How does antialiasing work?

[Crescent13]

I know what it does, but how does it do it?

EDIT: and what do those numbers mean (2x, 4x, 6x, 8x,)

 

[Lonyo]

It takes samples from surrounding pixels and aggregates the colour values IIRC.
The number reflects how many surrounding pixels it samples, so in 2xAA you take samples from 2 pixels, 4x means 4 pixels etc.
The more pixels you take into account, the closer you are going to get to the "right" value to make everything look smooth.

 

[kylebisme]

AA can be done many different ways, and it is all fairly complicated. Regardless, modren cards tend to do it like explained here. The link will explain what the x2 and such means as well.

 

[Crescent13]

Thanks!

 

[Crescent13]

Does AF work in the same way?

 

[Insomniak]

It gets rid of the aliasing.

 

[aka1nas]

AF is a different features. It mainly has to do with textures and is most noticeable with textures in a game viewed at different distances. Check out the FAQs or some of Anand's video articles having to do with image quality on various cards.

 

[ddogg]

Originally posted by: Lonyo
It takes samples from surrounding pixels and aggregates the colour values IIRC.
The number reflects how many surrounding pixels it samples, so in 2xAA you take samples from 2 pixels, 4x means 4 pixels etc.
The more pixels you take into account, the closer you are going to get to the "right" value to make everything look smooth.

:thumbsup: pretty much what u need to know

 

[Emultra]

What is the highest theoretical x value?

 

[aka1nas]

Don't think there really is one though it may depend on the algorithm whether or not there is a practical value. Performance-wise, up to 8x is all that is usually supported by most video cards currently as the performance hit for anything higher is too severe. Remember, it was only really practical to have any FSAA going on when the Geforce 3 came out. If I remember correctly, the Geforce 2 series was the first to offer it for Nvidia and even then, only the really high end models were powerful enough to actually run games at playable speed with 2x AA on.