CyberLab Death To Pixels Shader Preset Packs

[Cyber]

@Theoldnation

is this how it should look like?

I think I’ll let you be the judge of that. I’ve posted several pictures of my presets in action and some videos as well so you can easily get an idea of how things can look.

The screenshot looks good to me but I hardly test and play at 1080p these days and I hardly play and test PSX games in general.

Does it look good to you?

@Theoldnation

i had noticed that by changing non scale and offset in the normal preset it doesn’t really change much of how it looks the image,

I’m not sure if I’m understanding what you’re saying here when you say non-scale and offset. Are you talking about Non-integer scale and Non-Integer Scale Offset? If so, is there a need to change those settings?

Another thing to remember is that screenshots only tell part of the story if you’re trying to convey what you’re actually seeing to someone else. The same screen shot can look very different on two different displays depending on their subpixel alignment for example. The screenshot may not convey this. Sometimes what is needed is a stabilized close up photo of the screen showing what’s happening at the phosphor level.

But as I mentioned above, the screenshot looks as intended to me.

[Cyber]

Just a sneak peak at what I’ve been up to lately. I really like the way these new Shadow Mask presets are shaping up!

Tap on image then zoom in for best viewing. Desktop users, right click then Open in New Tab, then press F11 for FullScreen. Non 4K users, zoom in until it looks correct.

[Cyber]

If you tap to zoom in (no larger than fullscreen) on the following images you might notice strange artifacts if you observe the scanlines carefully enough.

In the first and third screenshots there are some scanlines which look different from the others. I’ll call them “runt scanlines” for now. They look narrower and not fully formed compared to the others. It’s easier to spot if the screen isn’t zoomed in to extreme, macro like levels.

My solution/workaround was to increase Integer Scale Offset.

Unfortunately, at these high integer scale levels a lot of the screen is cropped, leaving little to no area for the reflective bezel experience.

So I’m bringing this to your attention @guest.r and @HyperspaceMadness in case you might have not already been aware of it.

Runt scanlines

It occurs every 3rd scanline in this one.

No Runt scanlines

Runt Scanlines

It occurs every 3rd scanline in this one as well.

No Runt Scanlines

Any ideas about what might be causing this and how it might be solved or improved short of having 4K screens with an additional 120 to 240 vertical pixels?

I’m guessing that a 16:10, 4K display might be ideal for this although I’ve never heard of such a thing.

r/Monitors - Why does nobody produce a 4K 16:10 (3840x2400) desktop monitor?

[guest.r]

You can debug the scanlines by using the -1.0 mask. But usually it’s a product of the mask/scanline interaction on narrow scanlines and using non-integer scaling.

The “wrong” pattern might also emmerge in a different sequence if you use a game with some other vertical resolution. It might also happen with integer scaling and non-aperture masks. There is not much one can do about it, perhaps changing between odd/even integer scaling (crop or enlarge).

[Cyber]

Just doing some experimentation with low gamma as well as trying to match the intensity and accuracy of the artifacting compared to reference image just for fun. I did the gamma adjustment from memory and in hindsight it ended up much darker than the reference image below.

Reference image is also quite saturated.

This seems like a very interesting and informative picture to study if one were tweaking something like the “new” magic glow to try to nail the way colours sometimes appear to bleed or blend with surrounding pixels depending on the contrast or delta between neighbouring colours.

I always take these photos with a huge helping of salt when it comes to using them as an accurate point of reference though but they can still be useful at least for my approach to CRT shader preset development, which is based around whether something looks good to me or not.

[Cyber]

Some of my latest Shadow Mask work and why not create a new Composite Slot Mask NTSC preset?

[Theoldnation]

I’m quite enthusiastic about this new release combined with the latest hsm

[Cyber]

@Theoldnation

I’m quite enthusiastic about this new release

So am I.

@Theoldnation

combined with the latest hsm

All of those screenshots were taken using the latest version of HSM Mega Bezel Reflection Shader with a couple modifications. I first swapped out one of the shaders in the Base Presets to get the NTSC Filtering Section controls working again. Then I manually updated the Shaders and Resources using the latest GIT in order to fix a bug with the BGR Mask Layout implementation that was introduced in the version of CRT-GUEST-ADVANCE that the latest release version of HSM Mega Bezel Reflection Shader uses.

I’m optimistic that those two issues will be resolved in a subsequent release version of HSM Mega Bezel Reflection Shader in addition to the reflection bug when using Bezel Independent Scale and that version, barring any unforseen issues will probably be a definitive release for some time to come, at least when it comes to my Shader Presets.

[Cyber]

These might be some good reference shots for those who would like to improve their CRT Shader presets by focusing on getting the blending, edges and resolution of their presets to match just by using the scanlines alone. I might attempt to replicate this at some point in the probably distant future.

r/crt - David Attenboroughs 2021 Life in Colour on a 1988 5" Back and White CRT

r/crtgaming - Life in Colour but it's Black and White. David Attenborough fail

The Black and White really helps to bring the CRT’s “natural/analog” anti-aliasing magic into focus.

To be taken with a healthy helping of salt though because the photo not being perfectly focused can also lead to a softening of the edges, increased blending and reduction of aliasing.

[Theoldnation]

hello i’m back with further investigation about quality on my screen, i had managed to figure out it apparently wasn’t neither resolution brightness, color profile or anything of that, it was actually the scanlines, and by changing the scanline and opposite dir multiplier it generated interesting results, i was able to eliminate the weird blockyness and coloring of the games, i’ve matched it to screen resolution instead of viewport, and looks quite good

[Cyber]

@Theoldnation

it was actually the scanlines, and by changing the scanline and opposite dir multiplier it generated interesting results, i was able to eliminate the weird blockyness and coloring of the games, i’ve matched it to screen resolution instead of viewport, and looks quite good

I’m glad it looks good but do you mind sharing or elaborating as to what you did to get it to look good so that I can better understand what is going on.

The scanline direction multiplier is supposed to adjust the sampling resolution so I can see how increasing that might help things to look a bit more upscaled.

Opposite dir multiplier actually multiplies the number of scanlines by a percentage. 100% is ideal for an authentic look with the scanlines being the appropriate number for the core output resolution. Increasing or decreasing this would cause misaligned scanlines. Doubling it would cause the scanlines to be less visible and scanlines actually help smooth the image.

I haven’t spent much time on the Drez presets, only threw them in to prevent crashing on certain graphics cards with users who use upscaling.

[Theoldnation]

i didn’t did actually that much to “fix” my image i just matched the opposite dir and scanline dire in scaled core res to my video output, i had noticed this also makes changes to the mask, and it makes the image looked like it has a blur or “blarg” effect, this is how pixels looked like without modifying that

[Theoldnation]

i don’t know if it could be appreciated but, in the first one looks like there is some weird spacing between pixels that degrades color in a weird manner sometimes somehow and it makes quite noticable the scanlines over the image will moving, in the second doesn’t do that the first two images will show an example of how it shows on my screen with modified presets, the second will be an example of how it shows with similar configuration to normal preset, and this same thing happens on all presets as i’m looking into them, i can’t configure them to match my screen under the configuration menu, but i’ll see if i can modified it via the config file. also if i just stay with normal opposite and scanline dir multiplier, the pixel align will be normal but blockyness on fmvs will eventually appear as documented before alongside a weird pretty warm coloring

[Theoldnation]

i was able to get it

[Cyber]

I noticed you’re using my 1080p presets Optimized. These use BGR Mask Layout, 1. Are you sure your that is the correct Mask Layout for your screen?

In order to check this, you can look at an all white screen using one of my presets and if you see the phosphors appearing in the order of Red, Blue, then Green you should have the correct layout for your screen.

If not then change Mask Layout to 0 and you should see the phosphors appearing in the order of Red, Green, Blue.

If you’re seeing anything else for example Magenta, Green, then you’re probably using the wrong layout.

[Cyber]

@Theoldnation

i was able to get it

I’m glad you like what you’re seeing but all I’m seeing are uneven scanlines.

If you’re using any value for opposite direction scanline multiplier that results in a number of scanlines that’s not a multiple of the native resolution, you’ll get uneven scanlines. So you can go from 100 to 200 and you should be safe from uneveness but then the scanlines wouldn’t be perfectly aligned with the sprites.

If you use a value like 75 or 150, you’ll have both uneven scanline spacing as well as misaligned scanlines. So it’s generally best to leave that value at 100.

The other thing that might cause uneven looking scanlines is the viewport being too small vertically to provide enough resolution to properly render the scanlines. If this is the case you can try changing to integer scale first and if it still doesn’t fix it, you can probably increase the Integer Scale Offset.

Based on your feedback, I’m probably going to have to go through and test some of these 1080p presets to see if I can reproduce what you’re experiencing and resolve them.

[Theoldnation]

i’m checking quite a bit, as the modification i did to opposite dir to 125 is the most similar i could get to the rest of the presets and how they looked like, i’ll do more tests and see what i can get, this is what i see , this is the pixel patern with current, the second is the one i get with default opposite and scanline the problem is, the last one generates artifacting on fmvs and weird too much warm coloring, i’ll see the different layout masks just to see if any of them solves the artifacting, i gotta remember if something changes

[Cyber]

@Theoldnation

i did to opposite dir to 125

This will mess up the scanlines. Don’t you see it? They won’t be evenly spaced at this setting. That setting is really about having more or less scanlines you know.

Can you list the presets that you’re trying and some of the games as well. I’m going to give them a test at some point in the near future.

Those super zoomed in screenshots don’t really help much. It might be more useful to just post the raw screenshot and allow me to zoom in myself if I would like to.

I can’t remember if you mentioned if you tested your screen layout yet. What display are you using if you don’t mind you asking?

Another thing you can do if you wish is send some actual photos of your screen so that I can actually see what you’re seeing. A GPU screenshot doesn’t tell the whole story. You can use ISO 100 or 200, Shutter Speed 1/60, Auto or Manual Focus, WB 5,000 or around 4,200.

[Theoldnation]

My display is le48m600m80, psx and psx composite, both drez and normal, the games are dino crisis, silent hill, earthworm jim 2, final fantasy 9, medievil, megaman legends, ape escape

i’ll try later sending images of what i actually see with my camera

[Cyber]

@Theoldnation

psx and psx composite, both drez and normal,

Can you give the full preset names if you can please. Just makes things easier to identify.

@Theoldnation

My display is le48m600m80

Okay, so I’m now seeing that this is a Haier TV. There could be all sorts of issues caused by the TV itself and the modes it supports, or the mode that it is in currently.

You want to ensure that the TV is not performing any stretching or upscaling of the image. Also your colour format should be RGB 4:4:4 Full. Anything else and you might have some problems.