Prey and HDR

[Spooger]

Another technical question for the geniuses at Human Head (A nice little ass-kissing to make up for a certain someone not eating their underwear yet http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif)

HDR rocks. I can't say it enough. Many of us have seen the tech demos, and a few of us have followed The Lost Coast, and I believe it's shown its face in Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, but it's not in Doom 3 -- at least, the Doom 3 we know.

Regardless of that, we know Prey runs on a heavily customized/modified Doom 3 engine, and given that it's going to appear amongst a new rush of games equipped with the technology, it makes sense to see it here at least as an optional feature. After all, the Doom 3 engine is gonna be faced against some serious heavyweights when it comes to graphics, and while I'm 100 percent positive that the emphasis here is always going to be "gameplay, gameplay, gameplay", it's really a rather incredible tech (and is extremely immersive, too)

A big thanks in advance to any HH developers that take the time to answer this question of mine http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

[hell-angel]

It could be just me being blind, but I didn't see a question in there. http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/doh.gif

[Kristian Joensen]

The question is will Prey have HDR, like DNF.

[Killd a ton]

personaly i dont think so.

[hell-angel]

Kristian Joensen said:
The question is will Prey have HDR, like DNF.



ah. thank you.

I don't care if prey has HDR, as long as the gameplay rocks I really don't care (I cann't see the difference anyway. http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif )

[Antosa]

the HDR is true is one characteristic a lot interesting. Optimal question. I have seen the HL2 video: lost coast and he is truly impressive. We hope is inserted. Also of physics engine if it knows some little.
Hello
Antosa

P.S. Scuse me for my bad english http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

[Gabrobot]

Doom 3 actually did have HDR (there are several cvars for controlling it), but that was just something Carmack was fooling around with for his next engine (apparently it took him only one day to add HDR to the Doom 3 engine). The code he did should be available to licensees, although the technological aspect of it isn't the hard part of implementing...rather, the hard is integrating it into the tools and systems of the engine so that it can be used by the artists.

HDR would be cool to see in Prey...just imagine being out in space looking at Earth. http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

[trackit]

HDR is important mostly in simulating light of outdoor areas, in sunlight... Prey takes place in alien ship, so i dont think that HDR will give much improvment.

I could be wrong though http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

[Rider]

HDR Is just another way to make people believe that graphics in games are making great leaps. In fact, if I knew coding enough to make something for myself, I doubt it would take long to write code for something that looks like HDR-effects, and renders in real time.

but it does look nice...

[Theseus314]

HDR is perhaps the most easy graphical effect to code in, both the theory of it, and the implementation. The only reason it has only come into mainstream graphics recently is the introduction of floating point colour.

[Cerberus_e]

whata re the average system requirements for HDR?

[Killd a ton]

It needs to be able to handle 48bit images i think gf5 supports 128bit images

here som usefull articals
http://www.gamedev.net/reference/articles/article2208.asp
http://www.gregdowning.com/HDRI/stitched/

[Theseus314]

Cerberus_e said:
whata re the average system requirements for HDR?



Floating point colour (not a must, but is ugly as hell without), and support for programmable shaders. Nothing that the past two generations of GFX hardware haven't had. It's going to increase the number of passes the hardware has to perform so it's always going to be slower than without.

That said I'm not an expert, and my knowledge only comes from a programming project in which I implemented it into a software renderer (not realtime obviously). It's just yet another graphical programming technique that has been around since way before graphics hardware even existed and only recently has been implemented into real time visualisation.

[Tim. Just Tim.]

Have I seen HDR before? I thought HL2 had it. No? Post a video or at least a screenshot of HDR please http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Edit: Thanks for the link above, but I mean from an actual game ?

[Cerberus_e]

so a geforce fx 5200 can handle that? oh yes, true, it can handle that, because I can run far cry smooth.
that answersq the above question: far cry uses HDR, tim

[trackit]

only patch 1.3 of far cry uses HDR ,and even then GeForce 6x00 boards only.


EDIT: here is an example of HDR from Source engine (ftp://ftp.gaminguk.net/Mirrors/fileplanet.blueyonder.co.uk/blueyondergames/trailers/Source_HDR02.exe)

[Cerberus_e]

ok then, HDR is good if you can turn it off, I hope you can turn it off in DNF

[trackit]

Cerberus_e said:
ok then, HDR is good if you can turn it off, I hope you can turn it off in DNF



why?

[Cerberus_e]

because it is geforce 6*** only as someone here said http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

[trackit]

im not an expert, but i think that in Far Cry this has something to do with shader model 3.0 that only geforce 6 series have.

but im not sure that without SM 3.0 its impossible to do HDR.

But anyway, if your card dont support it you just wount see it. Its not like you wount be able to play the game...

[Jokke_r]

HDR is not dependant on shaderversion, you could probably even do it with PS:1.4 but with slower framerates probably, still i believe source HDR will be done with 2.0 since x800 and GF6 series are capable of doing it. but lost coast minimum is 3GHz CPU 512MB DDR X800 series/GF6 series

[pegisys]

it's all kinds of HDR info here

http://www.daionet.gr.jp/~masa/

I think it's in Japanese but the the powerpoint is in english

and a demo on this page
http://www.daionet.gr.jp/~masa/rthdribl/index.html

hopefully the lost coast also will use SM3 for those that have it

[Spooger]

Wow, I'm really not even sure if *I* see a question in my original post http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif Glad we have some intelligent people who can critically analyze what I say and make sense of it all http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif So, yes, will Prey have HDR? Some people think HDR is unnecessary, but I think it's almost a requirement for games like Prey, DNF (and a whole lot of other FPS games NOT being developed under the watchful eye of 3DRealms) to at least apply the technology to their game. Perhaps I don't fully understand every aspect of HDR, but let me tell you this: Real-Time lighting (One of Doom 3's greatest features) and HDR would mix imho beautifully.

That's my opinion on the matter, so, I definately hope they implement it.

[trackit]

Jokke_r said:
HDR is not dependant on shaderversion, you could probably even do it with PS:1.4 but with slower framerates probably, still i believe source HDR will be done with 2.0 since x800 and GF6 series are capable of doing it. but lost coast minimum is 3GHz CPU 512MB DDR X800 series/GF6 series




but its interesting that far cry patch 1,3 adds HDR only to geforce 6xxx bords. The only feature difference that i know between ati x8xxx and nvidia 6xxx is that nvidia supports SM 3.0 and ati SM 2.0 currently.

I would by ati x800 XL but now i dont know... If SM 3.0 is important in games that will com out in near future then maybe nvidia is better choise... http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif although ati x800 XL is quite powerful yet relativly reasonably priced.

[FireFly]

HDR doesn't work with ATI cards in Far Cry because ATI cards don't support FP16 blending (only FP8 IIRC). This is a feature separate from SM3.0.

SM3.0 gets you no image quality improvements, except in the rare case of artefacts, but you get a little extra speed. However, the 2.0b option for ATI cards in Far Cry gave almost as big a boost as the SM3.0 setting did for Nvidia cards.

[Gabrobot]

Besides, CryTek then went and released "The Project" which added HDR to CryEngine on ATI cards (even works on my Radeon 9800 Pro, though rather slow).

[Jokke_r]

FireFly said:
HDR doesn't work with ATI cards in Far Cry because ATI cards don't support FP16 blending (only FP8 IIRC). This is a feature separate from SM3.0.




GF:FX= FP16 SM: "2.0"
Radeon 9xxx/x8xx= FP24 SM:2.1
GF:6=FP32 SM:3.0

ATI cards can't do Farcrys HDR since it was written in PS:3.0, besides anything less than a current gen card couldn't have handled it with acceptable framerates in a game like farcry.

[FireFly]

I know all that. And it could have been written in SM2.0.

The OpenEXR (http://www.openexr.com/) HDR format Far Cry is using is a floating point format so it needs floating point framebuffer blending, which ATI's cards don't have.

To support ATI cards, Valve have had no choice but to go with an integer format, which gives reduced quality.

[Brian Karis]

The nv40 cards (6xxx) have floating point blending, which is an important feature in implementing a simple hdr solution. It can be done without so long as you have floating point render targets, which all Dx9 level cards have. You have to do the blending manually by using the framebuffer as a texture in the fragment program and blending with it there. This is neither simple nor fast. That is the reason why a lot of the games with hdr that you see will only run it on nv40 cards.

As far as the sm2/sm3 thing goes, it doesn't matter. Both are floating point and thats what matters.

[Kristian Joensen]

But the question is does Prey support HDR ?

[Spooger]

Kristian Joensen said:
But the question is does Prey support HDR ?



And that's not a question that I think we'll see answered right now http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

I wonder, though - will Prey show the same preformance increase with the 6000 series GeForce cards that Doom 3 shows?

[Sayantan]

Kristian Joensen said:
But the question is does Prey support HDR ?



I dont think so. Since its gonna release way before DNF, or Alan Wake or UE3 or any of those next-gen wonders, I wonder if its up for having HDR in it. http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif

[Nacho]

Doom 3 has a mod that adds it. Just make one for Prey.

[Sayantan]

Really? More info please. http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif
Maybe I'll include that guy in our team then. http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/hhg.gif

[Spooger]

Nacho said:
Doom 3 has a mod that adds it. Just make one for Prey.



Are you positive? I know that people have said Doom III already has what's necessary for functioning HDR, but I've also seen a lot of mods for games like Half-Life 2 that claim to be HDR, or an HDR effect, but are actually just bloom modifications.

I don't think we'll see HDR in Prey unless it needs to be there. HDR is something of a system killer, and the Doom III engine already requires a fairly powerful rig to decently preform. Even as an optional feature, it may not be worth the time to apply if Prey doesn't truly benefit from it.

[Kristian Joensen]

Spooger said:

Nacho said:
Doom 3 has a mod that adds it. Just make one for Prey.


I don't think we'll see HDR in Prey unless it needs to be there. HDR is something of a system killer, and the Doom III engine already requires a fairly powerful rig to decently preform. Even as an optional feature, it may not be worth the time to apply if Prey doesn't truly benefit from it.



They could make HDR a optional effect you can turn off in the graphics menu.

[SyntaxN]

Doom 3 has a mod that adds it. Just make one for Prey.


I think what you´re talking about is the blooming mod!
But if it´s real HDR it would be interesting to test, link please http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

[psyborg]

so yay or nay?

[Gryph]

Nay. No HDR.

[psyborg]

thanks http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

[Damien_Azreal]

Honestly I don't see the big fascination with HDR. Yeah, it does look impressive in HL2: Lost Coast... but it gets annoying after a while.

I'm glad the first epsidoe of SiN: Episodes won't have HDR in it, and very glad that PREY most likely won't have it. http://forums.3drealms.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

[theHunted]

probably way off topic, but i never really got why they would call it high dynamic range rendering. a high dynamic range sensor (like human eye) would be able to evenly capture luminances of large variance. looking outside the window of your room on a sunny day will allow a human to see both the outside and the inside of a room somewhat evenly lit.
in contracry to the high dynamic (because logarithmic) range of the human eye there's the low dynamic (because linear) range of general purpose cameras you use for photography. because of the limited low and linear range you can either have the outside of the room be nicely lit with the inside being really dark, or you can have it detect the inside of your room nicely lit with the outside being almost white.
now afaik this is what they're doing in games these days. if you come from an outside area to an inside area they're just shifting the linear range so the inside gets nicely lit again.

so why are they selling this as high dynamic range? shouldn't it be called poor and low dynamic range instead? "adaptive low dynamic range" sounds more reasonable to me.

[FireFly]

But HDR increases the dynamic range, so as with the human eye, large variances in luminance can be captured. With an FP16 storage format you can capture about 65,000 different brightness values so you should be able to store the entire range of all visible light intensities.

[theHunted]

FireFly said:
But HDR increases the dynamic range, so as with the human eye, large variances in luminance can be captured. With an FP16 storage format you can capture about 65,000 different brightness values so you should be able to store the entire range of all visible light intensities.



what fields are fp16 textures used in in hdr? is it just for environment maps or are there other applications?
i just had a quick glance at one of the articles mentioned above. to me looked like those floating point textures were used only for environment maps used for reflections of objects. but i guess there's gotta be more to it because i dont really get the importance of little objects producing hdr reflections. would you notice if it was just a regular fixed point texture responsible for the reflection?

[hell-angel]

Like most things, probably when you are looking for it. But I guess it all depends on the size and how close you are to it.

[FireFly]

As I understand it, the FP16 texture is just used as a general storage format, so it's completely internal. I think the framebuffer is converted to an FP16 texture, and then the range is clamped so each pixel is limited to the maximum brightness the monitor can display.

This means that all lights can benefit from the increased dynamic range - as it is with Far Cry, for example.