Borderlands 2... another AAA title bites the FXAA bullet......

[BallaTheFeared]

FXAA does blur slightly, the market doesn't care about 1600p ISP, some -LOD bias is needed with FXAA if you need to sharpen, just like it is if you ever use SSAA.

 

[AnandThenMan]

You can get the same effect as FXAA by taking some 400 grit sandpaper to your glasses. And no performance hit! But seriously, I don't like FXAA it blurs everything too much for my liking, I wish devs would not be so lazy and at least give us options.

 

[toyota]

the amount of blurring can vary wildly from game to game so its not always bad.

 

[moonbogg]

Well real AA would be nice, but if this is what they are doing moving forward then I guess they better refine it. Best way to do that is to use it. I like how it is easy on the resources. If it can be improved to actually rival traditional AA then that would be really excellent.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

 

[f1sherman]

FXAA looks great in GW2 ^^

And for those who are claiming to be that much of image aficionados that they can't live with FXAA, why not do SSAA on your own:

Downsampling: How to

Like here
So it's again much outrage against nothing.

 

[Nintendesert]

Who cares? It has PhysX!!

 

[Phynaz]

Nvidia has not allowed the use of MSAA to be forced nor can LOD bias be applied at this time from what I've tried.

Awesome features from Nvidia!

 

[BallaTheFeared]

Awesome features from Nvidia!

Yeah, they do offer driver level AO, but in this case shadows eat up too many cpu cycles for me so it's not something I can actually enjoy.

I haven't heard of AMD's drivers allowing forced MSAA, do you have any references showing it working for AMD cards?

 

[cmdrdredd]

the amount of blurring can vary wildly from game to game so its not always bad.

This. The implementation is what matters most. The FXAA injectors have sharpen filters that work well. FXAA isn't always the mess you make it out to be nor is MSAA the savior of all either. Some games, MSAA does very little and drops the FPS way too heavily to be worth touching anyway.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

This. The implementation is what matters most. The FXAA injectors have sharpen filters that work well. FXAA isn't always the mess you make it out to be nor is MSAA the savior of all either. Some games, MSAA does very little and drops the FPS way too heavily to be worth touching anyway.

Yep, if you really want to go at it you can sharpen the image with FXAA more than it was prior to using it.

Sadly you can't caputure it with a typical screen shot, at least I can't after trying it I'll look into it further.


These are the settings I'm using:

AntiAliasing 1
PreSharpen 1
Bloom 0
Technicolor 0
ToneMap 0
Sepia 0
PostSharpen 1
FxaaQualityPreset 9
FxaaQualitySubpix 1
FxaaQualityEdgeThreshold 9
FxaaQualityEdgeThresholdMin 9
HighQualitySharpen 0
AverageBlur 9
CoefficientsBlur 1
SharpenEdge 9
SharpenContour 9
BloomPreset 2
BloomThreshold 2
BloomWidth 2
BloomPower 2
TechniAmount 1
TechniPower 2
RedNegativeAmount 2
GreenNegativeAmount 2
BlueNegativeAmount 2
Gamma 4
Exposure 3
Saturation 5
Bleach 1
Defog 6
SepiaPower 2
GreyPower 1
Sharpen 9
BloomPresetToggle 0
HDR 0
HDRPower 1
HDRRadius 1
Chamoisee
#define FogColor float4(2.55, 2.55, 0, 0)

It gives me a sharper image than the game provides without FXAA, while giving me the benefit of FXAA.


Edit: FRAPS seems to capture it, here is No FXAA, HQ low Blur FXAA, HQ low Blur FXAA + Sharpen

Good enough for me, personally

 

[boxleitnerb]

Sleeping dogs allows you to use SSAA though if you wish. It works well on AMD cards, pretty bad performance hit on nvidia though. Sad state of affairs to see Anti Aliasing going backwards.

In some games AMD & Nvidia will add in driver control panel support for MSAA. Hopefully we see that in BL2.

But unfortunately it is OGSSAA. Bad performance/image quality ratio. But better than nothing I guess. MSAA could be upgraded to SGSSAA, that is why I'm always disappointed when there is no support for it.

 

[ViRGE]

The idea that a AAA game can ship without MSAA in 2012 is ridiculous. A game without AA is just that: an A game. You can't spell AAA without (MS)AA.

Meanwhile Borderlands was basically a textbook case for why TrAA and SSAA still exist.

 

[Grooveriding]

GW2 blurs with FXAA. It's pretty noticeable. I just play without it. It is subjective, but when I see folks with GTX 680s saying they don't need AA... Might as well return them and get a 660, if you don't care about AA, you don't need a high end GPU like that.

You could force MSAA in BL1 and it worked out nicely, hopefully the same holds true for BL2. I'm hoping nvidia allows it. As for GW2, I'm hoping whenever nvidia gets SLI working in GW2, they also add in support to force MSAA in that title as well.

FXAA/MLAA/SMAA always blur, always. It's more pronounced in some titles over others, but there is always blur and a reduction in IQ.

 

[Tempered81]

I like FXAA more than MSAA. TXAA and SMAA are better than both though. And OG/SG SSAA is the best of them all.

 

[Arkadrel]

It depends on how their implimented.
The custom injectors are much muuuuch better than what are put in games.

injectSMAA is the best of the FXAA/MLAA mix Ive seen yet, I just wish it was used more.
Nvidia's FXAA and AMD MLAA, just arnt up to pair.

 

[DarkKnightDude]

Well, I'll need to see comparison screenshots between FXAA on and off in Borderlands before going off on a rampage. In Sleeping Dogs for example, it was perfectly fine.

 

[boxleitnerb]

Yet Sleeping Dogs exhibits much aliasing with FXAA. Screenshots are not enough to judge AA methods, it has to be videos or ingame experiences.

 

[Grooveriding]

Yet Sleeping Dogs exhibits much aliasing with FXAA. Screenshots are not enough to judge AA methods, it has to be videos or ingame experiences.

The same is true with Guild Wars 2. With FXAA on, there are still many objects showing aliasing, and the game gets really blurry.

 

[imaheadcase]

Play over 1900x1200 and don't worry about AA at all.

 

[Nintendesert]

Play over 1900x1200 and don't worry about AA at all.

Does that take care of texture shimmering?

 

[Emultra]

It depends on how their implimented.
The custom injectors are much muuuuch better than what are put in games.

injectSMAA is the best of the FXAA/MLAA mix Ive seen yet, I just wish it was used more.
Nvidia's FXAA and AMD MLAA, just arnt up to pair.

Agreed, I wish they'd implement SMAA instead. The problem with using the injector is that it's applied to the GUI as well. When a PPAA solution is implemented by the devs, they can make it bypass the GUI render pass.

I like the look of 16xQ CSAA (+TrSS if performance allows), but there's too much of a hardon for deferred shading going on these days to make it usable most of the time.

 

[Pooptacular]

I thought this game was going to support TXAA?

 

[Clorky]

FXAA is good only when done well. For example some ENB series or FXAA presets by users using D3D9 infiltrator are done very good. Ex.:

Without
With

Sharpshooters Extreme Graphics Vision ENB

And those, are made by players. Not by any hi-tech company.
And those won't take away even half the performance as 4xAA do. So tell me, how hard it could be to make a good optimalized and perfect looking ENB, but in professional way, and even add a MSAA as second option (Battlefield 3).

This was a HUGE mistake by Gearbox Studios. HUGE.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

Too much sharpness is unnatural and fake looking, like the Sharpshooters one.



I just noticed I forgot to change Sampling from super to native, so basically my screen was Downsampling + FXAA, sorry about that I didn't intend to misrepresent that.

The minimal performance impact and zero increase in vram makes FXAA a great tool for some of us on older hardware.

The blurring is obviously over-stated, add some sharpening and you'll be fine, or -LOD bias.