Ken Hall Posted June 21, 2015 Share Posted June 21, 2015 I recently posted some information in the P3D forum but I feel that pictures may convey the message better. P3D 2.5 has had its shadow rendering optimised I now love the terrain shadows, gone are the hard edges instead a beautifull shading to add depth to your mountains etc, but I found many people were not utilising to autogen vegetation recieve shadows, this is a HUGE plus for turning your autogen into realistic vegetation, vegetation cast is also great but you can gget away without it if your system is struggling, I find that to have every shadow turned on does not have a detrimental impact on my system, maybe 5FPS the LOD and autogen density seem to have more impact, so better to reduce the lod and density a tiny bit and turn on the shadows. the difference is amazing. here are some screen shots comparing shadows recieve ON compared to the OFF Examine this shot closely do your trees have the depth of this shot, read on and check out some comparisons, P3D excells with its shadows and they are not as demanding on your system as you may have found with previous versions of P3D. No recieve or cast shadows here and the ground under the trees is way too light Compare to this shot where the cast and recieve are on, cast is more effective in this senario as the terrain needs the tree shadows late finals and the terrain shadows are giving depth to the trees on the right, some trees only the top onf the canopy is lit up, Ive been doing landscape paintings for years and this is what we should see Shadows ON and in this one there is also a cloud shadow over the cliff Shadows ON Shadows recieve ON notice the trees on the shaded side of the hill now blend with the terrain No vegetation recieve here, trees on the shaded side stick out like lollie pops I hope that some of you were able to gain something from this. cheers Ken Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VH-KDK Posted June 21, 2015 Share Posted June 21, 2015 Thanks for this Ken. Some great shots and explanations on how to improve how the scenery. edit. Just happened to be sitting on the ground at Christensen Ranch airport with a forest of palms next to the runway. Changed the vegetation shadow settings and the result is amazing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Capt Pugwash Posted June 21, 2015 Share Posted June 21, 2015 Superb shots and guidance Ken...P3D is on the cards for me... soon be shopping for a higher spec Mobo and sli my GTX970 and I reckon I will be "flying high" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bernd1151 Posted June 21, 2015 Share Posted June 21, 2015 Thanks again, Ken. I read your earlier post in the P3D section and used it immediately. As you said, the FPS impact was small, but the visual results immediately noticeable Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iain Emms Posted June 21, 2015 Share Posted June 21, 2015 Great post this Ken, should help a lot of people this. cheers Iain Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil Manhart Posted June 21, 2015 Share Posted June 21, 2015 Thanks Ken. I think too many of us are still gun shy about enabling too many shadows in P3Dv2, but as your post shows they can be well worth the few less frames per second. Sent from my HTC6525LVW using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sammy H Posted June 21, 2015 Share Posted June 21, 2015 Wonderful stuff, maybe one day I will make the jump to P3D but until then I will live vicariously though all of you Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Breeze Posted June 21, 2015 Share Posted June 21, 2015 Now I see! Thanks for this Ken. It does make a difference. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FILOU Posted June 21, 2015 Share Posted June 21, 2015 I used on all my shots and when i fly,it makes an incredible difference! Thank you Ken anyway to share for those who do not know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blue Sky Dreaming Posted June 22, 2015 Share Posted June 22, 2015 Thanks Ken, your shots are brilliant and am really looking forward to flying in this region very soon, appreciate all of your hard work! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam Banks Posted June 22, 2015 Share Posted June 22, 2015 I totally agree: P3D with its trees/objects shading really has one over on FSX. I just wish they'd sort out their water and cloud shaders (yuk!). Adam. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ken Hall Posted June 23, 2015 Author Share Posted June 23, 2015 I totally agree: P3D with its trees/objects shading really has one over on FSX. I just wish they'd sort out their water and cloud shaders (yuk!). Adam. with regard to the water they did provide me with an adjustment to the HDSL shaders which lightened the water to spot on, Ive lost thet setting but will contact LM and ask for it again, its a simple fix and will give you much nicer water , stay tuned for the mod, cheers Ken Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam Banks Posted June 23, 2015 Share Posted June 23, 2015 with regard to the water they did provide me with an adjustment to the HDSL shaders which lightened the water to spot on, Ive lost thet setting but will contact LM and ask for it again, its a simple fix and will give you much nicer water , stay tuned for the mod, I'd be keen to see that one, Ken. I've been following all sorts of home-built code tweaks for the shaders, but it's really something LM should be doing. They're standard C++ files - nothing fancy. I managed to tweak the clouds code a bit to make the distant "cotton-wool effect" clouds fluffier, but there really need to be changes in the repetition/randomness of cloud generation. If FSX can get it right, I can't see why P3D can't. I wonder whether your fix lightens all the water or just that "oily/black" stuff when looking vertically down. Adam. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ken Hall Posted June 23, 2015 Author Share Posted June 23, 2015 Here s the mod go to your P3D/shaders HDSL/GPUTerrain.fxh replace with the attached file, go to app data/LM/shaders folder and delete( please back up your shaders HDSL before doing this) you can tweek the Terrain. use these notes from Kevin to adjust If you want to test increasing the brightness more for the base texture to provide more feedback, you can modify GPUTerrain.fx line 881 “BaseColor *= lerp( .35f, 1.0f, fAlpha );â€.You can play with increasing the .35f toward a level that you think is more acceptable. We are always welcome to visual feedback.The changes that might be causing the darkness are related to how we go aboutblending the reflections / base textures together. the attached file has a value of 6.5f heres a screenshot showing the coral at Pago cheers Ken water shaders mod.zip Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam Banks Posted June 23, 2015 Share Posted June 23, 2015 Fantastic, Ken - I'll give that a whirl! Adam. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alan2 Posted June 23, 2015 Share Posted June 23, 2015 Thanks Ken - love the Islands . Installing the mod and firing up the sim as I speak .At last I may have a grip on ocean colour ( I dont touch FSWC ) .Water is the big eyesore atm , particularly inland water . Maybe LH is going to do something about it ? Cheers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam Banks Posted June 23, 2015 Share Posted June 23, 2015 Ken - here's the result of that revised shaders file: Hard to see the difference in these shots, but in the sim it's a lot more noticeable. This was with their suggested value of 6.5f (from 3.5f). I may try it even higher. Thanks! Adam. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ken Hall Posted June 23, 2015 Author Share Posted June 23, 2015 Ken - here's the result of that revised shaders file: Hard to see the difference in these shots, but in the sim it's a lot more noticeable. This was with their suggested value of 6.5f (from 3.5f). I may try it even higher. Thanks! Adam. you'llfind its effect is more for photoreal, those shots are of landclass/waterclass, try around pago, the 6.5 is the value I came up with after testing, but I did try 7.5 as well, good luck with finding wich value appeals to you cheers Ken Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Harris Posted June 23, 2015 Share Posted June 23, 2015 Or try Auckland harbor, this is all photoreal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kev D Posted June 24, 2015 Share Posted June 24, 2015 Ken, Can't find P3D/shaders HDSL/GPUTerrain.fxh. BUT can find Shaders HLSL. Is this a misprint, or am I looking in the wrong place? Thanks, Kev Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ken Hall Posted June 25, 2015 Author Share Posted June 25, 2015 Ken, Can't find P3D/shaders HLSL/GPUTerrain.fxh. BUT can find Shaders HLSL. Is this a misprint, or am I looking in the wrong place? Thanks, Kev go to your P3D/ShadersHLSL/GPUTerrain.fx and replace the GPUTerrain.fx with the attached file cheers Ken Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kev D Posted June 25, 2015 Share Posted June 25, 2015 Much obliged, Ken - Thanks. Did it, and it makes a real difference Kev Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adam Banks Posted June 25, 2015 Share Posted June 25, 2015 This is around NZQN (on a really cloudy/wintry day):Shader value at 7.5. Thanks, Ken - my P3D water is looking much better all-round now!Adam. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ken Hall Posted June 25, 2015 Author Share Posted June 25, 2015 This is around NZQN (on a really cloudy/wintry day): Shader value at 7.5. Thanks, Ken - my P3D water is looking much better all-round now! Adam. Those shots look great, glad I could help, I've been trying to get LM to adjust these in the default shaders, time to remind them again.Cheers Ken Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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