer back to my previous reply, in which I confirmed we offer an alternate set of textures with toned down maps. They won't be physically correct anymore, but if you cannot sort out your AA problems, or you cannot use the proper settings for any other reasons, they will do.
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Thank you for your answers Umberto. I look forward to the alternative textures which I may use at night then ;)
Other than that night issue, a great scenery! Been looking forward to this for a long time ;D
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We posted the alternate ground textures set in today's Live Update.
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We posted the alternate ground textures set in today's Live Update.
Thanks Umberto. Can you please tell me how i activate the alternative textures? Can't find any settings for this?
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As far as I see it automatically installs the correct textures, based on if you have MSAA or SSAA enabled. You can also copy the files manually from the \Addon Manager\FsDreamTeam\LFSB\Texture folder. It contains both a no_SSAA_version folder and a SSAA_version folder.
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From the Live Update release notes:
https://www.fsdreamteam.com/couatl_liveupdate_notes.html
NEW: - LFSB Basel airport - , alternate ground texture set to be used with MSAA antialiasing mode. Installed automatically depending on the AA settings in the sim.
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NEW: - LFSB Basel airport - , alternate ground texture set to be used with MSAA antialiasing mode. Installed automatically depending on the AA settings in the sim.
Had to copy the files manually, so the automatic installation based on MSAA did not work for me. Anyway, ground is looking good now, thanks. Except the taxiways, they still show that ugly Moire effect. Could you include those too ? Or anything else I could do ?
Mike
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Had to copy the files manually, so the automatic installation based on MSAA did not work for me. Anyway, ground is looking good now, thanks. Except the taxiways, they still show that ugly Moire effect. Could you include those too ? Or anything else I could do ?
The automatic installation works, if you set MSAA in the simulator, and I can confirm it's working fine, since I tested it in both cases. It won't work if you set the antialiasing mode externally, for example in a tweaker, or if your Prepa3d.CFG reported what shouldn't normally happen, like having both SSAA and MSAA enabled at the same time, which is not possible with the normal UI.
We haven't left out any textures, so taxiways are surely included. Please make a screenshot as an example. Of course, I assume you copied all files when the simulator was NOT running.
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Yes of course, P3Dv4 was closed and MSAA was set (MSAA=4, SSAA=0 in prepar3d.cfg).
Screenshot attached. Not sure if it's it is good to see in a static screenshot as the Moire effect is very prominent when moving. However I marked an area where the shimmering and flickering is intense.
The texture filenames in the SSAA_version and no_SSAA_version folders are identical, is that correct ?
Mike
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Yes of course, P3Dv4 was closed and MSAA was set (MSAA=4, SSAA=0 in prepar3d.cfg).
Are you sure you saw the message from the updater saying that the wrong ( in your case ) SSAA textures have been installed ?
I re-checked it again and, the only possible way for the SSAA textures being used, is that you should have a value other than 0 for SSAA in the Prepar3d.cfg file. Otherwise, the MSAA version will be used. And of course, I also tried with both settings, and in both cases the correct textures are copied.
Screenshot attached.
You said the taxiway textures were a problem, but your screenshot show the runway markings instead. Yes, of course they have been toned down too ( a lot ), but the final effect depends on your overall screen resolution. The lower your screen resolution, the HIGHER the antialiasing should be.
The texture filenames in the SSAA_version and no_SSAA_version folders are identical, is that correct ?
Of course it is, that's the only way they could work, they have the same name, but they are NOT the same.
In the attached screenshots, what you are supposed to see. Note that, even if #2 and #3 don't look that different in a static screenshot, SSAA make a huge difference in movement, preventing shimmering.
1) MSAA textures with MSAA 4x in the sim
2) SSAA textures with MSAA 4x in the sim
3) SSAA textures with SSAA 8x in the sim
I'm not using any tweaker, shader mod or anything else. If you, all bets are off, and everything can happen.
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When comparing the SSAA version (Screenshot attached) with the noSSAA version (screenshot further above), one can clearly notice an improvement. So maybe it is just a wrong expectation from my side: The Moire effect is just reduced with the new textures, but not eliminated. However, I do not see this effect with other Airport Addons.
There are some rumours REX Environment force does something with shaders. Anyway, just make sure, I started P3D without REX and cleared the shader cache before, so it should not have an influence. No other shader mods are active. And I'm just using the Laptop native resolution of 1920*1080.
Mike
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When comparing the SSAA version (Screenshot attached) with the noSSAA version (screenshot further above), one can clearly notice an improvement. So maybe it is just a wrong expectation from my side: The Moire effect is just reduced with the new textures, but not eliminated.
That's just subjective. We are seeing a borderline case here, which is at night with landing lights. I think the SSAA version looks just fine in SSAA but, obviously, nothing is preventing you to use the MSAA version even with SSAA. However, my screenshot of the MSAA texture is very different than YOUR screenshot with MSAA textures so, clearly, there must be some other issue at play, assuming you copied the correct files, which I don't have any reasons to doubt.
Reducing normal maps even more, while it might improve a bit ( it's already good to me ) at night, will make the scenery totally flat at day, like a freeware or default scenery.
And as already explained here, switching textures dynamically would have an fps cost, since we would have to attach a LUA script to all ground materials, and this has a cost (every line of every LUA script is evaluated at each frame, this has been confirmed by LM), for everybody, even those that CAN use SSAA or are not worried about the minor shimerring at night, especially if they don't tweak their shaders.
However, I do not see this effect with other Airport Addons.
That's just because they were probably made for FSX, converted to P3D or, even if they were made for P3D, they were made for the legacy shaders and not really thought as PBR, so they never bother to create normal maps to begin with. PBR simply cannot work without normal maps, since it affects everything. True PBR *requires* the proper antialiasing modes, like SSAA or Temporal Antialiasing, otherwise you WILL see moire effects and, as explained so many times already, if can affect each and every game out there, even those using more modern gaming engines, if the correct antialiasing is not set.
There are some rumours REX Environment force does something with shaders. Anyway, just make sure, I started P3D without REX and cleared the shader cache before, so it should not have an influence.
That's an assumption.
If you only removed the shader cache, the shaders would be only recompiled from their sources in the Prepar3d\ShaderHLSL folder. If THIS folder contains altered shaders, you won't see any difference, unless "without REX" means you ran whatever procedure REX has in place ( assuming it has one ), to RESTORE the default shader source files. Only after you restore the original shaders folder, then can be regenerated as default, when their binary cache in the %LOCALAPPDATA% folder is removed.
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....clearly, there must be some other issue at play, assuming you copied the correct files, which I don't have any reasons to doubt.
However, I do not see this effect with other Airport Addons.
That's just because they were probably made for FSX, converted to P3D or, even if they were made for P3D, they were made for the legacy shaders and not really thought as PBR, so ....
thanks for the info regarding shaders. Restoring them did not lead to any further conclusion though. So I'm somewhat at a loss what the issue can be.
Regarding the other Addons and the way they are creating the runways or taxiways or ground textures. Well, maybe so. I am talking about 135 Airport Addons for roughly 3000 Euros where I don't get that effect. Yours is No. 136 :-). I mean it's a Laptop with I7-4820HQ and GTX980M, so it is not sooo bad. Can run Red Dead Redemption2 visually pleasing, just as a side note. But it is simply not capable of running SSAA, because that would bring me below 20fps average. Sure it will be not able to run FS2020, no doubt. But what is the gain *NOW* of having non flat runway textures, for the price of such visual discomfort due to the Moire effect ? There is no gain, because the visual disturbance is bigger than even noticing non flat textures.
As a consequence, if new sceneries anticipate FS2020 already now, I would have to stop buying Addon sceneries. That can't be intended ?
Mike
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Regarding the other Addons and the way they are creating the runways or taxiways or ground textures. Well, maybe so. I am talking about 135 Airport Addons for roughly 3000 Euros where I don't get that effect. Yours is No. 136
Not many developers do proper PBR sceneries, we know.
But that's besides the point. The real question is: do you see the same result as in MY screenshot with the MSAA textures ? The 1st one ? That is taken using our texture set compatible with MSAA, using MSAA.
Do you see the same results ? It looks much worse in YOUR screenshot, so this is the real issue you have. You said you copied the files manually, because the Live Updater for some reason didn't. Are you SURE you copied the correct files ?
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But that's besides the point. The real question is: do you see the same result as in MY screenshot with the MSAA textures ? The 1st one ? That is taken using our texture set compatible with MSAA, using MSAA.
Do you see the same results ? It looks much worse in YOUR screenshot, so this is the real issue you have. You said you copied the files manually, because the Live Updater for some reason didn't. Are you SURE you copied the correct files ?
No, unfortunately I can't get your result, means I can't get any better than in my first screenshot. I doubled checked I copied the correct textures (with the incorrect textures it looks worse as in the screenshot above). I also double checked I'm using the latest NVidia driver, then reinstalled the P3D client (to get back the original shaders from the P3Droot\ShadersHLSL folder). And started from a fresh prepar3d.cfg. I also checked dxdiag, it said "No problems found".
I don't know what else to do.
Something the GTX980M Laptop GPU is not capable ?
Mike
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Mike
Are you using Chaseplane?
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Virtuali, could it be that during the process of updating the noisy textures at night you have forgotten one file? As you can see in the pic, the apron in the background is totally noisy and it shimmers very bad. With SSAA everything is ok but not with MSAA. This is the only place on the apron which shows such behaviour.
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No, the texture hasn't been forgotten, it's just that it required more toning down than the others. Try Live Update again now.
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Thank you Umberto, much better now ! :)