Visual design disasters I hope KSP 2 will steer away from

[lajoswinkler]

I was reading one article and it made me think, again, how annoying these things are when forced and used for the sake of being used, and how disappointed KSP 2 would be if its developers would go towards that path.

• motion blur - please no, this is annoying even in films where it's used to hide the fact the scene is poorly made
• eyeball grime - VFX atrocity that is trying to convince you how you're looking into the world through scratched, dirty plastic or eyes without eyelids, with damaged corneas
• chromatic aberration - just horrible. It's a favorite tool of hipster attention seekers on various mindless social networks where duckfacing is a norm. Lens makers solved this in mid 18th century and it's called achromatic lenses. 
• film grain - when used as a temporary effect in cinematics, it serves a useful purpose. If used all the time, it's just annoying.
• shallow depth of field - effect that says it knows what you want to look at better than yourself. Please, no.
• lens flare - computer monitors have a limit of brightness, so this is a good way to show something is really, really bright, like the Sun in field of view, if used decently, as a spice, however healthy human vision doesn't have lens flares so it's better to ditch it.
• bloom* - Who wants the feeling of watching the world through greased, foggy window? This is one of the worst things a computer game can force upon the user, especially the one where spaceflight is featured. It makes airless bodies look as if they have atmosphere. This belongs to late 70s and early 80s music videos. It's not pretty. Makes me want to wipe my screen with window cleaner. (*bloom does appear in human vision when small part of the field of vision has intense luminosity, and the rest is very dark, therefore it could be used in rare occasions as a measured procedure, but not far from Kerbol)
• overblown HDR - initially, made by overzealous amateur photographers who just discovered HDR and don't understand it's not supposed to look intense and weird, but since then this atrocity has been copied by some VFX artists. Please, for the love of aesthetics, just don't.
• vignetting - annoying artifact of old lens systems that photographers profoundly hate. Enormous money has been invested during the history of photography to attenuate it as much as possible.

 

I think I saw some bloom in the trailer and it made me grind my teeth.

If you have some additional horrible VFX you are afraid of being used in KSP 2, feel free to mention them here.

Edited October 9, 2019 by lajoswinkler
added vignetting

[ShawnPhillips]

37 minutes ago, lajoswinkler said:

motion blur - please no, this is annoying even in films where it's used to hide the fact the scene is poorly made

Motion blur in films isn't used to hide a poorly made scene, it is an artifact of Shutter speed, and if anything is necessary in Film as most movies still run at 24 FPS.

 

Everything you listed can (and should in all games) be options in the graphic settings. Many of these graphical options are things that some people may want in the game for making cinematic videos.

[catloverjerrygarcia]

1 hour ago, ShawnPhillips said:

Motion blur in films isn't used to hide a poorly made scene, it is an artifact of Shutter speed, and if anything is necessary in Film as most movies still run at 24 FPS.

 

Everything you listed can (and should in all games) be options in the graphic settings. Many of these graphical options are things that some people may want in the game for making cinematic videos.

Well aid, I agree completely.  And being a photographer, lens flares can still happen nowadays.  I was living in Michigan once a while back when the local news station got a photo from a viewer asking if they'd captured UFO lights.  It was actually lensing artifacts from a traffic signal in their photograph.

[lajoswinkler]

1 hour ago, ShawnPhillips said:

Motion blur in films isn't used to hide a poorly made scene, it is an artifact of Shutter speed, and if anything is necessary in Film as most movies still run at 24 FPS.

Hah, if this were only true. No, it is not an artifact of shutter speed. We're talking about video, not photography here.

In recent films, it's often used intentionally to hide things that would be too expensive for the predicted budget. And then others copy such "look" to seem "professional", but there's nothing professional or high quality about it. It's just annoying.

 

Quote

Everything you listed can (and should in all games) be options in the graphic settings. Many of these graphical options are things that some people may want in the game for making cinematic videos.

Keyword - should. The whole point of the thread is when these things are forced upon us, at the expense of quality and performance, so that people have to mod the game to turn them off.

Also it's sad that they're overused in cinematic videos because there's nothing beautiful about it. It's a fad people laugh at even today, and I'm sure it will be looked down on in the future.

Edited September 16, 2019 by lajoswinkler

[Guest]

13 minutes ago, lajoswinkler said:

Hah, if this were only true. No, it is not an artifact of shutter speed. We're talking about video, not photography here.

Yes it is too an artefact of shutter speed. Fast shutter -> no motion blur. Slow shutter -> motion blur. And yes, video/cinema also has a shutter speed even if the shutter is often electronic nowadays.

There's also nothing inherently "disastrous" about any of the things you listed. Like anything they can be used or abused.

[lajoswinkler]

17 minutes ago, Brikoleur said:

Yes it is too an artefact of shutter speed. Fast shutter -> no motion blur. Slow shutter -> motion blur. And yes, video/cinema also has a shutter speed even if the shutter is often electronic nowadays.

edit: I think we're talking about framerate issues here. That's where the confusion arose.

 

Quote

There's also nothing inherently "disastrous" about any of the things you listed. Like anything they can be used or abused.

Again, you missed the point of the thread. Does anyone even read before commenting?

Edited September 16, 2019 by lajoswinkler

[rtxoff]

yes, i abhor all these effects, if they introduce them i hope there will be disable options in the graphics settings

[ShawnPhillips]

1 hour ago, lajoswinkler said:

Hah, if this were only true. No, it is not an artifact of shutter speed. We're talking about video, not photography here.

Shutter speed is still a thing in Video recording. Longer Shutter speeds creates more motion blur in the video.

[Kerbart]

1 hour ago, Brikoleur said:

Yes it is too an artefact of shutter speed. Fast shutter -> no motion blur. Slow shutter -> motion blur. And yes, video/cinema also has a shutter speed even if the shutter is often electronic nowadays.

There's also nothing inherently "disastrous" about any of the things you listed. Like anything they can be used or abused.

To clarify @Brikoleur‘s correct answer: each frame in video needs a certain amount of exposure time. At 50 fps, that exposure time can be as long as 1/50 s, but with sensitive capture media (and lots of light) it can be shorter. Historically this is being referred to as “shutter speed,” even if there’ll no mechanical shutter involved.

The reason motion blur is added is because we’re used to it (from cinema movies) and subconsciously expect to see it. One of the reasons video games require a much higher frame rate than movies (running along at a leisurely 24 fps) is because every frame is razor sharp, requiring many more “in between” frames to depict fluid animation. Adding motion blur fixes that issue.

Or so I’m told. To be honest I don’t know to what extend the above story holds true, I’ve never had hardware capable of 60fps to check  if all that holds up.

 

Lensflare needs to go though. Lens manufacturers spend millions in research to prevent it, and adding it artificially just feels like any other graphical imperfection (chromatic abberations, distortion, etc) just to “make it real.”

[razark]

3 hours ago, AdmFranzvonHippie said:

And being a photographer, lens flares can still happen nowadays.

Which is fine with a camera that has a lens.  The viewpoint in KSP is not a camera, though, so lens flare is an added effect that serves to lessen the reality of the world.

[Guest]

2 hours ago, lajoswinkler said:

edit: I think we're talking about framerate issues here. That's where the confusion arose.

No, still shutter speed. 

In videography and cinematography the "default" shutter speed is 1/2 the frame rate. So for cine that runs at 24 fps it's about 1/50 s. That gives a natural feeling of motion. If you make it longer, you get motion blur. If you make it shorter, it looks sort of unnatural but in a different way.

2 hours ago, lajoswinkler said:

Again, you missed the point of the thread. Does anyone even read before commenting?

If people misunderstand you, the problem is not always at their end.

[catloverjerrygarcia]

11 minutes ago, razark said:

Which is fine with a camera that has a lens.  The viewpoint in KSP is not a camera, though, so lens flare is an added effect that serves to lessen the reality of the world.

I disagree that it lessens the reality of the world, but that's my opinion.  If it were a truly immersive real world simulation type thing visually you'd almost never see the views that are typical of the game so therefore camera analogy is appropriate.

[lajoswinkler]

2 hours ago, Kerbart said:

To clarify @Brikoleur‘s correct answer: each frame in video needs a certain amount of exposure time. At 50 fps, that exposure time can be as long as 1/50 s, but with sensitive capture media (and lots of light) it can be shorter. Historically this is being referred to as “shutter speed,” even if there’ll no mechanical shutter involved.

The reason motion blur is added is because we’re used to it (from cinema movies) and subconsciously expect to see it. One of the reasons video games require a much higher frame rate than movies (running along at a leisurely 24 fps) is because every frame is razor sharp, requiring many more “in between” frames to depict fluid animation. Adding motion blur fixes that issue.

Or so I’m told. To be honest I don’t know to what extend the above story holds true, I’ve never had hardware capable of 60fps to check  if all that holds up.

 

Lensflare needs to go though. Lens manufacturers spend millions in research to prevent it, and adding it artificially just feels like any other graphical imperfection (chromatic abberations, distortion, etc) just to “make it real.”

Yes, I haven't understood exactly what we were talking about here. I get it now. *brainfart*

[Bartybum]

Damn, I like some small amounts of motion blur

[nsgallup]

17 hours ago, Bartybum said:

Damn, I like some small amounts of motion blur

Hate it, I always turn it off

[Xurkitree]

I mean... Why is this even a question for a game about flying rockets?

[Incarnation of Chaos]

12 hours ago, nsgallup said:

Hate it, I always turn it off

Most motion blur i turn off; but decent per-object implementations i don't mind. Like DOOM (2016) where blur is applied to shell casings and weapon swaps but enemies and enviroment stay razor sharp even when i'm jumping and grappling all over the map; this actually is closer to reality and more importantly doesn't impact gameplay.

12 hours ago, Xurkitree said:

I mean... Why is this even a question for a game about flying rockets?

Because why do we fly them? Mostly it's to explore the enviroment around them; which is affected by these settings. Besides; if your way of playing KSP doesn't mind these settings then you can just crank them down//off for moar boosters.

[lajoswinkler]

16 hours ago, Xurkitree said:

I mean... Why is this even a question for a game about flying rockets?

Namely because it would be useless usage of valuable computer resources which are better spent on performance or part number. Other than that, most people who are into KSP love the visual realism of space.

[Guest]

2 minutes ago, lajoswinkler said:

Namely because it would be useless usage of valuable computer resources which are better spent on performance or part number. Other than that, most people who are into KSP love the visual realism of space.

I doubt additional VFX would have much of an impact on physics scaling.

[lajoswinkler]

1 hour ago, Brikoleur said:

I doubt additional VFX would have much of an impact on physics scaling.

Yeah, that's why everyone uses Astronomer's visual pack in KSP. /s

[Guest]

22 minutes ago, lajoswinkler said:

Yeah, that's why everyone uses Astronomer's visual pack in KSP. /s

I said, "I doubt additional VFX would have much of an impact on physics scaling."

Obviously VFX has its own performance cost, but I doubt you can just transfer the resources used for VFX to making physics go faster instead.

[swjr-swis]

44 minutes ago, Brikoleur said:

I doubt you can just transfer the resources used for VFX to making physics go faster instead.

Seeing as PhysX often uses the GPU to do its calculations, it's not that unlikely that the two can affect each other.

[swjr-swis]

Inserting a personal and completely subjective opinion here: I abhor all these 'realism' effects that have nothing to do with how human vision really works.

People get hung up on all kinds of effects that basically only demonstrate our shortcomings in replicating the human eye, and forget that what we've become used to seeing in photos and movies is NOT how we see things in real life. When they do consider it, they then often still forget that our brain has a major correcting impact on how we actually perceive things that goes beyond the purely physical aspect of light pathing and lensing. Our brain cannot do that same kind of correction when those aberrations are forced digitally onto a screen, often amplified 'for effect', which results in what I consider a highly handicapped form of 'vision' which I find neither enjoyable or artful in any way.

I build/buy my PCs with high end GPUs, so games tend to enable by default all their GFX trickery including many of the effects you mention in newer games, forcing me to go look for the settings to disable them again with extreme prejudice. I tend to quickly stop playing games that enforce some of these settings without option to disable them.

One other that I really dislike and quickly disable when possible: camera shaking or bouncing.

TL;DR: I vote these kinds of effects to be wholly optional if implemented at all.

Edited September 18, 2019 by swjr-swis
Why forum no merge posts? why?

[RealKerbal3x]

2 minutes ago, swjr-swis said:

I vote these kinds of effects to be wholly optional if implemented at all.

Luckily they probably will. Since they're trying to make the game run smoothly on most systems, there will most likely be options to disable fancy graphical effects for those who can't or won't use them.

[magoigor]

I wish there are all those effects in the game, but options to toggle for people who does not like them :))