External Lighting Streaks & Flickering Shadows?

[Fakum]

2 graphics issues I have that I havnt been able to figure out.

-Tree shadows (for example) flicker when Im flying helicopter.

-When I fly in formation with another Viper, and their NAV lights are on, flying level seems to be ok, but when they pull up, I see streaks of their external lighting?

I have my frame rates locked at 120 FPS, and my monitor is set to 120 Hz, VSync is on. Attached is my current Graphics settings. Which settings impact the 2 specific issues mentioned please?

Thanks for any help

[Fakum]

Can anyone suggest a better location to post this? I couldnt find a better location, figured this was an appropriate location, although not a bug, but it is a problem. Thanks,

[Flappie]

It's OK, your post has its place here.

What if you disable SSS?

[Fakum]

@Flappie Thank you sir for the response. I will give that a go, my question to that would be, since that is a "Shadowing" effect, would that still effect the streaks from the other Aircraft Navigation lighting I am seeing, or would that be an entirely different setting?

 

Thanks,

[Flappie]

For this, try to purge your shaders (both "fxo" and "metashaders2" folders in Saved Games/DCS...).

[Fakum]

@FlappieYeah, I do that before every update. I will do it again anyway. I did switch off SSS by the way and I still have shadow flickering

[Flappie]

Do you mind sharing a track showing the shadow issues?I'll see if I can reproduce it.

[Nedum]

On 2/26/2024 at 5:53 PM, Fakum said:

2 graphics issues I have that I havnt been able to figure out.

-Tree shadows (for example) flicker when Im flying helicopter.

-When I fly in formation with another Viper, and their NAV lights are on, flying level seems to be ok, but when they pull up, I see streaks of their external lighting?

I have my frame rates locked at 120 FPS, and my monitor is set to 120 Hz, VSync is on. Attached is my current Graphics settings. Which settings impact the 2 specific issues mentioned please?

Thanks for any help

Hi,

 

disable DLAA (Anti-Alaising off, no other AA method enabled) and look if those streaks are still there.

[Fakum]

@Flappie Short Track File attached.

@NedumI will try that as soon as I can hook up with someone to fly formation with me. but clarification please,,, i can set "Anti-Aliasing to "OFF", but is there something else I should turn off as well or just that?

Thanks guys!

nullnull

Tree Shadow Flickering.trk

[Fakum]

@FlappieIm assuming you havnt had an opportunity to review the Track File i posted above last week, but here is another one that I think is a much better example.

Op_Scorpion_1.1-20240305-174911.trk

[Flappie]

As a matter of fact I had, but I wasn't sure whether I was seeing what you described or not (tree shadows are not always perfect).

Better than words, here's my recording of your latest track on my rig. Options.lua attached.

 

options.lua

[Fakum]

@Flappie I didnt see much in your recording either compared to what i experienced BUT, I did see it start to develop right at the very end. The 2nd Track file I attached a day or so ago is likely to be more apparent. But as far as this goes, this is where I started to see it in your vid.

null

[Flappie]

So it's what I was seeing. I'm so used to it that I wasn't sure you were talking about this.

Does it happen more often on your end? Or is it more pronounced?

[Fakum]

@FlappieI think its more pronounced on my end, I think in the 2nd track file I show examples of the shadows on the sides of the buildings flickering annoyingly as well,,, the 1st track was basically tree shadows on the grass.

[Fakum]

@FlappieI have attached  very short Track file that is pretty much instant at the start where the Tree Shadow is flickering on the wall, its even a bit noticable while still sitting on the Pad. It  clears nicely when I get right on top of it. Focus on this building.

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Flickering.trk

[Fakum]

@FlappieDid you happen to get a chance to look at this last quick track? Thanks,

[Fakum]

@FlappieJust following up again to try one more time, thanks.

 

[Daemoc]

The shadows that flicker or change depending on how far away you are is normal. It just just a side effect of a cascaded shadow map. If you really want to understand what you are seeing, you can google it. The higher your shadow settings are the farther away that lower res shadow band is, but it will never go away.

 

The light streaks I only see when I have motion blur or TAA enabled. (and I think it is only with multi-threading, or at least it used to be) I don't have an nVidia card so I can't say if DLAA does the same thing or not, but you could try turning it off and see if that is the case?

[Fakum]

I did google "DCS Flickering shadows" before I even posted this up. As a matter of fact, I watched quite a few utube vids on graphics settings in addition to the reading about graphics settings, it was a rabbit hole! Im getting flickering on every shadow setting I could make, except when I turn them off. And that doesnt look appealing either. I cant imagine thta everyone elses shadows do the same as you suggest "it never goes away". Thats a hard pill to swallow in my opinion.

 

[Daemoc]

1 hour ago, Fakum said:

I did google "DCS Flickering shadows" before I even posted this up. As a matter of fact, I watched quite a few utube vids on graphics settings in addition to the reading about graphics settings, it was a rabbit hole!

 

I can imagine.
This is all very complicated and outside of most peoples knowledge base. I dabble in computer graphics and I still don't understand it all myself. What little I do understand I have a hard time explaining. I can imagine the ED devs would have a hard time trying to explain it as well. My guess is that's why this "issue" seems to never go away and has never been addressed. It's a graphics limitation that you have to deal with. Maybe they will have better tools to fight this once they transition to Vulkan.

The issue is the shadow anomalies (flickering, popping, etc.) are caused by a number of things, all of which are just technical limitations. I have a video I did a while back that really showcased a lot of them. If you watch about the 7:00 mark or so, you will see all of them.

https://youtu.be/16hkQWMwdVY?t=425

Issue 1 Cascade Seams:
Cascaded shadow maps are segmented into smaller resolutions the farther you get from the camera. Each segment is blended into the next in the attempt to hide the seam, but you will see those transitions as rings at certain distances from the camera. Those are the anomalies you have circled in flappies video. Looking at the circled image, you will see the closer trees have a nice sharp crisp shadow and the trees you circled are blurry. If a shadow happened to fall right on cascade transition you would see a visible seam.

Issue 2 Cascade z depth: The different cascade projectors are only rendering certain areas in the scene. Again, using my video as an example you will see the closest cascade seems to just flat out remove shadows from a lot of objects. (eg: A tall building's shadow just seems to cut off a few feet in front of the helicopter. Video timestamp 8:40) Maybe you can get someone from ED to better explain, but my crappy explanation is that the closer cascades are too close to project through the taller buildings that are farther away so no shadow is rendered in that cascade for that particular object.

Issue 3 Scene LOD and visibility range:
The biggest offender with shadows popping in and out altogether is the LOD and visibility range. With the sun very low on the horizon, tall objects will cast very long shadows. The shadows are so long that the engine visibility range setting will remove the object from view which obviously will remove the shadow as well. Changing LOD's will not remove the shadows completely, but they will change shape depending on the LOD rendered.

Again, if you really want to understand it just google "Cascaded Shadow Maps". Those articles will explain it better than I ever could.

Edited March 15 by Daemoc

[Fakum]

@DaemocI appreciate the feedback, I sincerely do. I'm not trying to learn a new career here, i have put in a fundamental effort before I even posted up here. I was just hoping to be pointed into the direction of "Turn Y on and X off, that is what is impacting what you are seeing" kind of response. I posted my setting and specs, Im runnin a 4090 for heck sake, it shouldnt look that horrible in my opinion.

Today I discovered that I am also seeing this flickering on flat ground (no shadows) just sitting on the Tarmac, perhaps this is an issue that is not just limited to the Tree shadowing? Could this be the same culprit? I added a short clip, and you will see a graphics change when I cycle RESHADE on and off, the Tarmac flickers either way. 

What would be your thoughts on that? I suspect if I resolve that, the more noticeable tree shade flickering would diminish/cease as well?

 

Op_Furious_Wind_v3.4-20240316-124612.trk

[Daemoc]

I hear ya, I am not trying to preach and I hope I don't come off that way. Again, it's just complicated.

I did look at your track. I have a video of what I see uploading as I type, but if there is indeed a video rendering issue on your end I am not going to see it on the track on my end. About the only thing I can do is show you what I see and you let me know if you see something different. The video is almost done, I will edit with the link once it is done.

Until then, the only thing I can see flickering is the terrain texture pop in as you bounce around the map. That is normal. Outside of that, everything else looks as it should.

My settings attached...

Track video examples...

https://youtu.be/06kaUU5IA3s

https://youtu.be/oAdnfQpWsss

 

Edited March 16 by Daemoc

[Flappie]

On 3/15/2024 at 3:00 PM, Daemoc said:

The shadows that flicker or change depending on how far away you are is normal. It just just a side effect of a cascaded shadow map. If you really want to understand what you are seeing, you can google it. The higher your shadow settings are the farther away that lower res shadow band is, but it will never go away.

I agree, and I'm seeing the same thing. It's a limitation of the engine, I guess.

[Fakum]

@DaemocMuch appreciated, and no, I didnt get any impression that you were trying to preach to me, but thanks. Now I looked at both of your vids, there was nothing there that I was talking about. When I looked at both the C-130 and the helicopter on the tarmac, the ground around the aircraft (paved or concrete) did NOT change visually. I am not talking about the grass and dirt, but by the way, I did see in your vid how the dirt/grass close to the C-130 was changing shades and clumps of grass were appearing and disappearing. That is not what I am talking about.

When you watched my last track, did you witness the tarmac around my aircraft changing tones of color?

 

Also, not sure if this is related to the shadow flickering when I approach trees, but I do often catch what I might best describe as some sort of delineation line when I look out left or right. This line did have an obvious impact on the tree shadows, but today I caught it on the side of a building?

null

Edited March 17 by Fakum

[Daemoc]

I can't see the track exactly how you can as I do not own the module you are using. When I launch the track my camera is locked to a FARP and can't look around. I can access the F10 map and look at everything else from there though.

The tarmac will do the same thing the grass is doing, but it will update FAR quicker. It is so quick on my end I do not see it, but it will load in stages. Your PC outclasses mine by a bit, so I am not sure why yours is taking longer to load. I have DCS installed on a high end dedicated PCIe SSD. A slower drive might make the tarmac load slower. Other factors like other software running in the background might do it too. ...malware?

Also as a test:

1: Watch the track once and let everything load

2: Exit to the main menu (do not exit the game)

3: Watch the track again

Does the tarmac still load in slow?

Outside of that, the picture with the shadow seam you circled is in fact a cascade seam. I just noticed your shadow settings are set to medium, that is not helping. The higher you set that, the farther away those ugly cascades will be. Again, they do not go away, so there is no reason to make it look uglier by turning that down. Especially with your PC specs.

That seam is really close, even for medium. You did not change any config files by chance did you?