Posted 27.10.19: amazing new shader patch features coming soon (video)

Looking great, they just need to tone it down a lot... the grass and spark particles I mean.
The grass texture is still WIP and (based on previous features) will probably be user-configurable, including the amount of debris thrown up.
I thought the sparks looked amazing as-is and a massive improvement over the current ones, but again, these are likely to be adjustable buy the user.
 
Yeah I'm sure we will at least be able to turn on/off, hopefully adjustable beyond that also :thumbsup:

Preview 245 has just been released, so take a look. :)

x4fabToday at 11:00 PM
v0.1.25-preview245 • Grass FX for new procedural grass (still WIP though, far from good); • Particles FX: sparks reworked, new particles for pieces and marbles, a few fixes for smoke and dust; • Smart Shadows: adaptive distances for better distant shadows with Extra FX; • Extra FX: • New approach for bounced lights, quite fast; • Screen-space lights (for now, only sparks); • New IMGUI-based apps (very WIP, more to come later); • Python apps: include icons in main app folder by naming them as “app.png” or “<form name>.png”: • Make it a simple icon without circle or background, patch would turn it into regular style icon; • Vertex shadows for trees (at least as a temporary fix); • Proper alpha-to-coverage for grass, trees and ksPerPixelAT (no more banding, instead, it’s used for anti-aliasing as it should be); • Specular lighting is affected by Lambert diffuse multiplier to get rid of wrong speculars; • New ksPerPixel_ppfog shader: simplest ksPerPixel, but with per-pixel fog, for tracks with some huge triangles (better to not do that though); • New biased double face shadow option for track meshes; • Option for alternative flip model initialization, improving performance a bit; • Improved auto-focus with Ctrl+Click, now working without photomode as well; • Use Ctrl+End to deactivate depth of field effect; • New taskbar: option for new icons style; • Align free camera vertically by pressing Ctrl+F7; • Car instrument inputs: • Set pivot for min/max mode, allowing to pick value the most or the least different from the pivot; • New input: POSITION, for race position; • New INPUT_THRESHOLD_LOWER/INPUT_THRESHOLD_UPPER options; • Cornering lights now would only work with headlights enabled; • Fixes.
 
The blades of grass will need a reduction to something quite a bit smaller.
The trajectory as it is 'rooted' up and thrown by that left spinning rear tire is spot on.
The dirt density at the side will need to be reduced.
The start of and the amount of front wheel smoke is very realistic.
All-in-all...Great work!
I have a feeling AC is about to be reloaded on more than just a few computers.
It is rapidly becoming quite the 'double-edged' sword though.
On the one hand, sales of AC will 'tick' upward.
On the other hand, AC is at the lowest price point it has ever been.
This is probably causing real headaches for KS and any future plans to move on to another sim.
The modding guys are seriously pushing this software to a whole other level.
AC is rapidly setting up to become the modern-day 'GPL' of simracing.
 
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I love all the updates which people are doing to the shaders in AC, its truly amazing.

One thing I wish there was a better way for is trees. Can anything be done about the trees in AC? I often think they are the weakest thing in the sim (visually). I am not necessarily hanckering for "3D trees", but just a better looking solution, even if that solution is different (but better) 2D trees.
 
New CSP is awesome, but I do have an issue with Sparks. They are "Active" and set to 20000 and 500. The particles are there, but they are just white/grey and suspended in mid air. It is probably something I have done or a conflict somewhere if nobody else is having this issue. Any suggestions to remedy welcomed.
 
New CSP is awesome, but I do have an issue with Sparks. They are "Active" and set to 20000 and 500. The particles are there, but they are just white/grey and suspended in mid air. It is probably something I have done or a conflict somewhere if nobody else is having this issue. Any suggestions to remedy welcomed.
UPDATE: Fixed: I Checked "Sort Particles Before Drawing" and all is well.
 
This is great stuff. As others have said, the grass can be a bit much, especially at more formal tracks like the GP circuit of the Ring. The grass would never be as high and wild as it appears with the Grass FX. BUT, this is a huge step in the right direction. I can imagine a time when a trip through the infield will result in a clogged intake and an overheated engine. Even visible grass in the front intakes after an off would be a huge visual enhancement. For now, flying grass mixed with the superb dust cloud is pretty cool though.
 
I guess the grass is so long at the moment just to show what's possible. There are already lots of configs being produced with much shorter, more realistic grass, and with different actual grass textures too. The default amount of debris 'churned up' by the wheels is also over the top but again, easily edited in configs to be more realistic.

eg:

auto_union_ring_new_grass.jpg
magna_steyr_new_grass8.jpg
puebla2005_with_new_grass.jpg
 

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