Will HDR on PC be a disaster?

[Deders]

What do people think of quantum dot displays?

http://www.pcgamesn.com/samsung-vs-lg

 

[sxr7171]

My honest opinion - another kludge for LCD. I wish they would just pour their R&D budget into OLED instead. But I guess like all the LCD technologies they make for good stopgaps until OLED issues get sorted.

 

[Dribble]

Something to note is I expect you will have to recode the renderer in games to take advantage of HDR. So as I understand it renderers right now have to turn what is essentially full range output from the code into something that looks good on limited DR monitors. If it knew it was renderering to full HDR it should in theory should be able to pass the full range output straight out, but it won't do that unless someone has specifically coded it to work.

 

[Smoblikat]

HDR is just high dynamic range, right?

Maybe I didnt read any of the articles on it, but I know Oblivion (2006) had an option to enable HDR, and that was 10 years ago. So how is this any better/different?

 

[Headfoot]

HDR is just high dynamic range, right?

Maybe I didnt read any of the articles on it, but I know Oblivion (2006) had an option to enable HDR, and that was 10 years ago. So how is this any better/different?

Very different. I'd suggest just doing some regular google based research.

 

[Phynaz]

I wish they didn't use the HDR abbreviation.

I'm an old timer and I still see High Definition Radiosity when I read that.

 

[nathanddrews]

Something to note is I expect you will have to recode the renderer in games to take advantage of HDR. So as I understand it renderers right now have to turn what is essentially full range output from the code into something that looks good on limited DR monitors. If it knew it was renderering to full HDR it should in theory should be able to pass the full range output straight out, but it won't do that unless someone has specifically coded it to work.

HDR is just high dynamic range, right? Maybe I didnt read any of the articles on it, but I know Oblivion (2006) had an option to enable HDR, and that was 10 years ago. So how is this any better/different?

HDRR is what we currently have - high dynamic range rendering. The game takes the darkest (ex: 0 nits) and brightest (ex: 23,000 nits) parts of any given scene in real time and effectively normalizes it all to fit within the range of 0 nits to 100 nits. Every game/engine probably uses a different rendering method to achieve this, but these HDR values are never sent to the display. The display only gets the standard 8-bit or 10-bit video stream (no HDR metadata) and reads it on the basis of that display's minimum and maximum brightness level (usually calibrated for 0-100 nits). This is an oversimplification. See here for more details about methods.

I would love to see every HDRR game get an update to pass along that HDR data to the display, but I'm not sure if that would require a change to the engine (likely), the API (likely), or the game itself (likely). Most likely we'll see an avalanche of "Remastered in HDR!!!1!" game releases in the next couple years.

It is analogous to DSR/VSR where the GPU will render a scene at 4K, but then downsample it to 1920x1080 because that's all the resolution that your monitor can display. There is a visible improvement, but it's not the same as the real thing.

 

[sxr7171]

Lost coast is the first time I saw hdrr:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-dynamic-range_rendering

 

[Pottuvoi]

Here is a lot of good information on HDR displays.
HDR Demystified
GDC 2016: HDR Rendering in Lumberyard

 

[nathanddrews]

GDC 2016: HDR Rendering in Lumberyard

Wow, that could be the single BEST video to date. All future HDR (high dynamic range) or WCG (wide color gamut) questions should be directed to watch that video from 6:00 to 16:00. Such a clear and simple description of the problems and the solutions. Bravo!

 

[Bacon1]

GDC 2016: HDR Rendering in Lumberyard

Nice find!

And for those that don't know, Lumberyard is Cryengine that Amazon paid for to make free a while back to pair games with AWS.

 

[PrincessFrosty]

I don't know much about this topic, I understand that HDR capable display devices will be needed but unsure of what technical detail makes them HDR ready and what sort of changes in rendering that will require. Are they just screens with a higher colour/luminosity space? And if so does that mean rendering on the PC will take more graphics horsepower? Kinda new to this so sorry if these are stupid questions.

 

[Bacon1]

I don't know much about this topic, I understand that HDR capable display devices will be needed but unsure of what technical detail makes them HDR ready and what sort of changes in rendering that will require. Are they just screens with a higher colour/luminosity space? And if so does that mean rendering on the PC will take more graphics horsepower? Kinda new to this so sorry if these are stupid questions.

It means the panels will be capable of showing more colors yes. Many things already render in more colors than can be displayed, so GPU work required might stay similar but yes it will probably require more as well. If nothing else people will use more elaborate lightning methods to better show off the range, which itself will require more gpu power.