Please GOD make the R420 have hardware truform and Doom3 support it

[Lonyo]

Screenies
2
3

A game with great graphics is fine, but the un-roundedness in those 3 screenships is absolutely aweful.
Either we've got to hope that they make some improvements or that truform will work wonders.

EDIT: OOPSIE, wrong technology thing, my bad.
Damned marketing.
I knew that the new cards had it in software, rather than the hardware of the 8500, but I got the wrong name :/
Thanks for pointing it out.

 

[Woodchuck2000]

Smoothvision is just anti-aliasing, isn't it? Those screenshots look like they're using 4 sample AA at the moment...
The problem on those screenshots is low poly counts on some of the models (hence the pointy heads) and that won't be affected at all by smoothvision...

 

[EdipisReks]

Lonyo, are you thinking of Truform?

 

[Woodchuck2000]

Originally posted by: EdipisReks
Lonyo, are you thinking of Truform?

That would make a lot more sense, thinking about it...

 

[0roo0roo]

personally i'd rather have tri display output with 3d. imagine that with 3 monitors!! total immersion gaming space concerns not so big now with lcds really eityher.

 

[Czar]

Originally posted by: 0roo0roo
personally i'd rather have tri display output with 3d. imagine that with 3 monitors!! total immersion gaming space concerns not so big now with lcds really eityher.

but there is money concerns

 

[Tab]

Originally posted by: 0roo0roo
personally i'd rather have tri display output with 3d. imagine that with 3 monitors!! total immersion gaming space concerns not so big now with lcds really eityher.

You would spend $1500 on moniters! AHHH!

 

[0roo0roo]

which is not as bad as spending 500 on a video card.

3 19" crts would cost you less then half that. and for gaming crts all the way.

 

[Cat]

You can't use Truform with Doom 3's shadow volume generation. The potential silhouette edges are calculated on the CPU. Anyway, play the alpha if you get the chance. You don't notice the polygonal silhouettes. The animators have done a top-notch job as well.

 

[Brian48]

Bah, I'm not worried about truform or FSAA. This game is going to look great even without it. Check out this screenie I took with just a 128mb R8500 running at 800x600 with medium textures.

http://users.rcn.com/chinmonster/d3.jpg

 

[Regs]

Yeah, don't let the market hype get to you. The game will look excellent on any DX9 video card. Even DX8 or lower well look excellent, they just won't support the little bits and tweaks of DX9.

Edit: Noticed you have a Ti4600. Good idea to wait for the new cores.

 

[randomlinh]

i just hope it still runs decent and looks relatively pretty on a ti4600 by the time it's finished.. hehe

 

[Regs]

Originally posted by: lnguyen
i just hope it still runs decent and looks relatively pretty on a ti4600 by the time it's finished.. hehe

It's coming out on X-Box so I imagine so.

 

[Dug]

Originally posted by: Regs
Yeah, don't let the market hype get to you. The game will look excellent on any DX9 video card. Even DX8 or lower well look excellent, they just won't support the little bits and tweaks of DX9.

Edit: Noticed you have a Ti4600. Good idea to wait for the new cores.

I thought this game was OpenGL.

 

[Regs]

Yes it is... hm. *Goes to read.

 

[roboninja]

The next big step in graphics will be a step back...to ray-tracing. Polygons, by their nature, have straight edges, so you use smaller and smaller ones to make things look smooth. Ray-tracing would solve that by removing polygons from the equation. We just need another 100-fold increase (my made-up numbers) in computing power to raytrace a believable, "3D" scene. Give it a few years

 

[OddTSi]

You'll always see that in the silhouette of characters/objects. 3D Graphics is still done with polygons. The way to make it look "rounder" is with shading and some other tricks. This blends colors and shadows evenly so to your eye it looks round, but it's still based upon the same number of flat polygons. So when you see the silhouette of the object, you see the polygons instead of a round-looking shape. It's just how it is.

 

[bluemax]

Originally posted by: OddTSi
You'll always see that in the silhouette of characters/objects. 3D Graphics is still done with polygons. The way to make it look "rounder" is with shading and some other tricks. This blends colors and shadows evenly so to your eye it looks round, but it's still based upon the same number of flat polygons. So when you see the silhouette of the object, you see the polygons instead of a round-looking shape. It's just how it is.

UNLESS you're using ATI's Truform. Truform takes a blocky polygon and smooths the edges to make a sphere an actual sphere as opposed to a dodecahedon or something.

Pity more games didn't use Truform.... it'd be nice.

 

[BoberFett]

Originally posted by: bluemax

Originally posted by: OddTSi
You'll always see that in the silhouette of characters/objects. 3D Graphics is still done with polygons. The way to make it look "rounder" is with shading and some other tricks. This blends colors and shadows evenly so to your eye it looks round, but it's still based upon the same number of flat polygons. So when you see the silhouette of the object, you see the polygons instead of a round-looking shape. It's just how it is.

UNLESS you're using ATI's Truform. Truform takes a blocky polygon and smooths the edges to make a sphere an actual sphere as opposed to a dodecahedon or something.

Pity more games didn't use Truform.... it'd be nice.

Ummm, no.

Truform just analyzes a series of polygons and breaks it down into smaller polygons.

 

[Zugzwang152]

Originally posted by: BoberFett

Originally posted by: bluemax

Originally posted by: OddTSi
You'll always see that in the silhouette of characters/objects. 3D Graphics is still done with polygons. The way to make it look "rounder" is with shading and some other tricks. This blends colors and shadows evenly so to your eye it looks round, but it's still based upon the same number of flat polygons. So when you see the silhouette of the object, you see the polygons instead of a round-looking shape. It's just how it is.

UNLESS you're using ATI's Truform. Truform takes a blocky polygon and smooths the edges to make a sphere an actual sphere as opposed to a dodecahedon or something.

Pity more games didn't use Truform.... it'd be nice.

Ummm, no.

Truform just analyzes a series of polygons and breaks it down into smaller polygons.

still, a polygon with a kazillion sides is close enough to an oval to me

 

[jbond04]

Originally posted by: roboninja
The next big step in graphics will be a step back...to ray-tracing. Polygons, by their nature, have straight edges, so you use smaller and smaller ones to make things look smooth. Ray-tracing would solve that by removing polygons from the equation. We just need another 100-fold increase (my made-up numbers) in computing power to raytrace a believable, "3D" scene. Give it a few years

That's definitely not raytracing...I'm not sure, but I think what you're talking about is voxel rendering. I'm not exactly sure what voxel rendering is or how it works (perhaps someone could fill us in?). Raytracing is a method of calculating the light distribution in a scene; it has nothing to do with how an object is created.

Here's a sample of what raytracing can accomplish:
realistic soft shadows
realistic reflections/refractions (no more reflection/refraction maps)
caustics (think patterns of light along the bottom of a swimming pool)
global illumination (absolutely gorgeous, realistic lighting of a scene)
dispersion (the rainbow of colors that appears as light passes through a prism)
sub surface scattering (the ability to display translucency-like candle wax)
true 3D motion blur
depth of field (out-of-focus objects appear slightly blurry)

For a better idea of what raytracing can do, go visit sites like cebas'
finalRender, Chaos Group's VRay, or Splutterfish's Brazil.

Personally, I think computer games are headed toward raytracing, but raytracing does not eliminate the need for polygons. Polygons are here to stay for quite a while...just look at the professional 3D animation/visualization community: nothing but polygons.

 

[Auric]

TruForm was used in hardware as a transitionary technology to make older low polygon games look better. It made sense to drop it in favor of just using the available resources to process more polygons as fast as possible, thus allowing game designers to use more in the first place and negate the necessity of special code and compromised image quality.

 

[OddTSi]

Originally posted by: jbond04
Raytracing is a method of calculating the light distribution in a scene; it has nothing to do with how an object is created.

Exactly. Ray-tracing just does what its name implies, traces the path a ray of light takes as it bounces off objects with certain reflective intensities. It just allows for MUCH more realistic looking lighting. The 3D objects in the scene are still composed of polygons.

 

[ethebubbeth]

If i recall you cannot use trueform if the newest shader technologies are used...

 

[rbV5]

The next big step in graphics will be a step back...to ray-tracing. Polygons, by their nature, have straight edges, so you use smaller and smaller ones to make things look smooth. Ray-tracing would solve that by removing polygons from the equation

You're thinking of NURBS (Non-Uniform Rational B-Splines) not ray tracing. NURBS or splines offer a different approach to representing geometry than polygons. Actually, its the shaders that will transition games to the next graphics level.