CyberLab Death To Pixels Shader Preset Packs

Yep, that’s what I’m doing now, it’s fairly complicated. Crt shaders are such a niche thing, there are very few people who understand it. With shaders I aim for the most “platform accurate” look and you are the only person who has a very good eye for this thing. Thanks to you I managed to get a satisfactory result for most consoles. Now I am trying to make a “perfect” shader for 480p platforms, but I lack the technical knowledge of how they look on an actual crt tv, your wii preset seems to be pretty good.

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Here are the screenshots of the wii preset with different versions of mega bezel:

This is with the latest mega bezel version: https://imgur.com/aYYMgjG

And this is with the 1.14.0 version: https://imgur.com/5IoyHnB

The first one looks nice and clean and the second one looks like a different mask type and it’s too dark. Just trying to find out the technical reasons for this difference and which one would be more “correct”.

This version of Mega Bezel Reflection Shader is currently untested and unsupported by my CyberLab Mega Bezel Death To Pixels Shader Preset Pack.

If you would like to find out these kinds of technical details then you can probably ask @HyperspaceMadness or @guest.r in their threads what has changed in their shaders since the last version of Mega Bezel Reflection Shader that my preset pack supports was released.

You can also look back through the threads and GitHub accounts and you can see the history of what has changed.

I can tell you that it’s a lot that has changed.

So I really wouldn’t be able to give you much assistance with a combination of shader and preset pack versions that is untested, not recommended and unsupported. That would not be a valuable use of my time.

If something is too dark, there are simple ways in which you can brighten it though. They will not have the same brightness on every display.

There are also various presets and preset packs which don’t give the Mask Strength and detail priority.

At this point you’re not making sense. You don’t want the bezel so you try to disable it. Yet I have a CRT-Royale preset pack as well as a Sony Megatron Color Video Monitor preset pack which don’t include any bezels. Why don’t you use those instead?

Now you mention that a preset looks too dark when Sony Megatron Color Video Monitor has solved that brightness headroom limitation with the use of HDR and other users have been using presets like this for years now without issue, they just know that in order to accurately emulate a CRT, you need a lot of brightness so they run their displays at full brightness. Even Sony Megatron Color Video Monitor in SDR mode tells users to set their display’s brightness to the max.

I personally don’t have to do that on my display because it’s bright enough and has more than enough contrast at the everyday settings I use. Users with different displays, calibration settings as well as different tastes, mileage may vary of course.

If you want presets which are generally brighter but might make compromises elsewhere, why not try Sonkun’s, Hyllian’s, RetroCrisis’, Zomb’s and other presets?

I know you may not like RetroGames4K’s or NesGuy’s presets if you think some of my Mega Bezel Presets are too dark.

So if you want to have a really special CRT Shader experience maybe you should look into upgrading or maximizing what you can get out of your display because that’s the biggest bottleneck when it comes to things like this and you have to be very careful what you buy because you can easily end up with something that’s rather unsuitable.

You can’t go wrong with an LG OLED TV or even one of their brighter, modern IPS offerings. Even in my preset pack there are presets which vary in brightness. There are even presets called “bright”!

So you see what happens when you try to provide variety and lots of choice? You still can’t please everybody.

So why is it that you don’t want the bezel, want things to be brighter and seem to want the latest advancements yet, you’re not using my preset pack which has support for HDR or allows you to turn your SDR display’s brightness to the max and uses more up to date base shaders and is currently the only one that is being actively developed and supported?

This is not a question I can answer. I don’t even use a CRT for reference. Maybe someone with a more critical eye or view of these things might be able to assist.

It might be better to use imgbb to share screenshots as it gives you the option to share the full resolution not recompressed image.

I don’t know if imgur allows that but if it does, I don’t know how.

Unfortunately, Sony Megatron Color Video Monitor preset pack will probably never look any good on my current monitor no matter what, even at max brightness, CRT Royale presets don’t look that good either, Mega Bezel presets are great in almost every aspect and look great on most monitors, that’s why I prefer them.

My only issue right now is finding a good shader/preset for 480p consoles, since almost noone cares about that and almost everyone just upscales the crap out of them, which is not always the best look, especially with games that still used prerendered stuff.

Did you mention what make and model or resolution it was already? If not, feel free to share.

Were you using these presets with their corresponding Blargg NTSC Video Filters which they were designed to go hand in hand with?

Good things come to those who read by the way…

Read these posts carefully and you might find exactly what you’re looking for.

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Introducing CyberLab Megatron 4K HDR Game PSX Composite Slot Mask Smooth Ultra.slangp

The pics might be dark because of the low ISO I used in order to capture all of the “phosphor” detail. Just brighten your display.

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Introducing CyberLab Megatron 4K HDR Game SNES Composite Slot Mask Ultra Smooth.slangp

The pics might be dark because of the low ISO I used in order to capture all of the “phosphor” detail. Just brighten your display.

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I have a 4k HDR tv. Which preset is recommended for PlayStation 1 and 2?

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If you’re using my Sony Megatron Color Video Monitor preset pack be sure to go into the Shader Parameters and set your Peak and Paper White Luminance values to match your display.

Also be sure to set your “Display’s Subpixel Layout” or “Mask Layout” setting to match your display or just to what matches or looks best on your display when you go right up to the screen.

Any preset across my preset pack with “PSX” in the filename should be suitable. You can try them all and see which ones you like best.

If you want to cheat a bit you can probably start with the ones that have the word “Ultra” somewhere in the filename because they’re relatively newer. That doesn’t mean the ones that don’t have “Ultra” in the name are not good though.

I had a really awesome experience recently with one of my first Slot Mask Presets for PSX, CyberLab Megatron 4K HDR Game PSX Composite Slot Mask Smooth Ultra.slangp.

Can’t really be of much use here as I don’t emulate PS2 using RetroArch so I don’t know how my presets would look on that system.

Maybe you can try my Turbo Duo_DC or PSX presets and see how they look.

for the CyberLab Megatron 4K HDR presets pack it says to put the shaders folder into the retroarch folder but those presets are loose in that folder. Don’t they go in the Mega_Bezels_Packs folder?

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“Loose” you say?

Don’t worry, I think I understand what you’re saying. The readme and setup instructions are correct in this regard.

I use my presets and share them exactly the same way that they are setup and used by me.

If you wish, you can alter the paths using a text editor, for example notepad++ then put them in a folder of your choosing and they should work once you don’t get your paths mixed up.

If you’ve been following my latest work, you should see how quickly and how frequently I release updates.

Having to edit paths everytime I alter a preset before uploading it would slow me down considerably.

It’s also one of the reasons why I don’t have my latest preset packs on GitHub (at least not yet). In my case time is of the essence.

Only Mega Bezel Preset Packs go in the “Mega_Bezel_Packs” folder".

CyberLab Megatron Death To Pixels 4K HDR Shader Preset Pack is not a Mega Bezel Preset Pack.

Ah ok. Thanks Cyber.

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Some recent screenshots from my Sony Megatron Colour Video Monitor Preset Pack.

Best viewed on a 4K Display HDR600 or better display.

CyberLab Megatron Death To Pixels 4K HDR Shader Preset Pack Screenshots - 02-2024

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@Cyber so I’m trying to just slap your ReShade presets on a 800x600 game running scaled inside 1080p just to see how it’d look like, but I’m getting a black picture no matter which Resolution X Y I put.

Then I did notice that the Border Size is at 700.0 value, but it goes 0.0 - 3.0 if I drag it, and then the image appears.

Am I doing something wrong?

Do note that my ReShade presets are based on a very old version of the GDV ReShade port. Are you using that one or the most recent one?

Are you using the same value for Resolution X and Resolution Y?

I haven’t the slightest idea. I don’t really know much about nor use the ReShade ports of GDV and CRT-Guest-Advance much. I just followed some guides in order to set them up, tweaked them to my liking in a few games then shared my results with the community.

You might get better support for these in the following threads.

This is the old thread where you’ll find the Guest-DR-Venom ReShade port, which is what my presets were made for.

This is the new version of the shader which I have no idea if my presets will work properly with.

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I was from that other thread, but I looked at your links and found an older one.

The .ini preset files I found (03-07-22) seem to use technique which is from CRT-Guest-Advanced, not GDV (is it this one I've ported Guest-Dr-Venom to ReShade!)?

That one handles the Border Size 700 value issue, so I can see all of your presets and the image.

I am confused to which version and where is the package for ReShade, I found one in that old GDV thread and here, and all else you posted if for RA, not ReShade. I have “CyberLab ReShade Death To Pixels Shader Preset Pack 03-07-22.zip” that I found but please tell me if that’s outdated.

So, is that 03-07-22 zip presets + the old CRT-Guest-Advance is the way to go (not old GDV)?

Blargg doesn’t seem to have ReShade port, I guess it’s not needed for it?

As I understand it, the new ReShade 6.0.1 as of writing can “auto-fill” the X and Y resolutions (ie 480x270 in your presets). I saw X and Y using your (preprocessor) resolutions, and they are correctly applied.

On the fly what would you recommend for 1080p screen (which has 800x600 content inside, stretched vertically only? It’s not in RA, so ReShade will apply the filter to 1080p, but I’d just need it to cover the content nicely).

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To avoid any confusion you need to follow the steps in the readme file. If the readme points to a link to a post in another thread then that means you need to go to that post and follow the instructions there.

In the case of my Re-Shade Preset pack, the first post of this thread points to the post in this thread where I originally posted my ReShade preset pack, which you have already downloaded.

Once you download that, you then need to follow the steps in the readme, then you need to follow the links until you learn and understand how to install the Guest-Dr-Venom ReShade port.

“Outdated” is a bit harsh. It does what it’s supposed to do and better than many commercial solutions included with some pixel art games. It looks particularly beautiful in “The Messenger”.

I loaded up “The Messenger” a little while ago and I think I might have tweaked at least one of my presets there but I guess I have to update the package.

This +

Which is what the readme points to.

Blargg video filter presets have nothing to do with ReShade. That’s for RetroArch only.

This is a welcome development.

This is supposed to match the native resolution of the particular game that is being run.

As far as I understand, you should still use the native resolution of the content especially if you want to be able to see any sort of scanlines.

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For some more inspiration.

https://www.reddit.com/r/crtgaming/s/E4RUAtYs6L

https://www.reddit.com/r/crtgaming/s/XUhkcSd6PH

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Hello! Can i undo the color change and how? Thanks. I am trying Dino Crisis psx, but color changes drastically in game. What should be grey becomes some version of purple. Grey walls also get reddish and green tone.

Hello @IceLancerSR, I have multiple shader preset packs on this thread now so you’ll have to let me know which shader preset pack and preset you’re having an issue with.

It would also be a great help if you can post a screenshot and or a photo of your screen showing the issue. That should make it easier to proceed.

It might also help if you can share what make and model display you’re using and at what resolution you currently have it set to.

In addition to that, which emulator core are you using?

Be sure you’re using the recommended version of the shaders with the Shader Preset Pack in question and also be sure that your Display’s Subpixel Layout or Mask Layout matches the subpixel layout of your display. You can easily cycle through them all and see which looks best.