New CRT shader from Guest + CRT Guest Advanced updates

Sooo, what I’m hearing is test this and give me more stuff to work on.

2 Likes

You deserve a break but make sure to come back! You have a lot of fans and we eagerly await whatever you have in store next. :hugs:

5 Likes

Well deserved break too. You have (imo) by far created the best CRT shader currently available on any piece of software. Even with its default settings, nothing comes close.

Thank you.

5 Likes

I agree !! thanks you so much

5 Likes

Still loving this shader, I’ll have to do some measurements soon to see what kind of brightness I can push with the Lottes masks at full.

I did notice though that the colours change (look more warm than they should) when maxed out with Lottes maskLight = 1.00 and Lottes maskDark =0.00, but don’t with the CGWG mask (haven’t tried the Trinitron ones). Is this expected?

Also, is there any way you could port the downres feature that’s in the NTSC preset in the interlacing settings to the normal version? It’s really handy for cores like Flycast that don’t switch resolution internally down to 240p.

1 Like

I have been experimenting with the Reshade port of this shader as well and I was wondering, is there anything else happening when enabling Interlaced Mode in the shader other than adjusting the mask itself? I am not sure exactly how to describe it but when using it with PC games that use resolutions of 480p and up, I find that when moving around quickly the mask itself will bleed into itself (not like Phosphor bleed which is normal for CRTs) and it makes these lines from the mask appear on screen for a few seconds. I can’t capture a screenshot of it because it only happens when things are moving on screen but I can deduce that it would be a result of the mask trying to adjust to everything happing on screen and as a result, any fast horizontal movements results in these lines on the screen appearing from the mask (they are vertical black lines that appear for barely a second when moving around in game, but it is prominent enough to be noticeable).

Any ideas? I find that to get the mask layout that I need for using the CRT Guest Reshade port on PC games, I have to enable the interlaced mode so that the mask is fine enough for resolutions of 640x480 and up. I am not sure if this is just a drawback of CRT emulation on LCD technology or if there is something I haven’t configured correctly.

1 Like

I found the crt-guest-dr-venom2 amazing !! I’m using crt-guest-dr-venom with gaussian_horizontal-sharp for an antidither effect. I would like to know: how can I implement gaussian_horizontal-sharp in guest-dr-venom2?

screens with gaussian_horizontal-sharp + guest-dr-venom:

3 Likes

Hi there!

I know a nice setup, but it works best with the new ‘crt-guest-advanced’ iteration of the shader.

A single pass resampler is to be used instead of the first stock pass of the preset and scaling of the first pass increased to let’s say 3x.

Then nice features like x-pre scaling or downsampling can be used.

g-sharp-resampler (single pass):

Fixed version:

https://mega.nz/file/194l0aCI#Kd4ALj4fVGM31fFCrwh2HCv8i9UERhsjYm_BsQJQ_yk

Edit: for horizontal only effect this version can be used. First stock shader is to be replaced.

https://mega.nz/file/otohlYYQ#EH4bNecPhCkhoy78S36Wd1YwRULpuxms2b0WLtddLj8

Scaling in the preset (pass0) is to be corrected:

filter_linear0 = false
scale_type0 = source
scale_x0 = 3.0
scale_y0 = 1.0
alias0 = StockPass

Looks very nice with x-scaling.

7 Likes

Thank you very much for introducing me to g-sharp !! It’s really beautiful !!

All dither and pseudo transparency have been perfectly blended, and the sharpness is much better !! With the adjustments of this advanced version I managed to leave the white tone as I wanted! I imagine how this preset for Reshade in Sonic Mania could be !!

Look at the before and now:

before

after

5 Likes

One question ¿What I need set for vertical games like 1942 (arcade)? to get the correct scanlines, etc.

1 Like

You need to set the TATE parameter to 1.0, works quite nice with the FBNeo core. MAME cores might do a rotation before shaders are applied, be sure to check it out.

3 Likes

@guest.r

Why does the spacing of the scanlines change when you adjust the custom viewport height when playing a game with vertical scanlines? This has always puzzled me.

Hope you’re doing well, thanks for the updates.

2 Likes

Which core are you using? and which retroarch version? Some cores cause the viewport to be rotated like mame 2003 or FBNeo.

There used to be a problem with the aspect ratio used in these instances, but I think there was a fix put in for this in the last few months. So a new version might help, or a different emulator which doesn’t rotate the viewport might help too.

3 Likes

RA version 1.8.1 and FBNeo.

I really dislike that FBNeo rotates vertical games by default, forcing the user to toggle a core option and re-load the content. I opened an issue on Github which resulted in a lengthy debate but no resolution, lol.

Still, I don’t understand why adjusting the height of the custom viewport would affect the scanlines if the scanlines are vertical.

1 Like

So this is probably related to the aspect ratio and rotation issue I mentioned, so if you try V1.9.1 your issue may go away.

2 Likes

@guest.r the anti-ringing of g-sharp is wonderful! I configure it as much as possible, and there is no artifact around sprites!

Sonic1SMS_FM_v102-210430-031505 _Sonic1SMS_FM_v102-210430-031601

You did an amazing job here! as much as i love mdapt and sgenpt-mix, this is the only preset that i didn’t need to make adjustments per game, just by core.

I played here more like g-sharp + guest-venom-advanced and got more sharpening with this shader.

4 Likes

I tried it and it’s… different, but still wrong. Now the game is unrotated (good!) but the scanlines ARE rotated (bad). What we need is for the game and the scanlines to not be rotated by default. This shouldn’t be done under the hood; I feel really strongly about it, lol. The default rotation and ratio should be exactly how it would look on a CRT, and if it’s a vertical game that’s what the rotation options in RA’s video settings are for.

Also, now I’m noticing a weird bug where the highlight option rectangle in the GUI is now rotated 90 degrees and moves left to right, haha.

2 Likes

Meanwhile i’ve been testing the new PCSX2 core and the crt-guest-advanced (gdv2) works regular with the D3D11 driver, which is quite nice. The cross-compiler to HLSL had some issues with the g-sharp-resampler (single pass version) and i have fixed it, so it should be working now.

New DL link for g-sharp-single pass:

https://mega.nz/file/194l0aCI#Kd4ALj4fVGM31fFCrwh2HCv8i9UERhsjYm_BsQJQ_yk

A good example of usage for PS2 games:

  • set PCSX2 internal resolution to 2x
  • load g-sharp as the first pass (replace the stock shader), scaling of 1x is fine
  • g-sharp filtering range can be increased for better aa effect
  • enable downsampling under the Interlacing options of the crt shader
7 Likes

Can you post your current preset ? I still cant figure it out how you manage to dither both checkerboard pattern and waterfall for Shinobi III screenshot posted earlier. Thanks.

2 Likes

@hunterk Hey, how’s it going? Might have caught a bug, see one post up. Load a vertical game and the highlight option rectangle rotates 90 degrees and moves left to right :stuck_out_tongue:

2 Likes