June update + Antialiasing glitch

[Guest]

Hey good work Ross thanks for the Update can't wait for the CP and freeman's mind ain't bad either

[Guest]

perhaps you need more anisotropic filtering? 16X?

[Guest]

I'm not really a great computer person, but maybe its kind of like a pixel problem.

The pixels at a certain angle seem to disappear. Like how a straw loosk like its in two pieces in a cup of water at an angle, refraction.

 

Kind of like using Paint. You make a srtaight line, and it's straight. But as soon as you add a little angle to it, some of the square pixels stick together and make a rectangle pixel.

 

I know it might not help, but thinking outside the box never really hurts, right?

[Guest]

So I'm guessing part of the video involves the trainyard?

[Guest]

I have a perfect simple solution!:

just ignore the problem, nobody even notices that...

If you watch on a rail you don't even notice it and if you do, it doesent bother you...

[Guest]

Just dropping a comment on the FM vs. CP, personally I prefer hearing Gordon's raving over the dialogue of a few soldiers.

 

It's just that FM is so much more accessible to people. Everyone's played HL and can appreciate the straightforward humor. So far the series has been excellent.

 

CP on the other hand takes a lot more time, it's not as striking and a random viewer can't really appreciate the production value of it.

 

So, if the aim is to please the crowd prioritising FM over CP does make sense.

However even if you decide to go with CP I understand, after all it does look a lot more personal.

 

In any case I'm really looking forward to the next FM episode.

 

Take care.

[Guest]

Dang. I've come across this quite often as well, but even when I'm playing I rarely give it any heed. If it makes you feel any better, you pointing this out completely took me by surprise as I've seen Episode 4 many times and never even thought about noticing some glitch like this. It looks natural enough to go undetected even in plain view anyway.

 

Definitely don't give up any other current visual effect for this little thing.

[Guest]

If you're right about the conspiracy theory, i guess graphic cards like Quadros would fix this problem. Not really a solution, but i guess if also quadros have the same problem, it's a bug from the engine.

But since you do frame by frame rendering, why not use the slower AA that works?

Or is that too bad quality?

[Guest]

Guys offering workarounds: Don't worry about it. I tried to emphasize that this is just an annoyance, nothing that impacts production. I can always just use supersampling instead, I've already done that on a couple FM episodes.

 

Northern: Well I think CP you can actually show to people who know NOTHING about Half-Life and they'll still enjoy it. FM feels a little more targetted to gamers, though that's probably most of my demographic anyway.

 

Blackangel: I do use it, though AA limits on that are a little lower, plus it's slower. This is really just me wondering why the hell it's happening in the first place.

[Guest]

I never played Half life before yet I totally prefer FM than CP.

[Guest]

looks like z-clipping to me...

[Guest]

I've tried to reproduce the problem on two computers, one with a GeForce 7600 GS and one with a 8600 GT, but neither did it, so I can't really find a fix. Have you tried fiddling with the antialiasing settings in the Nvidia Control Panel (should be in the menu when you right click the desktop)? Under the 3D Settings Menu, click manage 3d settings and direct it to the hl2.exe file that you use. Try fiddling with the antialiasing settings there, which override HL2's settings. Hopefully that might work, but if not, you can just turn it back off.

[Guest]

Hey Ross, I found a video on youtube you might want to see

 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8w89wPStlEQ

 

 

Might help generate revenue you know

[Guest]

You using HDR with AA? It's a known issue in DX9 that when using the 2 together messes up results of black pixels often being full bright.

[Guest]

Oh I should say SSAA instead of MSAA should work fine.

[Guest]

Maybe I have a solution to the problem: while you record, don't use the AA filter of the Source Engine but activate the AA manualy from the control panel settings of your video card.

[Guest]

i don't know if i speak for everyone. but don't rush anything. who cares if you take awhile to complete an episode. i'd rather wait and have it be excellent, then see it now and be disappointed

[Guest]

There is something about your posts that really make me believe you are the most awesome person ever.

[Guest]

NOTE: I do nott own any source game, so all of this is a speculation on the screenshots . This is a theory and has not been tested.

 

Would it be possible to stop certain edges of brushes getting AA rendered on them if:

- One face (caulk or not) is parallel to another on another brush

- Two of these face's vertices (corners) on each brush (that are linked to form an edge) share the same coords along the edge?

 

My theory is simply that Source's maths output to render the polygons/faces on screen is rounded to a few decimal places to reserve memory. This is fine on-screen as one brush will be >.5

and the other <.5 of a pixel and so they fit together seamlessly.

 

However AA 'creates' the gaps even though the two brushes do not even have the tiniest gap between them because it (probably) takes the values that were used to render the faces on-screen which are rounded rather than re-harvesting values all over again.

 

I could be wrong however.

[Guest]

Why don't you try to run HL2 in DirectX 10? Is it possible? Maybe is a DX 9 glitch...