Graphics setting for spot airplane

[[DBS]TH0R]

1 hour ago, SYN_Requiem said:

I meant when the visibility changed again just after the initial patch to create the extra visibility setting after the initial backlash to the flaws in what we know as the alt visibility now. It was an amazing difference to not need to  "zoom in" to maximum so often while performing every single scan of a sky sector or losing sight of someone when they go a few thousand feet above you when they should be clearly silhouetted against the sky (which has always been the case). Just being able to sit in the cockpit and look around without all the zooming, for me, made the Il-2 experience more immersive but unfortunately I could see contacts from MUCH too far away which ruined my depth perception of estimating how far away the targets were. Outside of 5nm I'm fine with fighters looking like a dark grey/black shape that transitions to a very light grey by 7nm so it blends into the background, but for larger airplanes their distance would be further. The problem with this is I don't think our monitors have the pixel density to do this justice with how we see in RL without some form of small scaling. I'd still take that tradeoff though if it's done right compared to what we have at the moment.

 

The bolded part should be the main emphasis of any new visibility changes as it adds not only to realism - but more importantly, immersion.

 

3 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

Graphics aren’t everything but they’re a lot. If nobody cares about that they could still be running 1946

A sure way to kill this genre is to make it look like 20 year old games

Again... you’ve seen what the future competition in flight sims is going to look like. Games should encourage you to run higher settings if you can and not lower. Otherwise why do they put any work into more sophisticated graphics? The future is heading towards higher resolution displays so they’d better get on board with that and not live in the past. I’m sure there were people saying the same thing about 1080p. What is everyone using today? Are people still playing on CRTs?

What about VR? Should the game give an advantage to a CV1 over a Reverb because of the lower resolution? 

And HDR? That would be a godsend for this issue. Everything people are complaint about would be greatly helped by that. In PC monitors HDR is available in all resolutions besides 2160p and not even expensive. It’s almost a standard feature in any new gaming displays. 

 

Graphics are one thing. Having functional visibility spotting system is not mutually exclusive with quality and modern graphics.

 

Your fear of any potential scaling is though. Let us not mix those two very important arguments.

 

A sure way to kill this genre is force a system that evidently doesn't work and force your customers to find other games to cater to their free time simulator needs. At least DCS has radar. ?

 

Devs can tune this game for the likes of you, Dakapilot and IckyATLAS all running at 4K. The fact of the matter is this game is being run on vast number of different resolutions and systems. Therefore an unperfect system serving as a compromise is the only way to deal with this issue (high number of variables).

 

Last but not least: HDR would and will not solve the disappearing plane on wide FOV bug. As many times as you post this false claim I will be correcting you.

Edited December 13, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[SharpeXB]

1 hour ago, SYN_Requiem said:

Just being able to sit in the cockpit and look around without all the zooming, for me, made the Il-2 experience more immersive but unfortunately I could see contacts from MUCH too far away which ruined my depth perception of estimating how far away the targets were.

The trouble is maybe that there isn’t a middle ground for this. If targets don’t vanish with size, either by zooming out or being farther away, then they’ll be visible for huge distances. Forcing their size to a certain number of pixels encourages setting lower resolutions which is counterproductive.  

6 minutes ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

Last but not least: HDR would and will not solve the disappearing plane on wide FOV bug. As many times as you post this false claim I will be correcting you 

the fact that targets get smaller and vanish as you zoom out isn’t a “bug”. That term implies something broken. This is the way the command is intended to function. If they didn’t vanish you’d see them from across the map like on Alt. It’s possible that there isn’t a middle ground for this. 

HDR has nothing to do with that. And yes it would be the single best thing to help this issue in flight sims. 

14 minutes ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

At least DCS has radar. 

Have you ever played DCS?

Radar doesn’t replace your eyeballs in modern air combat. 
For what it’s worth I think DCS is handling visibility better right now. I can easily see a wingman 6mi away which is almost the max range in IL-2GB

[IckyATLAS]

It is an interesting debate. But just a remark here, Real pilots did not have zooming possibilities if I am not wrong. Some planes had telescopes to help aiming but this was not really the standard. So as a fighter pilot it is just your eyeballs. I do not use any zooming facility and do not want it. I have a standard seat position and that's it. The hard way ? 

[[DBS]TH0R]

 

35 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

The trouble is maybe that there isn’t a middle ground for this. If targets don’t vanish with size, either by zooming out or being farther away, then they’ll be visible for huge distances. Forcing their size to a certain number of pixels encourages setting lower resolutions which is counterproductive. 

the fact that targets get smaller and vanish as you zoom out isn’t a “bug”. That term implies something broken. This is the way the command is intended to function. If they didn’t vanish you’d see them from across the map like on Alt. It’s possible that there isn’t a middle ground for this. 

 

Yes there is. It is called a compromise. Since current modeling 1:1 is not representing a realistic visibility. Forcing such a system is hurting sales, forcing users to run their games at lower resolutions = lowering realism / is counterproductive.

 

 

35 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

HDR has nothing to do with that. And yes it would be the single best thing to help this issue in flight sims.

 

What purpose does spending resources on HDR support have, when the majority of users aren't using a monitor which support it? None but to troll threads all over the place like you are doing. A logical way would be to fine tune the game visibility for current hardware, then if there is need / manpower / benefit tune a system for newest and most expensive hardware. This isn't Microsoft were discussing here.

 

 

35 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

Have you ever played DCS?

Radar doesn’t replace your eyeballs in modern air combat. 
For what it’s worth I think DCS is handling visibility better right now. I can easily see a wingman 6mi away which is almost the max range in IL-2GB

 

Yes, I have plenty of modules and flight hours in DCS. And am running a simpit with TM Warthog. (FYI my comment about DCS was of sarcastic nature)

 

You see, even in this sim I can spot contacts up to 10 km on a good opportunity and light angle on 1440p. Which, when compared to what you are saying, is a clear advantage of lower (than 4K) resolutions. The main problem though lies with contacts below or above you that blend in too perfectly at medium to close distances which are, as many have stated, most important.

 

 

13 minutes ago, IckyATLAS said:

It is an interesting debate. But just a remark here, Real pilots did not have zooming possibilities if I am not wrong. Some planes had telescopes to help aiming but this was not really the standard. So as a fighter pilot it is just your eyeballs. I do not use any zooming facility and do not want it. I have a standard seat position and that's it. The hard way ? 

 

Zoom in this game is mandatory if you wish to spot anything. If you zoom out (wide FOV) the contact is simply not rendered any more (or is, but a mere pixel). Many of us here are calling this a bug, yet SharpeXB is adamant it is a feature. ?

 

With that said, Jason also made a statement "real pilots didn't have zoom". Then why are you forcing us to use one in order to be able to see anything????!!!! ?

Edited December 13, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[sniperton]

38 minutes ago, IckyATLAS said:

Real pilots did not have zooming possibilities if I am not wrong.

The human eye is a fairly complex organ and has an effective resolution which even surpasses 8X zoom at 4K. It's explained here (among others):

https://clarkvision.com/imagedetail/eye-resolution.html

Quote

How many megapixels equivalent does the eye have?

The eye is not a single frame snapshot camera. It is more like a video stream. The eye moves rapidly in small angular amounts and continually updates the image in one's brain to "paint" the detail. We also have two eyes, and our brains combine the signals to increase the resolution further. We also typically move our eyes around the scene to gather more information. Because of these factors, the eye plus brain assembles a higher resolution image than possible with the number of photoreceptors in the retina. So the megapixel equivalent numbers below refer to the spatial detail in an image that would be required to show what the human eye could see when you view a scene.

Based on the above data for the resolution of the human eye, let's try a "small" example first. Consider a view in front of you that is 90 degrees by 90 degrees, like looking through an open window at a scene. The number of pixels would be
90 degrees * 60 arc-minutes/degree * 1/0.3 * 90 * 60 * 1/0.3 = 324,000,000 pixels (324 megapixels).
At any one moment, you actually do not perceive that many pixels, but your eye moves around the scene to see all the detail you want. But the human eye really sees a larger field of view, close to 180 degrees. Let's be conservative and use 120 degrees for the field of view. Then we would see
120 * 120 * 60 * 60 / (0.3 * 0.3) = 576 megapixels.
The full angle of human vision would require even more megapixels. This kind of image detail requires A large format camera to record.

 

Our vision is seriously compromised in any video game and the loss has to be compensated for by artificial means (what you'd call "unrealistic") if we want to get near the RL experience.

 

 

Edited December 13, 2019 by sniperton

[SharpeXB]

55 minutes ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

What purpose does spending resources on HDR support have, when the majority of users aren't using a monitor which support it?

No idea what that costs to implement. It may cost nothing. 
But you might as well ask why IL-2 supported VR back when very few people owned those headsets.
It will certainly be a feature in the near future that players will want. Every new monitor will support it. And it would be a tremendous help in this regard. 

59 minutes ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

The main problem though lies with contacts below or above you that blend in too perfectly at medium to close distances 

Which is exactly what HDR would solve. By having a much greater contrast ratio and a gamut of 1 billion colors vs 16.7 million. 

Edited December 13, 2019 by SharpeXB

[[DBS]TH0R]

VR didn't arrive yesterday. It is already on its second gen sets. I don't need to ask, since I know the answer.

 

Until the HRD monitors take on as much as VR has, it is futile to spend resource on it. Increasing contrast ration as easily be done by forcing a darker or whiter contact render. No need for expensive HRD stuff.

[SharpeXB]

51 minutes ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

Until the HRD monitors take on as much as VR has, it is futile to spend resource on it. Increasing contrast ration as easily be done by forcing a darker or whiter contact render. No need for expensive HRD stuff.

Its “HDR” not “HRD”. And you can’t “force” it to render on an SDR display. Read up on what it is.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-dynamic-range_video

Again, every current TV and “gaming” monitor I see has this as a standard feature and it’s not even expensive. 

Edited December 13, 2019 by SharpeXB

[[DBS]TH0R]

Triggered over a typo perhaps? ?

 

Well aware what High Dynamic Range stands for, but thanks for the link non the less. Yes it is picking up, and contesting with high refresh rates as a "thing to get". Higher FPS can make you a better gamer. HDR gives you a nicer image. I'd take the former if I have to chose.

 

If you want to sound even remotely serious, don't merge "TV" and "gaming" together as "gaming TVs" are as much a niche as flight simulators are (meaning there are few and far in between that can be called that). Especially since you mentioned "cinema" and "game" modes as gimmicks earlier on in this thread.

Edited December 13, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[SharpeXB]

2 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

Higher FPS can make you a better gamer. HDR gives you a nicer image. I'd take the former if I have to chose.

Well today you don’t have to choose. All the monitors like that now come with both features. 

2 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

If you want to sound even remotely serious, don't merge "TV" and "gaming" together as "gaming TVs" earlier on in this thread.

Well that’s manufacturer lingo. By that it seems they mean TVs with Vsync and low lag. 

I’m sure TVs are very common for this type of game. And again. Every one of those today has HDR

[[DBS]TH0R]

You really ought to read up on reviews, as not every HDR badge is equal in performance and what that monitor actually can reproduce contrast and picture wise.

 

As far as TVs go, only recently G-Sync equipped examples started appearing and vast majority of "gaming TVs" still suffer from large input lag - making them everything but ideal for gaming. Especially if you are into competitive gaming where input lag matters the most. Followed closely by high refresh rate and one of the sync technologies.

[SharpeXB]

2 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

You really ought to read up on reviews, as not every HDR badge is equal in performance and what that monitor actually can reproduce contrast and picture wise.

 

As far as TVs go, only recently G-Sync equipped examples started appearing and vast majority of "gaming TVs" still suffer from large input lag - making them everything but ideal for gaming. Especially if you are into competitive gaming where input lag matters the most. Followed closely by high refresh rate and one of the sync technologies.

When it comes to HDR displays I don’t think LCDs can meet the full brightness spec without local dimming which monitors don’t have. But HDR still looks quite fabulous. I’ve seen monitors labeled as HDR which only have 16.7 million colors. So that’s questionable. 
And for input lag, unless you’re a pro eSport player most people won’t care. They’d rather have a big nice picture. 

[[DBS]TH0R]

Input lag is divided into several Classes (speeds). "Esports grade" (sub 8-10ms), "medium" and "slow". Most TVs fall into the last category still, sadly. You can read up on the differences on tftcentral.com, on any of their reviews.

 

Back on topic though - HDR might help a bit, but won't fix the bad contrast issues current visibility system has, let alone planes disappearing on wide FOV. When there is nothing to render, contrast benefits either due to game engine modification (e.g. by forcing low gama to get one) or HDR implementation are moot point (not to mention heavily off topic). ?

 

You seem to be obsessed with "fabulous" image quality (AA, 4K, HDR or bust). Most of us want a functioning spotting system, and will gladly sacrifice some of the visuals for an accurate representation of one - if there isn't another way. And no one but you is saying there isn't.

 

Read up on various threads here and stop sticking your head into the sand. People are searching for all sorts of mods and changes to improve on the spotting, asking for help which graphical settings to use (this very thread). All of this means that this is a very important issue and the visibility system has a plethora of bugs and is a sore thumb of this flight sim.

 

Excuses "other games have spoiled you from spotting A/C" are arrogant and down right ignorant of the serious issue with visibility the game currently has.

Edited December 15, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[SharpeXB]

14 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

 Most of us want a functioning spotting system, and will gladly sacrifice some of the visuals for an accurate representation of one

It shouldn’t be necessary to sacrifice visuals and graphics to get good visibility in the game. They should go hand in hand with one another. 

[SharpeXB]

16 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

You seem to be obsessed with "fabulous" image quality

I’m not the only person who wants that. Lots of people want that. 

[[DBS]TH0R]

9 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

It shouldn’t be necessary to sacrifice visuals and graphics to get good visibility in the game. They should go hand in hand with one another. 

 

When we get visibility that isn't forcing people do lower their resolution and graphical settings in order to see something, they will go hand in hand one with another.

 

Simple as that.

Edited December 16, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[SharpeXB]

4 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

 

When we get visibility that isn't forcing people do lower their resolution and graphical settings in order to see something, they will go hand in hand one with another.

 

Simple as that.

Agreed

[SeaW0lf]

On 12/6/2019 at 11:46 AM, II/JG17_Furias said:

I gave up online. I work as an illustrator and I need to keep my eyes very healthy.

 

I have been considering this lately. At this point, it is important for them to fix visibility even to don't become a hazard to the eye sight.

[Alonzo]

It's also worth factoring in the average lifespan and upgrade cycles for components. For example if you're using a VR headset you are probably looking at a 2 year (or less) upgrade cycle, simply because the tech is moving very quickly. For monitors, I expect it's a lot slower than that, for GPUs, maybe somewhere in the middle. It would be interesting to know the stats on this, maybe via Steam surveys or something. It would be somewhat academic that we can get HDR-badged monitors if most users are only replacing a monitor every 5 years (but of course we don't know how often IL2 players in particular do their hardware upgrades).

[SharpeXB]

1 hour ago, Alonzo said:

It's also worth factoring in the average lifespan and upgrade cycles for components. For example if you're using a VR headset you are probably looking at a 2 year (or less) upgrade cycle, simply because the tech is moving very quickly. For monitors, I expect it's a lot slower than that, for GPUs, maybe somewhere in the middle. It would be interesting to know the stats on this, maybe via Steam surveys or something. It would be somewhat academic that we can get HDR-badged monitors if most users are only replacing a monitor every 5 years (but of course we don't know how often IL2 players in particular do their hardware upgrades).

Well like most upgrades, people only replace things when there’s a reason. HDR is a pretty good reason though. It’s the best improvement to video since HD, even more so than 4K. Most all newer mainstream games support it too. 

[[DBS]TH0R]

Only when the prices come down, we can discuss HDR as an option. Unless you like shelling over $ 1000 for a gaming monitor with proper HDR support. And for that amount of cash, I'd rather spend it on a VR gen2:

 

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

 

HDR won't fix the large number of issues visibility currently has. Getting one for this game without changing anything else would be like buying premium tires on a car that doesn't drive in the first place = pointless.

Edited December 18, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[SharpeXB]

3 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

Only when the prices come down, we can discuss HDR as an option. Unless you like shelling over $ 1000 for a gaming monitor with proper HDR support.

They’re not that expensive. It’s basically a standard feature these days. 

[[DBS]TH0R]

Standard feature? Yes on highest end models that cost, like I said over $1000 or even $2000 for wide and curved versions. Entry level HDR is as good as no HDR. For the rest, see my video from last post.

 

Prove me wrong with an actual info, else seek help with this HDR trolling.

[SharpeXB]

6 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

Standard feature? Yes on highest end models that cost, like I said over $1000 or even $2000 for wide and curved versions. Entry level HDR is as good as no HDR. For the rest, see my video from last post.

 

Prove me wrong with an actual info, else seek help with this HDR trolling.

Heres one for $499

https://www.lg.com/us/monitors/lg-27GL850-gaming-monitor

 

[[DBS]TH0R]

Just released recently, and a good monitor. No doubt. However, it's HDR is found lacking, at best:

 

The screen can take an HDR input signal but has no local dimming capability, so cannot truly offer an improved dynamic range. It has a peak brightness of less than 400 cd/m2 so doesn't even carry the rather meaningless HDR400 certification. It does at least have the extended DCI-P3 colour space and 10-bit colour depth support for improved colours in HDR content so you will benefit from enhanced colours for this kind of content. You just won't benefit from any improvements to the active contrast ratio of the image.

 

Source: https://www.tftcentral.co.uk/reviews/lg_27gl850.htm#hdr

[SharpeXB]

42 minutes ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

The screen can take an HDR input signal but has no local dimming capability, so cannot truly offer an improved dynamic range. It has a peak brightness of less than 400 cd/m2 so doesn't even carry the rather meaningless HDR400 certification. It does at least have the extended DCI-P3 colour space and 10-bit colour depth support for improved colours in HDR content so you will benefit from enhanced colours for this kind of content. You just won't benefit from any improvements to the active contrast ratio of the image.

 I don’t think any LCD display can meet that spec without local dimming. OLEDs can but I don’t see any monitors using that tech. TVs of course do. 

The expanded color space does look really fantastic though. You should see what games look like in HDR. Very nice. If you want help seeing green aircraft over green trees that’s the solution. 

[RedKestrel]

On 12/18/2019 at 12:03 PM, Alonzo said:

It's also worth factoring in the average lifespan and upgrade cycles for components. For example if you're using a VR headset you are probably looking at a 2 year (or less) upgrade cycle, simply because the tech is moving very quickly. For monitors, I expect it's a lot slower than that, for GPUs, maybe somewhere in the middle. It would be interesting to know the stats on this, maybe via Steam surveys or something. It would be somewhat academic that we can get HDR-badged monitors if most users are only replacing a monitor every 5 years (but of course we don't know how often IL2 players in particular do their hardware upgrades).

Just from looking around the forum I think Il-2 players run the gamut from playing the game on the proverbial 'potato' rig all the way up to people running things on what amounts to a 6-7000 dollar machine.

Personally, I bought my machine 2 years ago, a mid-range PC, and got a relatively cheap monitor. My goal was to get a machine that could run the game at mid-range settings for the foreseeable future, maybe a 5 year window. So realistically I'm still looking at 3 years before making significant upgrades. God I hope video cards come down in price a little before then, some of the prices I'm seeing cost more than my entire PC did.

There's also a huge chunk of the player base in Russia, where apparently high-end computer hardware is both harder to come by and expensive. As long as that is true, the devs will likely continue to find ways to make sure the game can run on lower end rigs acceptably. This may, in the end, be at the expense of implementing newer and cutting edge tech, but who knows?

[[DBS]TH0R]

2 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

 I don’t think any LCD display can meet that spec without local dimming. OLEDs can but I don’t see any monitors using that tech. TVs of course do. 

The expanded color space does look really fantastic though. You should see what games look like in HDR. Very nice. If you want help seeing green aircraft over green trees that’s the solution. 

 

I don't think anyone here doubts that with a proper implementation (local dimming) HDR looks stunning. Just that it isn't an option / solution to only one smaller segment of a problem with spotting. Perhaps in 5-10 years when the prices come down and it becomes more of a main stream. By then the remaining OLED problems should be solved too.

[[LAS]JanMcQuack]

On 12/12/2019 at 2:34 AM, [LAS]Wochi said:

Your opinion is respectable, but not sustainable, if you come from other simulators such as Il2 Cliff de Dover or Rise of Flight, spoting always takes practice, it is not so impossible. And I can tell you that those of us who think in this thread are not noobs, so as not to distinguish what is right and what is wrong. If you want to turn a deaf ear and advocate that the sim be all right I respect it. But in my humble opinion other sims of the same company are better achieved in this regard.

This recording is interesting to see only at the beginning, I have the resolution in 1680x1050, to see contacts a little larger, and they are still too small, and according to the zoom you use the brightness of the plane disappears.?

With the last 3 updates we returned to the same problems always, losing contacts we are as at the beginning.

 

Edited September 1, 2020 by [LAS]JanMcQuack
Status change in visual simulation since update 4.09b

[VR-DriftaholiC]

On 12/7/2019 at 8:05 AM, SharpeXB said:

HDR. High Dynamic Range. Set On. The definition speaks for itself, I prefer more dynamic range in order to see contacts. 

 

The HDR in this game is actually a limited color space. It's improperly labeled. It's LESS dynamic range.