stoppingby4now

I believe that formula was established as a reference to the default values, and initial testing following the same ratio. I personally have found no harm in increasing Cell Buffer, and go beyond the formula value when setting uGrids to 7. I too have experienced more stability by doing so. The only question about increasing is if there is a point where it becomes detrimental. I don't know the answer to that, so the usual BE CAREFUL applies.

It doesn't make much sense how it could be breaking AA like this. It really sucks. :(

Boris added an update. I believe I'm seeing a slight improvement, but not entirely sure. Interested to hear if you notice any improvement Vond. Problem is still there though. Tried both the injector and wrapper version, and even resorted to the default enbseries.ini and disabled everything except shadows. Then disabled shadows thinking it might be the cause, but still same result.

I've been using this preset which disables all effects except Bokeh DOF (though I disabled DOF for the purpose of testing shadows). I did add the new shadow specific variables to the enbseries.ini file though. Under [EFFECT] added: EnableDetailedShadow=true Under [sHADOW] added: ShadowCastersFix=false ShadowQualityFix=true DetailedShadowQuality=1 UseBilateralShadowFilter=true

I hadn't even thought that it could be ENB, but I remember thinking to myself, "This looks like my AA settings aren't being applied". I even double checked my values a couple times. Good catch. It's also very noticeable when moving and looking at bars and other small structures outside of Whiterun. A lot of waviness from bars and slats in guard towers, along with jaggies.

I'm getting a lot of texture shimmer. I just now payed attention to the mountains surrounding Riverwood, and the shimmer is rather bad. When testing with the shadows, it wasn't as bad outside of Whiterun with high quality, but it's still annoying to me.

ENB 110 Shadow Comparisons Conclusion Testing will need to be done tweaking shadow settings to see if there are any significant gains in shadow quality with ENB enabled. I also spent some time running around the landscape outside of Whiterun, and the biggest annoyance factor for me was a big increase in shimmering from the shadows with low quality shadows, and to a slightly lesser degree with medium quality. The shimmering was significantly reduced when jumping to high quality. As it stands, I believe the best quality/performance setting to be medium, and though I didn't capture any useful statistics, I could "feel" the improvement in performance. When set to low, the quality of the shadows just isn't there and the pixealation causes a lot of visual problems. For best quality, I find no reason to go beyond high without further testing with shadow tweaks. With more testing, some custom settings may improve shadow quality further while keeping performance reasonable. One last item to note, is that when shadow draw distance is lowered, the shadows don't "pop" in when using ENB, but rather are smoothed in. It's noticeable, but not near as annoying. UPDATE 1: After exploring a bit beyond the locations I tested shadows in, I'm getting a lot of texture shimmering, which to me is more annoying than blocky shadows. Not sure yet if there are any settings that will help that. UPDATE 2: Good catch by Vond in this post. Looks like ENB 110 is disabling AA.

ENB 110 Shadow Comparisons Location 3 Another location inside Whiterun, this time examining the shadows produced by the lattice work surrounding the Gildergreen tree. Shadow Low Comparison - Very blocky shadows as we have come to expect from a low setting in Vanilla, and again ENB causes a lot of pixelation. The detail of the lattice work in the shadows is nearly lost, and is only vaguely recognizable. Shadow Medium Comparison - Jumping to medium, the detail in the lattice work shadows becomes much more recognizable with ENB enabled. The edges of the shadow from the high beams is smoothed out rather well. Shadow High Comparison - As usual, jumping to high quality makes the shadows sharper in Vanilla. Again, ENB does a great job in smoothing out the shadows at this quality setting. When compared to medium, ENB retains a lot more of the shadow structure while keeping the edges smooth which is very noticeable on the high beam shadow. Shadow Ultra Comparison - Again, no major gains in either Vanilla or with ENB enabled.

ENB 110 Shadow Comparisons Location 2 These screenshots are in Whiterun near the main gate. This was mainly to show the differences on a solid shadow produced by a building. Shadow Low Comparison - Typical blocky shadows in vanilla, and less definition than will be seen in higher quality levels. When enabling ENB, there is a lot of definition loss as it smooths the shadows out. Still a lot of pixelation as was seen on the trees, but not quite as noticeable as the shape of the shadow isn't as dramatic. Shadow Medium Comparison - With vanilla shadows, there is an immediate increase in sharpness on the straight edges of the shadow, and they are better defined. ENB does a pretty good job of smoothing the shadows without losing too much of the shape. Shadow High Comparison - Now we see even sharper shadows in vanilla, which also accentuates the blocky nature of them on some of the edges. I think ENB does a really good job with these types of shadows, as the overall shape of the shadow is mostly left in tact, while the edges are very noticeably smoothed out. Shadow Ultra Comparison - Much like when comparing the tree shadows, virtually no difference is seen here when jumping to Ultra. There is a slight variation when enabling ENB, but it's not something that you are going to notice in game. Based on the two locations so far, I don't see ultra providing anything extraordinary, with or without ENB. Shadow tweaks may reveal more differences.

ENB 110 Shadow Comparisons I downloaded ENB 110 and started playing around with the various shadow quality settings and ended up taking screenshots in three locations. The screenshots consist of every shadow quality level from low to ultra, and with ENB off (disabled) and on (enabled). All tests are performed on an nVidia graphics card. I also have no shadow tweaks applied for the purpose of these tests, as I wanted to compare vanilla quality before heading down that road. You can also download enbshadows.7z which has the PNG image files for comparing locally. Location 1 These screenshots were taken slightly up the mountain path as you are heading towards Bleak Falls Barrow. These first two screenshots compare ENB on and off, and shadow quality set to low. Shadows Low Comparison - On low quality, shadows are very blocky and lack definition as can be seen by the increased darkness within the tree branches and the lack of sunlight peering between branches on the right hand side. With ENB enabled, you can see an immediate change in the edges of shadows as they become smoother. But, if you look closely, the shadow edges are extremely pixelated, and is very noticeable on the ground shadows to the right. Examining the tree branches show pixelation of shadows on the foliage. Shadows Medium Comparison - There is a very noticeable improvement to shadow definition when going up to medium, as they lighten up to reveal more detail, though they are still very blocky. But once ENB is enabled, the pixelation on the edges virtually disappears. The definition of the shadows still isn't great, but they definitely are smoother. Shadows High Comparison - Jumping to high shadow quality shows a greater increase in edge definition of the shadows on the ground, giving a much better representation of the tree branches that are causing them. When enabling ENB, the finer detail is lost, but they are much smoother. Unfortunately screenshots don't quite do this justice, as you need to see the shadows in movement to appreciate the effect. You can still tell a blocky quality when watching them move, but it's not near as much of an eye sore as vanilla. Shadows Ultra Comparison - When taking only the screenshot into account, the visual quality between high and ultra really isn't that much. The biggest difference that can be seen is when looking at trees in the background in the upper left hand side of the image. In this case, shadow details on those distant trees is increased, as well as the ground shadow around the trunks. When ENB is enabled, there is a slight darkening of shadows on the tree branches directly in front of the character, but overall there is no real noticeable difference between high and ultra quality. While the screenshots show a lot of fine detail lost even at high and ultra quality, they are slightly misleading. You need to watch the shadows in movement to get a real sense for how ENB is effecting them. I also noticed that on low and medium quality, there was a lot of shimmering on grass in open fields. When setting to high quality, the shimmering was significantly reduced.

You are correct. I play in 3rd person all the time, and very rarely move to 1st. Just tried it out, and had a very large amount of clipping on the landscape around me. Down right fugly. Still playing around though.

Good find. I really like the ability to adjust the DOF effect in game with Dynavision. Here's to hoping he's successful. :)

I had started playing with that value specifically after reading a thread somewhere describing what you just did. I play primarily in 3rd person view, and with that value it's been quite amazing. As for the clipping, I experience the opposite. I see through myself, the stairs are still just fine. There are a few cases where when the camera moves it's easier to cause clipping, but so far it hasn't been a big deal for me. I will gladly pay that very small price in clipping in the quest to rid my world of Z-fighting.

I was playing around with various settings one at a time to see what their effect on Z-Fighting was. Have a few that are still applied, and I need to work out what those are, but I now have almost no Z-Fighting at all. It's down to probably less than 5% of the time I will see it. After doing some testing looking at the mountains west of Whiterun, I would get Z-Fighting nearly across the entire mountain range, and it was particularly bad on the peak with heavy cloud cover. Now, I see virtually no Z-Fighting. I am beginning to have to struggle to see any at all. I believe the main thing that significantly improved this was setting fNearDistance=35.0000. When I started upping that value, that's when I started to see Z-Fighting greatly diminishing. I saw no real difference between 35 and 40. One caveat is that I have very few mods installed ATM (SRO, AOF, RCRN, More Rain, Real Rain).

A fishing mod would be epic, especially with some good animations as you try and reel that fish in. Nothing like relaxing, waiting for a bite, and enjoying a good ale. :)

The description for the mod says that anything that modifies light position or values will conflict. Something to keep in mind when using the mod (though the author says it doesn't conflict with RLwC, but haven't tried).

I feel like a dunce. I was aware of both of the items you listed, and for whatever reason I verified EnableDepthOfField was set to true, but forgot to verify bFloarPointRenderTarget. Cleared everything up. :) Thanks for the reminder.

More Rain by Zappoo This mod has a few ESP's that you can choose from to change the look of rain storms. They are: MoreRain.esp - DefaultMoreRainHeavyandDarker.esp - A lot more rain and decreased visibility, with wind effect.MoreRainWindy.esp - Adds wind to the storm which causes mist to fly by.MoreRainWindy33percentLessView.esp - Same as above, but reduced visibility.MoreRainWindy66percentLessView.esp - Same as above, but reduced visibility.After trying all of them, I settled on the Heavy and Darker version, but mainly because I'm using Real Rain . I think the end result is quite stunning, and I was beginning to feel a little chilly after running around in the downpour for a while. The only thing I wish is that the waves of mist generated would move a little slower.

That's a great strategy, why didn't I think of that? :facepalm:

Downloaded 109beta again to make sure I have the latest. I'm guessing that the files I'm using for Bokeh DOF aren't compatible with 109, as I'm still not getting the effect. Trying to find information on Bokeh DOF with 109.

I had read that, but Bokeh DOF also stopped working when I tried it. I had heard it was working with 1.09 as well, but I have had no luck.ATI card then I guess? DoF/SSAO didn't work with ENB 0.109 until the last betaversion he released. That version still has the grass/underwater issue for ATI too though, just not Nvidia. Next version that should be released in the next 24h most likely if his forums are a clue, will have that fixed aswell + his new improved shadows.nVidia here. I had tried 109 maybe a week and a half to two weeks ago? Can't remember. I'll check for any updates and retry it. I loved the performance of the DOF effect and miss it.

+1 to SRO. I've been leaving Skyrim HD out of my install as well.

You may still be able to reduce the quality, but we won't know until he releases it.