GUIDE [WIP] DDSopt & Texture Overhauls

[z929669]

Discussion thread:
DDSopt Guide by STEP
Wiki Link

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GET DDSopt:
Github Pre-release versions
Official Nexus versions (select pre-release update 4)

[EssArrBee]

Poco will work with TTW just fine, any texture replacer will. I'm saying that reducing Poco textures with DDSopt from 2k to 1k didn't look right to me. I believe that tapioks designs his textures to look a certain way at a certain resolution for the most part. Probably does everything 4k and then drops them to 2k for Poco Bueno use, but going lower seems to make them a bit blurry. NMCs TTW pack removes the redundancy form his F3 and FNV packs since both games share many files, you can ask Roy Batty for more info. It pretty much reduces the size of the mods. I recommend that NMC Medium be used and that exteriors textures be reduced to 1k resolutions unless you have plenty of VRAM to spare. I have 2GB and use 1k exteriors.

[redirishlord]

Gotcha, I too have 2gb (GTX 670) so I'll optimize NMC medium to 1k exteriors as you recommend and leave Poco as is (since its already optimized from the original Bueno if I understand you correctly). I need to take a break from tweaking Skyrim and give FNV/TTW some attention and testing.

[EssArrBee]

Well, if you do the FNV mods use the batch files linked in Kelmych's post above. You can follow the DDSopt guide and replace FNV stuff for Skyrim stuff where ever applicable. When you run the files it splits mod(s) into separate folders like it does for Skyrim. NMCs seems to already be optimized, so if you can just run DDSopt to reduce the size of exterior and exterior normal maps folders and then ignore the rest. Really helps with the Strip and Freeside, I got about 10-15 FPS from doing it that way. I might even drop the normals to 512k just for a another few FPS on Strip.

[Kelmych]

Have you used the new FNV batch files enough to feel there are no major problems? If so the "beta: addition can be removed.

 

Should there be a FNV Quickstart page in the guide with some basic instructions on using the batch files? I know you are writing some detailed instructions with suggested parameters, but should there also be a Quickstart page with the mechanics of using the batch files?

[EssArrBee]

I was actually going to point to the DDSopt guide for instruction on extracting the BSAs and archives to the working directory. A quick start page would probably help. I had written a bunch already, but it happen when the site got shut down so I lost it. I could probably link to parts of any quickstart page from the detailed instructions.

 

I didn't notice any problem textures like monochromatic ones reduced to 1x1. I think I got most of those in the INI files, and if there are any more it will just have to come from actually putting in hours of play. There is really no other way to ID them since they are placed in the stupidest folders. The problem was reducing Poco Bueno made some of the ground textures a bit blurry, but I can always recommend not messing with that mod.

[Kelmych]

The Quickstart guide will be fairly minimal and I expect most of the detailed questions to be answered in your guide. Once it is done it might make sense to also change some of the settings recommendations in the Quickstart guide. I can have the vanilla textures part done fairly quickly and I'll then add the mod part later since the examples you are creating are much better than the simple ones I'd provide. I haven't much time yet to examine FNV mod properties, and you're already doing an more extensive job of that than I've done with the Skyrim mods (thanks by the way).

 

Because Notepad++ is a lot easier to use than the Wiki editor, and because I worry about losing a guide/mini-guide, I've been doing any major edits on Notepad++ (and saving the results on my PC) then pasting the whole page back into the Wiki editor.

 

Collapsed textures are problematic because, according to Ethatron, the GPU is supposed to properly handle them. It does most of the time but not always, and it doesn't seem possible to predetermine which will cause problems. Facetint textures in Skyrim seem to the most sensitive to collapsing so I often exclude them from optimization in the batch files.

[hellanios]

I want to learn how to properly optimize body mods like Better Males. I want to use the mod in a somewhat heavily modded skyrim with a 1GB video card. What resolutions should I choose? Should I use different resolutions for different types of .dds? And about the constraint tab, what should I choose for each of the drop-down boxes?

[Kelmych]

There is a lot of useful discussion on this in the Better Males thread in the Mod Anthology portion of the forum that you should read. One starting possibility is to use the Constraint settings from the following for all the textures except the "facedetails" folder.

 

For the facedetails folder use the example settings in the "Constraints" figure in the "Using DDSopt" part of the guide except use 1024x1024 for the two resolution limits (the size of the exisiting textures) or 512x512 to reduce their size.

[hellanios]

so there are no normal maps for body mods? I was thinking like going for 1k for diffuse and 512 for normlas. So, 1k everything except for facedetails folder which will be .512 ?

[Kelmych]

The resolution limit values are a starting point. If you need more VRAM reduction you can try smaller limits for the model space normal maps, but be careful and I would't suggest it. The quality of Model space normal maps (which are used instead of tangent space normal maps for some body models) are even more sensitive to format and size change than the color maps and other maps (e.g., *_s.dds) used for body textures. Compare whatever you try with the original version. It's best to minimize any changes to body part textures, including the MSNs) and achieve VRAM reduction elsewhere. It's all too easy to get awful looking NPCs.

[Nearox]

You could check out my DDSopt recommendations for Better Males (based on the aforementioend forum thread) in this guide, the savings are pretty significant (100mb vram+ in towns & cities) and the quality loss is minimal, if non-existent. In the forum thread I wrote down some preliminary findings, the guide has my final optimizations (for 2GB VRAM though but at least it shows you what compression to use for which files, any files not mentioned should not be compressed as they result in errors). I think others also said in the forum thread that even reducing to .5k instead of .1k will probably go unnoticed in your game.

 

With only 1GB VRAM, you shouldn't be running 2k compressed textures, let alone 2k UNcompressed textures (like Better Males has). 

Edited July 24, 2014 by Nearox

[hellanios]

You could check out my DDSopt recommendations for Better Males (based on the aforementioend forum thread) in this guide, the savings are pretty significant (100mb vram+ in towns & cities) and the quality loss is minimal, if non-existent. In the forum thread I wrote down some preliminary findings, the guide has my final optimizations (for 2GB VRAM though but at least it shows you what compression to use for which files, any files not mentioned should not be compressed as they result in errors). I think others also said in the forum thread that even reducing to .5k instead of .1k will probably go unnoticed in your game.

 

With only 1GB VRAM, you shouldn't be running 2k compressed textures, let alone 2k UNcompressed textures (like Better Males has). 

Should I change anything from your guide to adjust to 1GB?

[Nearox]

You can decrease the resolution of other textures (not mentioned in the guide) to 1k... 1k resolution should work with 1Gb VRAM, I think, though I am not entirely sure. 

 

Also you can install Gamwich's Bethesda Performance Textures mods like https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/42360/? and there is a 2nd one as well. Both are pretty good and I actually use them (put them right after UHRP in MO) to have better quality textures than the STEp-DDSOpted stuff while still getting more performance. 

[Vedra]

I followed the Quickstart Guide with the new batch file, and in the virtual textures folder MO shows a bunch of loose .dds files (color names, plus default_n.dds, defaultdiffuse.dds, defaultwithspec_n.dds) originating from STD_opt that are not there without activating the optimized folders. I'm guessing those files were sorted wrong by the batch file? Where do they belong, so I can change it manually?

 

ETA: I actually didn't use the zip batch file, but renamed the STD folder manually, so that situation occurs before zipping.

Edited July 26, 2014 by Vedra

[Octopuss]

I've just noticed that some textures from the hires DLC get moved to the other DLC folders by the optimization process. Is that intended?

Um, hello?