A trio of visual annoyances: what are their proper terms, and what is causing them?

[Brambleshire]

Hey guys, may I please ask this fairly general question? So I got these visual problems going on, but I don't know what some of them are called, or even the neighborhood of what could be causing them. I'm hoping that some folks in here have more advanced knowledge of displays and graphics that may be able to point me in the right direction of solving them. There's some very knowledgeable folks around these parts. So maybe someone happens to know something!

1. Vibrating Shadows 
screen record example (oops. skip ahead to 0:05 in the video to actually see the recording)
 There's a lot of talk online about funky shadow behavior but I don't know which one applies to this situation. People are talking about shadow flicker, shadows shaking, shadows moving, etc. In my case I would say its more of a vibration. 1. What is this phenomenon called? Do you happen to know where to start to fix it? Is this an ENB issue? Lighting mods? Weather? .ini settings? I'm not sure where to start.

2. Pixelated Volumetric lighting / God rays
Screenshot 1
Screenshot 2
I very much enjoy thick volumetric lighting, but when its extra thick like on a real foggy day, it looks tiled and pixelated. What is this phenomenon called? Is this an ENB issue, a weather mod issue, lighting mod issue, settings, or some combination of all of the above? I am using Bjorn ENB for cathedral weathers, with Cathedral Weathers MCM, Cathedral Weathers and Seasons, Enhanced Volumetric Lighting and Shadows EVLaS, Reshade, and Volumetric Mists. The version of Bjorn ENB I have is for sure supposed to be used with Cathedral, EVLaS, and Reshade. I want to test by turning the ENB on and off, but for some reason the usual F12 or SHift F12 doesnt work.

3. On dark areas of my screen colors bunch together and the shadowy areas look extremely pixelated.
Screenshot 3 (in this screenshot you might not see it, unless you go fullscreen and turn off the lights in your room)
This ones a stretch because I'm pretty sure it actually has nothing to do with Skyrim. But if anyone knows about this any tips would be appreciated. A great example is the mist on the Skyrim main menu. Instead of looking like mist, its just a grey blob made up of about 3 different shades of grey. The same thing happens in very dark areas, where instead of solid or graded black, the blacks blob together in maybe 3 different shades. What is this phenomenon called Does my monitor just suck? Is this a display settings issue? Does this have anything to do with Skyrim at all?

My build is basically finished, I'm just cleaning up the rough edges, and this is one of them. I followed the STEP guide about 95%, except where I opted for different lighting mods, omitted a couple mods, and so I didn't use the STEP compatibility patches. The rest of it is a lot of mods that I added on top of a 90% STEP foundation. I haven't yet run Dyndolod either. It's one of the last things I'm doing.
Mod info:
https://modwat.ch/u/Brambleshire/plugins
https://modwat.ch/u/Brambleshire/modlist
https://modwat.ch/u/Brambleshire/ini
https://modwat.ch/u/Brambleshire/prefsini
Specs: 
https://pcpartpicker.com/list/VzsWRK

Thank you in advance for assistance!

Edited May 12 by Brambleshire

[z929669]

42 minutes ago, Brambleshire said:

Hey guys, may I please ask this fairly general question? So I got these visual problems going on, but I don't know what some of them are called, or even the neighborhood of what could be causing them. I'm hoping that some folks in here have more advanced knowledge of displays and graphics that may be able to point me in the right direction of solving them. There's some very knowledgeable folks around these parts. So maybe someone happens to know something!

1. Vibrating Shadows 
screen record example (oops. skip ahead to 0:05 in the video to actually see the recording)
 There's a lot of talk online about funky shadow behavior but I don't know which one applies to this situation. People are talking about shadow flicker, shadows shaking, shadows moving, etc. In my case I would say its more of a vibration. 1. What is this phenomenon called? Do you happen to know where to start to fix it? Is this an ENB issue? Lighting mods? Weather? .ini settings? I'm not sure where to start.

2. Pixelated Volumetric lighting / God rays
Screenshot 1
Screenshot 2
I very much enjoy thick volumetric lighting, but when its extra thick like on a real foggy day, it looks tiled and pixelated. What is this phenomenon called? Is this an ENB issue, a weather mod issue, lighting mod issue, settings, or some combination of all of the above? I am using Bjorn ENB for cathedral weathers, with Cathedral Weathers MCM, Cathedral Weathers and Seasons, Enhanced Volumetric Lighting and Shadows EVLaS, Reshade, and Volumetric Mists. The version of Bjorn ENB I have is for sure supposed to be used with Cathedral, EVLaS, and Reshade. I want to test by turning the ENB on and off, but for some reason the usual F12 or SHift F12 doesnt work.

3. On dark areas of my screen colors bunch together and the shadowy areas look extremely pixelated.
Screenshot 3 (in this screenshot you might not see it, unless you go fullscreen and turn off the lights in your room)
This ones a stretch because I'm pretty sure it actually has nothing to do with Skyrim. But if anyone knows about this any tips would be appreciated. A great example is the mist on the Skyrim main menu. Instead of looking like mist, its just a grey blob made up of about 3 different shades of grey. The same thing happens in very dark areas, where instead of solid or graded black, the blacks blob together in maybe 3 different shades. What is this phenomenon called Does my monitor just suck? Is this a display settings issue? Does this have anything to do with Skyrim at all?

My build is basically finished, I'm just cleaning up the rough edges, and this is one of them. I followed the STEP guide about 95%, except where I opted for different lighting mods, omitted a couple mods, and so I didn't use the STEP compatibility patches. The rest of it is a lot of mods that I added on top of a 90% STEP foundation. I haven't yet run Dyndolod either. It's one of the last things I'm doing.
Mod info:
https://modwat.ch/u/Brambleshire/plugins
https://modwat.ch/u/Brambleshire/modlist
https://modwat.ch/u/Brambleshire/ini
https://modwat.ch/u/Brambleshire/prefsini
Specs: 
https://pcpartpicker.com/list/VzsWRK

Thank you in advance for assistance!

Pixellated godrays and volumetric rays are almost certainly produced by post processing like ENB. Test by toggling ENB off/on using Shift + F12. This problem is most likely due to your graphics hardware or software settings. There's too many possibilities for me to say for sure what it is, but I personally would not use any "super resolution", upscaling, or image sharpening in your graphics software.

Try the Step 'Heavy' ENB preset to rule out anything caused directly by the ENB preset. Our presets are simple and straightforward.

The shadow flicker is well known. Use BethINI Ultra preset to avoid that. You can also try Soft Shadows, but I'm fairly certain BethINI Ultra will resolve. Be sure to use our BethINI recommendations if running ENB.

I don't see any issues with the dark shadows in your screenshot 3, but what you are describing seems like you have Microsoft Windows HDR enabled. Disable that. It doesn't work for these old games and causes this sort of GFX glitching.

 

It looks great otherwise, but breaks the graphics of these old games on my system. My monitor supports HDR nicely, but I don't use it for this reason.

[Brambleshire]

17 hours ago, z929669 said:

Use BethINI Ultra preset to avoid that. You can also try Soft Shadows, but I'm fairly certain BethINI Ultra will resolve.

You mean to just click the ultra button in Bethini and nothing else? 
I did that and it did help, but not completely. It's more varied now. Sometimes the shadows look perfect, other times its still there but less strong; but overall better than before. As long as I understood your suggestion correctly, I'll probably just leave it at that. Also I was actually already using Soft Shadows because it's on the STEP list.

17 hours ago, z929669 said:

Pixellated godrays

Most of those settings on my graphics software were off. HDR was already off as well. I dont see any changes. It's either an ENB issue, ENB settings, or something interfering with ENB. Sadly the ENB author will not reply on nexus or his discord and its been weeks. However, I can definitely say it has something to do with fog. The light rays look very nice, but its the fog that frankly looks very bad.
Light rays screenshot
Fog screenshot 1
Fog screenshot 2

17 hours ago, z929669 said:

I don't see any issues with the dark shadows in your screenshot 3

In that screenshot its actually not the black thats the problem, its the grey mist/smoke that usually floats around the main menu screen and loading screens. Instead of looking like mist, it looks like monochrome grey blobs. Let me know if you can see that. If not I'll get more screenshots.

Basically any time the screen is dark, or in a dark area of the screen the colors band together instead of being a smooth gradient. Not necessarily only black.

Edited May 12 by Brambleshire

[z929669]

1 hour ago, Brambleshire said:

You mean to just click the ultra button in Bethini and nothing else? 
I did that and it did help, but not completely. It's more varied now. Sometimes the shadows look perfect, other times its still there but less strong; but overall better than before. As long as I understood your suggestion correctly, I'll probably just leave it at that. Also I was actually already using Soft Shadows because it's on the STEP list.

Most of those settings on my graphics software were off. HDR was already off as well. I dont see any changes. It's either an ENB issue, ENB settings, or something interfering with ENB. Sadly the ENB author will not reply on nexus or his discord and its been weeks. However, I can definitely say it has something to do with fog. The light rays look very nice, but its the fog that frankly looks very bad.
Light rays screenshot
Fog screenshot 1
Fog screenshot 2

In that screenshot its actually not the black thats the problem, its the grey mist/smoke that usually floats around the main menu screen and loading screens. Instead of looking like mist, it looks like monochrome grey blobs. Let me know if you can see that. If not I'll get more screenshots.

Basically any time the screen is dark, or in a dark area of the screen the colors band together instead of being a smooth gradient. Not necessarily only black.

Did you toggle ENB off to verify if each problem goes away (shadow flicker, pixelated rays, oversaturated black)?

If so, then your ENB has incompatible weather settings for foggy weathers, or your weather mod has some issues. Which ENB and weather mod are you using? Those rays in the fog are out of place, IMO. Fog obscures light rays.

As explained in the SSE guide, turn of Ambient Occlusion, Lens Flare, and Anamorphic Lens Flare with ENB. To fine tune shadows, shadow resolution should be > 2048, and you could try raising shadow bias to 0.60 and slightly raising shadow filtering in BethINI.

[Brambleshire]

Affirmative. In each case, turning the ENB off made almost no difference. The ENB just made things brighter and the problems easier to see. But each problem still persists. The vibrating shadows, the fog tiling, and the shadow color clumping.

I'm using Bjorn ENB (the cathedral weather version, which only exists on Bjorns discord) with Cathedral Weathers. This particular ENB was made specifically for Cathedral Weathers.
 

Quote

turn of Ambient Occlusion, Lens Flare, and Anamorphic Lens Flare with ENB

Just to be extra sure, you do mean turning these off WITHIN the ENB, right? In the ENB in-game menu?

1 hour ago, z929669 said:

slightly raising shadow filtering in BethINI.

Do you know where this is located in BethINI? I can't find it. I checked all the tabs and the "display" section of the custom tab.
 

[z929669]

45 minutes ago, Brambleshire said:

Just to be extra sure, you do mean turning these off WITHIN the ENB, right? In the ENB in-game menu?

 

Do you know where this is located in BethINI? I can't find it. I checked all the tabs and the "display" section of the custom tab.
 

Not in ENB but in the game INIs. See our BethINI guide. Or BethINI Pie ... same thing really, just a different UI.

[Brambleshire]

Yes, those settings are turned off. However I can't find the "shadow filtering" setting, so I don't know what it's set to. Do you know where that setting is located?

[z929669]

29 minutes ago, Brambleshire said:

Yes, those settings are turned off. However I can't find the "shadow filtering" setting, so I don't know what it's set to. Do you know where that setting is located?

If you are using BethINI and not BethINI Pie, it will be under Custom > [Display] > fPoissonRadiusScale

[Brambleshire]

Got it. I changed it to 6. I think it may have helped slightly, but it made everything at night just a sheet of solid grey.