Leaves (by ramccoid)

[ramccoid]

Mod Source:
Leaves by Ramccoid

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{Mod Author, please insert OP text}
 

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OP originally by DoubleYou:

This mod replaces the textures of the falling aspen leaves and pine needles that are seen around the wooded areas of Skyrim.
I have also changed the animation effects slightly to something a bit more natural.

Available in x512, x1024 and x2048 textures sizes.

The original vanilla size for these textures are 256x256 but I wasn't able to reduce my retextures down to that size because of too much loss of quality. I found this amount of quality loss to be unacceptable to release a version at the original game size.

[Kuldebar]

If people can run it on their machines well enough, more power to them. As for myself, I took a different tack: Skyrim Performance PLUS by VirusType2 aka Vergis

 

PC gamers play at higher resolutions, and use effects like Amibient Occlusion, Anistropic Filtering, Anti-Aliasing, and Post Processing Effect Filters. This really puts a burden on the PC. Especially because this game is already very demanding of a CPU. Even the real-time shadows are CPU intensive.

The special effects in this game, like snow and rainfall, are called particles, and are rendered by the already overtaxed CPU. Therefore, by reducing the textures in these particle effects, we can expect a variable degree of graphic performance improvement, depending on your system and graphic setup.

The Rift, or Autumn area of Skyrim, is the most graphically demanding part of the world, on my computer.

I figured I could greatly increase performance in The Rift by degrading the quality of the complex falling leaves FX.


The vanilla leaves are 512x512px, fast moving, animated objects, with 64 frames of animation, and upwards of 20 can fall at any time. The leaves require more animation as they are asymmetrical and are spinning and twirling. Even in the best of situations, this contributed to a significantly lower minimum framerate in this area, compared to other parts of Skyrim.

 

 

Does snow and pine needles, too.

 

It's always nice to have options. :)

[TechAngel85]

Skyrim Performance Plus is what STEP currently uses.

 

I don't care for what appears to be the extra brightness and saturation from this mod's leaves. Yes, they look better; however, it can be a performance issue on some systems. Especially since the Riften area is already such a performance hog.

[Noobsayer]

I can't imagine using 2K textures for that. Just because you CAN doesn't mean you SHOULD. How much more detail could you possibly get with 2K textures on something that small?

[ramccoid]

I totally agree 2048k textures are a bit over kill to most systems but it is only an option, which I don't recommend to anyone to use. There are other lighter versions to download, it is not compulsory to use the heaviest files but they are there should you want to experiment.

Edited April 7, 2014 by ramccoid

[rootsrat]

Skyrim Performance Plus is what I use as well, and IMHO it's enough. These are such a small details, that they're barely noticable in game. This mod is an unnecessary overkill, even with 512x512 I think. Even for screen archery.

[torminater]

Well apparently vanilla resolution is 512² as well.

[ramccoid]

"These are such a small details, that they're barely noticable in game"

 

I've found it's always those little insignificant details that have a huge impact on immersion in the game.

Have you tried the mod out to see if they are barely noticeable? There isn't any scripts involved so uninstalling wouldn't be a problem if you came to the same conclusion.

Edited April 11, 2014 by ramccoid

[rootsrat]

I must admit I did not try it in game. I do have it on my list "to check at some point" though :)

[DoYouEvenModBro]

The rift is such a performance heavy area, especially with 2k textures and a heavy ENB. Even with an R9 290 4gb GPU and Skyrim Performance Plus Mod, it still lowers my fps to like 25 with Serenity Full version. I can't imagine raising the resolution of the leaves. 

 

I am using the Dandelion Mod at 512 though, since there are far less of those floating around than there are leaves. 

Edited April 11, 2014 by DoYouEvenModBro

[rootsrat]

"These are such a small details, that they're barely noticable in game"I've found it's always those little insignificant details that have a huge impact on immersion in the game.Have you tried the mod out to see if they are barely noticeable? There isn't any scripts involved so uninstalling wouldn't be a problem if you came to the same conclusion.

I thought about it you are right, I should try it in game, as the small details DOES matter indeed.

 

I added this to my game, if I won't forget to look for it, I'll express my opinion again :)

 

Ditto for Dandelion Seeds.

[Garfink]

I too with have a look at this mod and dandelion seed, I am currently using Skyrim Mod Combiner as a base to work from, I probably went a little overboard there and chose all 2K-4K MAX texture options for everything (probably not a good idea), even on a Titan with a heavy ENB my game stutters horribly, but Seasons of Skyrim ENB works great, looks great with good performance, I don't know how the author did it.  I had to uninstall unique grasses (which is probably the worst culprit) and replace it with Grass on Steroids and that solved much of the stutter issues (except around super heavy areas like Windhelm.)

[DoYouEvenModBro]

Unique grasses at 2k crippled my r9 290

[Garfink]

I am using tonnes of huge textures everywhere, but Unique Grasses is the straw that breaks the camel's back for me too.  I go into stutter hell when I have it installed at 2K,  whereas without it, I only get momentary stutters occasionally when I am near super high texture load areas.  BUT, unique grass is by far the best looking grass mod IMHO and even though Grasses on Grasses with density at 40 looks AMAZINGLY close (I tried it at 20 and it looks amazingly stupid, the grass is so dense it doesn't make sense!), I think I am going to try Unique grasses at a lower res to see what happens.  

 

I just further tested glorious grass/grass on steroids also and on close up the "individual grass" textures just look wrong, maybe the stems are just too unrealistically big.  I think grass on grass just mess with density/distribution and doesn't mess with the texture themselves.  

 

I think I will play with lush grass & trees again some time... but I remember I had issues with the LOD trees looking all wierd when I use this mod.  I do remember that the lush trees make for a much nicer denser more realistic looking forest though.  

 

I have installed the 512 version of Leaves and Dandelion mod and will look out for it in game and report back.

Edited April 14, 2014 by Garfink

[DoYouEvenModBro]

Garfink, can you let us know the performance impact of 1k unique grasses, if you end up trying it?