Ambient Occlusion (SSAO) way too WEAK

[Ala12Rv-watermanpc]

For the very first time, we have SSAO for DCS since a few months now, and I think it is a GREAT addition to visuals!, thanks ED!!

 

However, the implementation makes for a extremely slight darkening, almost invisible, rendering the effect useless in all situations. In real life, the places where there is not much indirect light (less energy light bounces) tend to look much darker. Of course, the relation between the darkening and the lighting is fixed, but our eyes/cameras can increase/decrease the overall brightness of the whole image so this is a relative issue. 

 

Nevertheless, I think we can conclude there is an acceptable level we all will agree from "correctly exposed" images and what our eyes usually perceive, and definitely, this effect must be MUCH darker and evident.

 

I have taken several images with and without SSAO enabled and as you will see, there is barely a difference, which shouldn't be the case. Also, this is happening in both internal cockpit view and the external world.

 

First w/o then w/ SSAO enabled:

 

 

 

 

 

As the images demonstrate, it is very hard to notice any ambient occlusion effect taking place, in the spots where there should be plently of light occlusion (no matter if on a sunny day or overcast, although in overcast, there is a slightly increased amount of darkening but still way too weak) there is pretty much nothing, and most of the visible AO is comming from the baked red channel of the roughmets files. As a comparison, here are few real life images showing the effect (and with a more or less equal exposition as one would have with his eyes, for those arguing about HDR or human eyes light adaptation). Note how the indirect light is specially strong (darkness) when the plane is over the ground and/or full of external tanks/bombs due to the objects making harder to the light bounce to these places.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Again, it depends on many factors, however, what's the point of having an effect that is doing pretty much nothing?. I'm not asking for a new solution nor ray tracing for making indirect global illumination, but for a simple darker effect of the actual implementation, and, if possible, with a better/more detailed option for SSAO in the graphics menu. Instead of SSAO=on/off there should be a variety of possibilities like low/med/high/ultra which would able for a higher quality (lower radious/more accurate/less grainy) SSAO...but at least, just darkening the effect would be great!. This is a FUNDAMENTAL visual effect for realism, so please, make it at least visible!

 

To clarify a bit more my point here are a few images of the effect working isolated from other things so we can better know what could be done. This visual effect is not a fully realistic approximation to the real life light behaviour, but it is much better than nothing, that's for sure, and while waiting for a future RT implementation, it can do a great work.

 

 

 

Thanks!

Edited July 17, 2021 by Ala12Rv-watermanpc

[Ala12Rv-watermanpc]

Hope something can be done about this!, little up!

Edited August 6, 2021 by Ala12Rv-watermanpc

[fagulha]

On 8/6/2021 at 6:14 PM, Ala12Rv-watermanpc said:

Hope something can be done about this!, little up!

 

+1

[GEIST]

Please keep in mind that SSAO generally speaking looks a bit s*** - it flickers and doesn't always appear in the correct spots.
BUT I do like the idea of having Raytraced AO (maybe that can be only feature to keep it fast) could help a lot for the look of the planes and the world.

[Ala12Rv-watermanpc]

On 9/17/2021 at 10:39 PM, GEIST said:

Please keep in mind that SSAO generally speaking looks a bit s*** - it flickers and doesn't always appear in the correct spots.
BUT I do like the idea of having Raytraced AO (maybe that can be only feature to keep it fast) could help a lot for the look of the planes and the world.

 

 

Having a proper ray traced global illumination solution for indirect light in DCS would be awesome. However, that would truly be performance hungry and would take quite some time to develop so I don't think that would be a solution at the moment. AO is far from perfect, and you are right, it won't be 100% accurate, but it is 1000% better than having nothing and to be honest, I think it makes a GREAT job when done right (take a look at other certain modern flight sim, AO looks incredible and extremely realistic). About the flickering, well, it shouldn't happen unless samples quality is way too low so it should be aesily fixable (some quality options in the graphics menu should do, just select between low, med, high and ultra and then everyone can choose accordingly with the power capabilities of their machines).

 

Anyway, I would be already happy just by making AO more pronounced, at least to make it visible in cockpits/airplanes, which right now is not the case.

[TheTaker]

I played with ReShade MXAO plugin (Marty McFly's Ambient Obscurance), here are the results:
Reshade preset attached.

MXAO.ini

Edited April 13, 2023 by TheTaker

[Nick_17]

9 hours ago, TheTaker said:

I played with ReShade MXAO plugin (Marty McFly's Ambient Obscurance), here are the results:
Reshade preset attached. 

I did not know about this shader, it looks great, i have integrated it into my preset - many thanks

 

Edited April 13, 2023 by Nick_17

[draconus]

15 hours ago, Nick_17 said:

Looks like solar eclipse, no thanks.

[Nick_17]

1 hour ago, draconus said:

Looks like solar eclipse, no thanks.

Really? Huh...i guess my Monitor is just bright af, the increased contrast and depth looks really nice on my end, the brightness is about the same. Good thing this can all be adjusted in the shader settings tho, if the effect is too harsh for some