zyg0tic

I found that only the ENB AA settings were the only ones that removed the 1-pixel edge. That is why I said not to use driver-forced AA. If a different form of AA could be found which does the same thing then Id happily change my recommendation, but Ive not yet tested enough options. Disabling ENB's AA and using only injectSMAA might work. UPDATE: I have discovered that the only thing that causes a 1-pixel edge (like a hard glow) is the game's own AA. I tried multiple combinations of other AA types (injectSMAA, all the ENB options, driver-forced transparecy AA) and none of them gave the 1-pixel white edge except iMultiSample (game's own AA). So given that discovery, I can now rethink my fix. I will recommend only the bare essentials necessary for to remove all traces of the glow - additional tweaks unrelated to the essential fix will be labelled as such.

Performance wont be made any worse or better by the fix. Normal shadow performance rules still apply (draw distance, shadow resolution, enabling/disabling certain types of shadows), but none of those will have any effect on the aura. ENB antialising is superior to the game's own or driver-forced AA, as far as performance is concerned anyway. So if anything itll improve performance because of that. Using only ENB AA (and only improving it beyond that with injectSMAA) is essential to the fix so that the remaining 1-pixel aura is removed.

I have discovered how to fix the aura/glow around player, npc and object in front of a shadow. I have published a guide here: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/54335/? Basically you use whatever shadow settings you like for performance, quality and draw distance. But do this to remove the aura/glow: 1. In skyrimprefs.ini iBlurDeferredShadowMask=1iMultiSample=0bFXAAEnabled=0bTransparencyMultisampling=0bDeferredShadows=1 2. Use ENB with enblocal.ini settings: UsePatchSpeedhackWithoutGraphics=false EnableEdgeAA=trueEnableTemporalAA=falseEnableSubPixelAA=trueEnableTransparencyAA=true 3. Use enbseries.ini settings to adjust ShadowBlurRange to your liking. Dont change iBlurDeferredShadowMask anymore. 4. It is compatible with injectSMAA so you can use that too. This will result in the aura/glow being removed, but also no issues with a one-pixel white edge or blocky shadows. If you set iBlurDeferredShadowMask=0 you can also remove the aura, but it isnt a real solution because shadows will be blocky (edges not blurred at all). And also the ENB blurring effects wont work nicely. My fix avoids those problems.