Koko-aio shader discussions and updates

[estefan3112]

Hi all, I am experiencing full crashes in RetroArch with koko-aio as well as Mega_Bezel (but not e.g. CRT-GEOM) since the 10 September Nightly Build. I am no programmer, but the commit on 10 September called “Downsize big char arrays in shader structs” made me test the builds of 9 September, still works, while 10 September and following crash. MacOS here. Any other platforms also affected? Many thanks for letting me know, need to file a bug report. Vulkan of course. Will also ask in Discord.

Crashed Thread: 0 Dispatch queue: com.apple.main-thread

Exception Type: EXC_BREAKPOINT (SIGTRAP) Exception Codes: 0x0000000000000001, 0x0000000184a6ce44

Termination Reason: Namespace SIGNAL, Code 5 Trace/BPT trap: 5 Terminating Process: exc handler [1159]

[kokoko3k]

Everything fine here, sorry to hear that.

At least you bisected bad commit, it’s a great start.

[estefan3112]

Linux right, or also Windows?

[Duimon]

@Starman99x

Hi @Duimon can I have your permission to use some of your backgrounds in these Mobile/J2ME presets I’m making?

My forum thread may have been a better place to ask. Please contact me in a private thread and we can discuss it.

[kokoko3k]

Just Linux, but I’m sure if it happened on Windows too, there would be plenty of complaints.

[estefan3112]

As of today’s build everything works again as promised by warmenhoven.

[kokoko3k]

I just pushed a commit to show simple test patterns.

For this change to NOT affect performance at all, only very simple patterns can be shown, this includes full black, gray, white, color to color vertical, horizontal and oblique gradients, color fades over time.

Gradients are good to spot color clippings and full screen time fades are very useful to spot moire patterns.

[ynnad4]

Excuse me for the extreme ignorance but I really like your presets.

I would like to use them alongside with the Overlays around this community, but I would like to get usage from your TV reflections that gives such a massive realism in any of the preset experiences.

Is there a way to just get the Reflections effect from your presets ?

Would really appreciate it.

[kokoko3k]

The 'reflections" are tightly integrated in the shader with their needed code spreaded across multiple passes to maximize an efficient use of the gpu; this makes nearly impossible to isolate them.

Depending on the external shader preset you want to use, it may be possible to prepend it to koko-aio; but usually you need a very fast gpu for it.

[Starman99x]

It seems that uncommenting the following line in config-user.txt will crash the shader:

// #define AUTOCROP_SAMPLES 0.02

[Starman99x]

I suggest this tweak to the default GameboyAdvance-Overlay.slangp:

BRIGHTNESS = "-0.050000"
IN_GLOW_GAMMA = "1.500000"

Before:

After:

[kokoko3k]

Its value should be an integer, not a float, the default is 10. However, it works here by uncommenting it either with an integer like 10 or with your example 0.02.

[kokoko3k]

Thanks, indeed the gamma was a bit dark, but I think i’ll tweak the gamma out value instead from 0.45 to 0.40.

[kokoko3k]

Lately there has been work in improving deconvergence emulation, kudos to @RickDangerous for asking for it and helping to set it up!

Deconvergence can now be a function of the distance from the center; this means that it is possible to have more deconvergence near edge/corners.

Another thing is that the image can be defocused the same way:

I hope the new parameters meaning is self explanatory.

Since the effect wanted is usually subtle, this feature comes in 2 flavours / performance targets:

Both the modes allow to higher the deconvergence and modulate horizontal blur near edge/corners.

In config-user.txt I’ve added a static parameter to enable the higher quality deconvergence setting:

// Use higher quality deconvergence flattering rgb scanlines when deconvergence is high
// and by syncing them to the deconvergence settings
// To enable high quality deconvergence, remove leading "//"
// #define HQ_DECON

Enabling this will move the scanlines to match the deconvergence and will flatten them near edge/corners…

Default quality:

HQ_DECON:

HQ_DECON has a small performance hit; still i don’t think it is worth to leave it enabled by default.

[Starman99x]

@kokoko3k

Thanks, indeed the gamma was a bit dark, but I think i’ll tweak the gamma out value instead from 0.45 to 0.40.

Yes, I like your tweak, but with bloom off:

GAMMA_OUT = "0.400000"
DO_BLOOM = "0.0"

Before:

Poor Lucas, blinded by bloom

[Kefka2b]

Hi @kokoko3k, I am having a blast with your shaders on the Odin 2 pro!!! I created a preset where I removed bezels and applied custom resolutions to all my cores, it’s awesome, thanks a lot!

I have one question is it possible to leverage my preset and make it 16/9 for games that are native wide-screen or have patches or cheats, basically a setting removing the ambient side bar and taking the whole screen.

[kokoko3k]

Hi there, i’m glad you’re having good times with your Odin 2 pro!

There is no way for a shader to know what is the aspect set by a core when you set retroarch option settings/vides/scaling,aspect ratio = “Full”, as you did, since you’re seeing ambient lights. So the easiest route would be to set that to “core provided” and save that as an override for games that needs it. (quick menu, overrides, save game override ,or save core override)

There are also several other way to achieve it by the shader but they also need you to save an override for the game (or the core), so I’ll spare you that

[Kefka2b]

Awesome I’ll give that a shot when I get a moment, I was playing around yesterday and was amazed that even with shader on and upscaled to 1080p 3d games on PSX and Dreamcast were running at full speed, and looked beautiful with your shaders.

[kokoko3k]

If you’re not doing it already, then I suggest you to use the presets in the Presets_HiresGames_Fast/ directory, since they will run faster with basically no visible quality loss for high resolution/upscaled games, at least you’ll spare some battery.

Speaking of battery life, search for “DELTA_RENDER” in this topic; it can be enabled by editing the file config/config_user.txt: change:

#define DELTA_RENDER 0.0 

to

#define DELTA_RENDER 1.0

…save and reload the shader;

[Starman99x]

There’s a big brightness loss when setting the corner radius to 0.0, you can replicate this bug in two ways: either manually set it to 0.0 in a slangp file, or use RA’s menu but don’t use left/right keys, instead click on the parameter and set it to 0 by choosing 0 from the scrolling menu. This confused me at first.