Texture Sizes !

[Ali Fish]

a Poll to generate information on what texture sizes people are generally using. Or in other words what works with your system for stability and suitable performance ?

PLEASE INCLUDE details of your GRAPHICS CARD TYPE and onboard memory for that card.

[skouras]

original for me:grin:

[Baron]

Original.


Haven't tested the difference between the options graphics and performance wise so i don't know if that's the best choice.

[TheEditor]

I was having stutter problems with original. I put it down to medium and alot of the stuttering went bye bye.

[Querer]

Have only minor stutters left with the settings I have atm, no need for me to reduce textures to medium, as, imho, the visual appearance is significantly decreased with textures on medium only. So, I keep them on Original and go with the stutters (actually, the only recognizable stutters occur when my bullets hit another plane...).

[Ali Fish]

im thinking of putting out a half size resolution pack of textures for the key culprits. the texture memory drawn for them for me personally is just too much. if the majority of people use high then surely we can cope with a 1024 texture and not a 2048 which is an exponential increase in size and probally handling by the engine. also we could have an extra mipmap out at the horizon possibly making things even smoother transitionaly

[Querer]

Wonderful idea, I am sure that a reduction from 2048 to 1024 regarding texture resolution would already lead to a huge improvement with little loss of quality... I think the textures would still look better than on medium with this decrease in resolution...

[Rattlehead]

Medium setting.

[Ali Fish]

ive just halfed all the scenery based texture. and theres definetly some difference ! loading time has been cut to about 1/4 of the original time and ingame the stutter is reduced for me so far(but not eliminated). i think if i reduce the normal map details to half too and well nobody could actually argue against the performance increase v visual loss. i dont appear to be getting any FPS increase however. another aspect im seeing is a smoother scenery visually.

conclusion so far is that there is severe strain going on somwhere .possibly an issue with how these textures are being streamed in and out of the memory and not so much the amount of texture calls for massive files.

i was fine with medium before, now when i set high with the reduced texture pack, i get that similar improvment in performance with medium, but it definetly looks nicer. this will be an optional mod for sure guys benneficial for some, controvertial for others.

[BigPickle]

*Medium*

well I'm fully in agreeance with you Ali, 2040 is just ludicrous, Lord knows why the Dev's went with this. Here's to hoping its on the fix list, as well as a set view distance as at the moment people with Original Textures get a bigger view distance than those on low.

[Ali Fish]

View distance. this would be good as a configurable option IMO i feel half my problems could be solved with that.

the part that could be controvertial is the fact that previous to any mod here the engine is simply dipping into a 5 meg file to use the 2nd stage or 1st stage mip map, a first stage mip map is the original texture a second stage is the next mip obviously but it s half the size. with this mod the system is dipping into a 1.3 meg file, its controvertial as to wether im seeing better imagery or not and wether this file size is so important as to produce better stability ingame.

[ATAG_Dutch]

Medium here. 5770 is a gig.

[lensman1945]

Original for me....

good frame rates and very little stuttering. Modest resolution tho' to match my 1280x720 projector.

:grin:

[KG26_Alpha]

Original Textures

Gainward GeForce GTX 560 Ti Phantom 2 GB - GDDR5 SDRAM

All ok on highest settings.

[Pitti]

Original
Point of View GeForce GTX 580 1.5 GB

No problems on highest settings. :)

[TheEditor]

So a better video card helps to cut down on the stutters?

[RE77ACTION]

Original. I've also tried high but it didn't make any difference for my average frame rate on the Black Death track. There have been reports that original would give more stutters than high but I haven't tested that yet.

[Orpheus]

Voted high, after last patch actually managed to use Original though with big stutters - but now I get launcher crashes and stutters are now unplayable.

You know roughly when I last installed Ali, so I'd say it's taken about a week/2 weeks of quite rare play to degrade to this point.

[335th_GRAthos]

medium


Thanks for testing Ali, looking forward to hear more :)

[Ali Fish]

well im incredibly happy with what reducing the textures has done. ive incorporated it into my general mod with the colour changes and dark trees. but how will those who use original texture sizes appreciate using 1024 textures i wonder ??? any insight from the original size users ???

[Birdflu]

original

[badfinger]

I am using "High". Is "Original" higher than that?

binky9

[Jugdriver]

Original. I have a 5870 with 1 Gig of VRAM. I think going to a card with 2 + gigs of VRAM would certainly give some noticeable improvement.



JD
AKA_MattE

[KG26_Alpha]

well im incredibly happy with what reducing the textures has done. ive incorporated it into my general mod with the colour changes and dark trees. but how will those who use original texture sizes appreciate using 1024 textures i wonder ??? any insight from the original size users ???

Any comparative screen shots we can look at [before/after] ?

[Ali Fish]

Any comparative screen shots we can look at ?

well this is what im looking at ingame with reduced textures. and colour changes, ill try get some comparitive shots.
france

http://i.imgur.com/VPidJl.jpg (http://imgur.com/VPidJ)

england

http://i.imgur.com/xeMMCl.jpg (http://imgur.com/xeMMC)http://i.imgur.com/IWWpbl.jpg (http://imgur.com/IWWpb)

[skouras]

great pics
Ali is this on original or high
i would like to see it on original if this is not:grin:

[Ali Fish]

this is half size texture and colour changes vs the Originals. at max settings possible. The detail loss from halfing the textures is negligable on my system. its only just daawned on me that i should use a static camera ingame to create comparison shots. maybe next time.

http://i.imgur.com/EbhYzl.jpg (http://imgur.com/EbhYz)

[LoBiSoMeM]

"High" texture in a GTX 560 Ti 1GB VRAM, until Ali Fish Mod with reduced textures size and colour tweaks become official!

:)

[Ali Fish]

what i think is happening is kinda weird, im not really getting any FPS increase but im positive the stuttering isnt quite as bad, i usually use medium for some stability on my GTX280 card. i can achieve similar stability with High setting and half size textures. i believe all im proving that this texture setting is essential based upon how powerfull the graphics card is to be quite honest.

[LoBiSoMeM]

what i think is happening is kinda weird, im not really getting any FPS increase but im positive the stuttering isnt quite as bad, i usually use medium for some stability on my GTX280 card. i can achieve similar stability with High setting and half size textures. i believe all im proving that this texture setting is essential based upon how powerfull the graphics card is to be quite honest.

With better textures and modern VGAs, no much increase in FPS with lower resolution ones, but the impact in VRAM is big, because CloD uses really big size textures and almost all VRAM available.

That's why we can't see big gains in FPS, but a lot of redution in texture streaming resulting in stutters. You are in the right path, because the bigger trouble in CloD is the bad stutters in high quality texture settings... Maybe if you invest lowering the "less important" textures quality/size you can really do the trick!

[Tiger27]

I am running original, but tested medium and I didnt see much difference but my fps were well up, I probably get an extra 10-20 fps low down over London with textures at medium.

[FS~Phat]

If I use medium landscape which seems to reduce draw distance I can use original textures with everything else maxed over London with rare occasional texture hiccups.

If I use High Landscape I can only manage High Textures and Medium Building, Trees over London.

Anywhere outside of London I can use everything Maxed and get an occasional texture hiccup. If I reduce Landscape to Medium everything else maxed the game runs perfectly smooth.

[Ekar]

Interesting poll :)

I like to be able to run hi res textures, so I haven't checked out what lowering the texture size does in regards to fps/smoothness. But I have done the opposite experiment to Ali and tried running 4k textures for the landscape (simply the original 4 terrain textures upscaled) and I didn't notice much difference in performance between original and the modified size (of course there is no visual difference either). My frames are not perfectly smooth while running either of these size textures, they are not bad though. I'm interested to see now what lowering the textures will do to both the look and performance.

FS~Phat - does lowering the landscape draw distance affect the visibility of planes also? If not this might be a good tip to inject a bit more smoothness without sacrificing quality too much.

[David198502]

i use mid and high textures.i change my settings once in a while, depending on what mission i am flying.
ali this mod would be great!

[LcSummers]

Original here:grin:

[FS~Phat]

I just did some a-b screen shot comparisons and there is no difference in aircraft draw distance between medium and high land detail but there does appear to be less detail on land for trees and other things in the very far distance. You have to flick between 2 screen shots to see it because the difference is so minimal, but performance is way better!

I just redid the screen shots with everything max and land detail low so it was easier to see what is going on as it was really hard to see the difference between medium and high land details.

Max
https://blufiles.storage.live.com/y1pLoihkoUj6ZBwov42U3wiNBrbwDfTHvKnUirrv6fuH9_LgqL OUuykh9uoWAOcHSF7d39PUOtfals/high1.jpg?psid=1

Low land detail everything else max
https://blufiles.storage.live.com/y1pVHuwOUW2YmmwMm6TAUzHN-aIKjISeURPHEZvnf6zYXKYd9lB9L3pPQw8QE01W7Dc8-ErhEjoqP0/low1.jpg

Max
https://blufiles.storage.live.com/y1pLoihkoUj6ZCO_sCMpHlET5hb2tTijwBlGPSqetXJCVZNbUM mDr6JMPpGT6GkzVQof4zehp-_dc0/high2.jpg

Low land detail everything else max
https://blufiles.storage.live.com/y1py4EhBCbhcIUPLA6Hx0XlFIcx4aAUaRMQMjrvT11mpUwwf-ER-aEN-3uv5l-I631npPMxkT2bXiA/low2.jpg

Max
https://blufiles.storage.live.com/y1p5h-C9EA1jIkzJDx_EdRySXWXdA-DbnelDgZoUlHZ7DdaTnARspl31iRBn1kvmrj4V2RF4bE8qVE/high3.jpg

Low land detail everything else max
https://blufiles.storage.live.com/y1pezBgnOYEKPFDMAjRBoQFMk64U9iRTVKNmFTSnW7od6GBO4u LxGWTKXT0l7KYVG7noyO4lcbGI-8/low3.jpg

[KG26_Alpha]

this is half size texture and colour changes vs the Originals. at max settings possible. The detail loss from halfing the textures is negligable on my system. its only just daawned on me that i should use a static camera ingame to create comparison shots. maybe next time.

http://i.imgur.com/EbhYzl.jpg (http://imgur.com/EbhYz)

Ok

Here's the problem "I" see here in these comparisons.

I have flow extensively over the South East of England around 3000 - 4000ft over a 20 year period, with the realization we are not going to get photorealistic 3d scenery just yet :) bear in mind the rest of this post.

The original textures look better than the ones you have modded in relation to the time of day and season.
Now the reason I say this is that the ones you have done look like they have had a polarizing filter applied, or looks like I'm wearing sunglasses.

I really think because of different graphic setups, monitors and peoples different eyesight, it would be better to have a "saturation slider" to adjust to the persons taste the way the landscape looks.

I have posted lots of pictures here and emailed in the past asking for corrections, but with no luck from Oleg and 1C (back then), Oleg being a keen amateur photographer, may know what he's talking about in the technical side of things, but I know what I have seen with my own eyes over my own country in all different seasons and weather conditions, and to be told by them "thats the way it is no changers we know best" , the only option left is to allow users to adjust it themselves to suit what they consider to be correct.

As for the texture/stutters/lagging etc etc
I'm not convinced its all to do with the sizes of them either.

Perhaps some testing with the original textures downsized, but left as they look, to see if FPS improves at all.

[Ali Fish]

completely agree. colour wise all i did was desaturate it somewhat, too much infact. also agree on the texture sizes not doing much but they should in theory.

[KG26_Alpha]

completely agree. colour wise all i did was desaturate it somewhat, too much infact. also agree on the texture sizes not doing much but they should in theory.

So the finger points somewhere else then maybe

Core.dll ........... ?

[Ali Fish]

So the finger points somewhere else then maybe

Core.dll ........... ?

is our way of introducing custom files via modding the problem where this lack of performance is seen with sever reduction in texture sizes, possibly those orginal files are still in use prior to my using the customs, who knows. zzzzzzsdk. zzzzzzzsdk..zzzzzzzsdk.

not maybe, but definetly. Where? im not sure. Before the Last patch was better imo. i would love to be privy to what poly outputs & texture calls are made at any given fraction of a second. The other thing i question is how an engine scales for higher or lower machine base.The scaling proecudres might not be correct or suitable for this generation of top end graphically heavy software & hardware mix. It could require a more than a simple downsizing ethos to the scaling prcedure for the engine. for example a DX change and everything that comes with the PITA that would be. just an example. Another example and one proven to a considerable level is the necessity for true 64bit. over at ED the attention within the 64bit factor and the 32bit counterpart has unfortunatly ment the 32bit tech is limited in comparsion to its 64bit version. It doesnt pretend to be what the 64bit version is. loosing shaders and minor aspects. dare i mention also because of the necessity for "Large 1:1 scale scenery " again this is imho a good example of how to go about scalability and use what we have constructivly.

to sum cod's problems up in not so many words i think "COD is pushing and pushing everything to the max in a non true multicore, non 64bit,(maybe it is 64bit im not sure:presumption) non multigraphics chip format. untill we get the wider field for the software to work in, it might not work as intended", this is why we sit for months awaiting speculating the outcome. We need the upper end of the environment for the top end software to work to its max. /rant off

[KG26_Alpha]

Yes SDK needed fast.

Core.dll
Well I've seen only 24bit & 32bit so far in there regarding the textures not surprising though.

I just don't have the time at the moment to spend on CoD's graphical problems
as I'm sure any effort made outside of the 1C Team will be overwritten in the very near future.

Im struggling with the FMB's desire to use C++ , what happened to the good old point n click of IL2 :)

Just for the sake of it ..............

Here's the core.dll DX dependency tree showing Dx11 also in there just not enabled .

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v119/alpha1/dependancycopy.jpg

[Ekar]

So the finger points somewhere else then maybe

Core.dll ........... ?

I was mucking around last night with various settings, and I realised that the only setting that will totally eliminate those micro stutters is to reduce land shading down to low. Other settings can make a difference and increase fps, but the little stutters will still be there if land shading is set to anything but low. When set to low, I notice-

1. There are no bump maps anymore.

2. You can see the higher res texture pop in at a closer distance than at higher settings. More aggressive LOD for mipmaps I guess.

3. The ground shadows get really blobby.


I think, somewhere in there, perhaps cumalatively- but perhaps not, is the reason for these micro glitches. PS, I've been meaning to ask someone about the method that CloD uses for bump maps on the terrain? I've not seen this before... when you look at the texture files there, there are two greyscale images- one in rbg and one in the alpha. They look similar but they are not standard greyscale bump maps but each contains directional lighting information as well, the opposite direction in each image. I'm just wondering whether this was done as a more efficient way of doing bump than by using a normal map or traditional greyscale bump, or perhaps it's actually less efficient??

Anyone got any ideas?

[lothar29]

Now I'm using ORIGINAL, but a couple of weeks ago used the high texture, the truth is that I just do not work well with any of the two options, and as neither I understand its functioning because I do not object well on the subject, but in my view, is still much to optimize the performance of CoD, but we already know all truth? jijijiji


I have stuttering in the coastal areas both English as French, unlike if I fly on London to me is very fluid.


My computer:
I7 950 3. 07GHz
COOLERMASTER V6
ASUS P6T DELUXE V2
Corsair VENGANCE 2x3Gb 1600MHz CL9 9-9-9-24 1.64v
HDD SEAGATE BARRACUDA 7200 RAID0 3x500Gb
SDD 1x64Gb Kingston
PSU NOX APEX 800W MODULAR
ASUS GTX470 GPU SLI option 2xGTX470 now no use, the second GPU in your box.
Zalman, 6 fan controllers
Saitek X52 Pro & Saitek Ruders pedals
HOTAS Thrustmaster WARTDHOG A-10C
TrackIR 5 x64 Drivers
Monitor PHILIPS 224EL LED 22" 1920x1080p resolution

[RE77ACTION]

The original textures look better than the ones you have modded in relation to the time of day and season.
Now the reason I say this is that the ones you have done look like they have had a polarizing filter applied, or looks like I'm wearing sunglasses.



I agree. It maybe has something to do that 1C already changed the colors since the original release of CloD. Personally I think that 1C has made the colors of the landscape a bit too dark and a bit too desaturated while the trees should have a small bit more darkening and desaturation.

This is of course my opinion. But since I almost live in the region of CloD (very southwest of The Netherlands) and have often visited the region and use a hardware calibrated IPS monitor, I think I can give some useful information about the colors (which includes hue, saturation and brightness (before I start a discussion about that ;))).

[Ataros]

OMG most people use original textures and complain about stutters. Turn it down to high or medium or get gtx580-3GB vram! Otherwise the game would never seem 'fixed' to you.

Running textures on high only with my 2gb video card to avoid stutters.

[Ali Fish]

1C have not changed the scenery textures since release. they have changed the ingame lighting ie shaders.


Bump Maps. ive worked wth bumps and normals all my life lol. This method they are using seems like a basic 3dmax height map shader, atleast thats the only place ive seen that style before. i have never seen this used like this before in software. btw the info lies on independant colour channels ie R,G,B not RGB, and alpha ofcourse.(room for more or possibly stuff missing) also whats strange us that the alpha is the direct inverse of the G channell.

somthing else ive noticed with these bumps is that peoples screenshots show an incredibly detailed bump map which ive never been priveledged to see ingame :( gtx280.

I was mucking around last night with various settings, and I realised that the only setting that will totally eliminate those micro stutters is to reduce land shading down to low. Other settings can make a difference and increase fps, but the little stutters will still be there if land shading is set to anything but low. When set to low, I notice-

1. There are no bump maps anymore.

2. You can see the higher res texture pop in at a closer distance than at higher settings. More aggressive LOD for mipmaps I guess.

3. The ground shadows get really blobby.


I think, somewhere in there, perhaps cumalatively- but perhaps not, is the reason for these micro glitches. PS, I've been meaning to ask someone about the method that CloD uses for bump maps on the terrain? I've not seen this before... when you look at the texture files there, there are two greyscale images- one in rbg and one in the alpha. They look similar but they are not standard greyscale bump maps but each contains directional lighting information as well, the opposite direction in each image. I'm just wondering whether this was done as a more efficient way of doing bump than by using a normal map or traditional greyscale bump, or perhaps it's actually less efficient??

Anyone got any ideas?

[Querer]

Honestly, I never noticed bump maps neither throughout the game... where should they be? On the plane textures? On the land textures? Which screenshots are you talking about?

Edit: bummer, I've found the screenshots you're talking about. Strange, which setting has to be on maximum to have bumps on the landscape? I have textures on "Original" and no bumpmaps...

[Ali Fish]

im off to hunt for those screenies !...set the time ingame to approx 17:00 hrs, there is an extra pseudo 3d layer of detail over the texture defined as land shading in the settings, it only works with directional lighting in a very angular situation. ie low sunlight. suprised theres no use of paralax mapping !

edit, cant find the screenshots but anyway... heres a random thought, could 1C have forgotten to put these textures through the normal map filter ???< A: NO. actually its an X,Y version of a normal map >

[JG5_emil]

Smoke and clouds are the killer for me

[LoBiSoMeM]

Smoke and clouds are the killer for me

+1 to clouds. REALLY bad optimization in this aspect...

[Rattlehead]

I just did some a-b screen shot comparisons and there is no difference in aircraft draw distance between medium and high land detail but there does appear to be less detail on land for trees and other things in the very far distance. You have to flick between 2 screen shots to see it because the difference is so minimal, but performance is way better!



This is an interesting comparison. It's very hard to actually tell the differences between the screenshots, and maybe with the game actually running, it would be even more difficult to spot the differences. (Or maybe easier, even. I'll have to give this a try for myself.)

As I understand the land detail setting, lower detail means less detail concerning the actual physical terrain, such as less detail around the shoreline, terrain being more flat and things like that.
I do speak under correction, but that is my understanding of it.
In the screenshots you posted, I honestly couldn't say which is which without looking at the captions.
I''ll have to try this out for myself tomorrow. (I've always just run it at medium settings and never bothered with anything else.)

[Ekar]

Bump Maps. ive worked wth bumps and normals all my life lol. This method they are using seems like a basic 3dmax height map shader, atleast thats the only place ive seen that style before. i have never seen this used like this before in software. btw the info lies on independant colour channels ie R,G,B not RGB, and alpha ofcourse.(room for more or possibly stuff missing) also whats strange us that the alpha is the direct inverse of the G channell.

somthing else ive noticed with these bumps is that peoples screenshots show an incredibly detailed bump map which ive never been priveledged to see ingame :( gtx280.

Right. So I guess my next question is how to create these bump maps? I'm not familiar with Max (I use Maya at work), so I'm wondering how complex this process is. Heck, if I get around to finishing those terrain textures, I may need to send them to you if you feel like doing the bump maps for them? :) I checked, a standard bump does not work in the CloD engine..

[itgl72]

OK, sorry, new guy to the show as steam just released it to me. Where are these texture packs available for download. A forum search has resulted in poor results here.

[ingsoc84]

Original...I'll post my system specs if anyone is curious.I get very little to no stutter.

[NedLynch]

Original
But the biggest performance increase/decrease for me was after trying different terrain shading, right now on medium, about 10fps difference for me bewteen high and medium.
I will try the terrain detail to low, since in the screen shots it only seems to affect draw distance and I as well can hardly tell the difference, in the last two screens I see the most difference, but only in the very far distance.

[itgl72]

I just can't wait, nor do I want to tweak. I know, I know... What I see is, this is the only software not working on my current PC. A-10, RoF, several sims and other games, all run well even on high. I just assume at this point give up. They have our money. I'll wait until either the patch that fixes it, or a PC upgrade in a year or so that over powers the issues CoD has. :(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(

[NedLynch]

Have to agree on clouds as well, just flew a quick mission Bomber Intercept-Channel, without clouds 60 - 80 fps, with clouds 30...ish ????????:confused: