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Shadow quality (Shadow resolution)

Discussion in 'PSM' started by Project-Mysh, May 29, 2014.

  1. Project-Mysh

    Project-Mysh

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    Hi all,

    Overall, shadow system in psvita is very slow, but im having some problems adjusting the quality. Changing soft shadows to hard shadows its working but all changes i made in "Shadow resolution" or "Shadow cascades" are not working in Vita ( they are working in the editor only ). There is some way to control shadow resolution in PsVita?

    (Its not a platform quality problem, both PSM and PC are on "Fantastic")
     
  2. blackbird

    blackbird

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    i had that issue too but as far as i know because you are using very low poly-plane that#s why there is no shadows ..... make a report bug so the sony guys will help you out
     
    Last edited: May 29, 2014
  3. Project-Mysh

    Project-Mysh

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    That's not what's happening to me, the shadows are working but a very low resolution. I need to change shadow resolution or shadow cascades, but i cant in the quality setup ( they change only on the editor, not in Vita). If i set high resolution shadows the result is the same as set "low resolution".
     
  4. blackbird

    blackbird

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    could you please post some screens
     
  5. jesusluvsyooh

    jesusluvsyooh

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    Quality settings don't really seem to change anything (bone blend weights in particular) (realtime) on my vita either, but they do in the editor, i thought this was an obvious bug that was picked up already, as no one ever mentioned it.
     
  6. Project-Mysh

    Project-Mysh

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    Ok, but better if they confirm to us that this is a bug and will be fixed next release. And one more thing, for me, bone "Blend Weights" are working fine, there is massive difference on my animations with 1 bone vs 4 bones in PsVita. Maybe is another bug you have in your project.

    Here are the screens, note the diference with shadow quality:

    EDITOR:
    $ShadowQuality1.jpg

    PSVITA:
    $IMAG0403.jpg
     
  7. blackbird

    blackbird

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    i had that issue too but the strange the quality changes everytime when i change the angel camera by the way you can make screenshots from vita by pushing the home and start button at the same time
     
    Last edited: May 30, 2014
  8. Project-Mysh

    Project-Mysh

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    Ahhh, good tip, i didnt know that i can take screenshots like that! Can you explain better how you fixed that bug?
     
  9. blackbird

    blackbird

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  10. eriQue

    eriQue

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    I don't see that bug report (yet?) - do you have a case number for me?

    Thanks.
     
  11. blackbird

    blackbird

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    well i send two files actually : with two different issues but i got only one case number (Case 609847) i will re-send the second project about the directional light
     
    Last edited: May 30, 2014
  12. blackbird

    blackbird

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    the number of the case file about directional light is (Case 610758 )

    @eriQue could you please make private messaging available so it will be easier to contact you
     
  13. blackbird

    blackbird

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    third case about the shadow issue is : (Case 610811)

    the sample i send was based on unity-chan

    here are some screens which show the shadows dispears depands on camera position and sometime depands on model placement

    $2014-05-30-184259.jpg $2014-05-30-184212.jpg $2014-05-30-184200.jpg
     
    Last edited: May 31, 2014
  14. mbowen89

    mbowen89

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    It seems like even now in the official PSM Vita build 4.3.4 that changing the shadow resolution does nothing... is this normal?
     
  15. jesusluvsyooh

    jesusluvsyooh

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    Maybe not normal, but i'm also getting the same thing :)
     
  16. mbowen89

    mbowen89

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    OK, interesting. Hopefully someone at Unity can chime in on why that is.
     
  17. jesusluvsyooh

    jesusluvsyooh

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    I don't know if the vita / what we've been given to use on the vita, has enough memory to display high quality shadows.
    Like certain other mobile devices, which seem to have up to 2g ram these days.
    Or it could just be that Unity-PSM is still fairly new and it'l just take a bit more time to implement features to improve shadow quality :) Would be nice to find out.
     
  18. mbowen89

    mbowen89

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    @eriQue

    Can you give us information as to why only Low Resolution shadow resolutions work on Vita, PSM?

    I'd really like to have higher res shadows for my next game before release... Thanks!
     
  19. eriQue

    eriQue

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    I haven't seen any repro projects where low resolution shadows couldn't be tweaked (with the Quality Settings) to achieve high resolution shadows..
    Have you tried playing with the shadow settings in the Quality Settings?

    (attached is a simple project where 2 cubes project shadows on each other and a plane, while rotating the light source.)
     

    Attached Files:

  20. eriQue

    eriQue

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    You can also try using Close Fit (instead of Stable Fit) - it should improve the quality (lessen the pixelation).
     
  21. mbowen89

    mbowen89

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    I can tweak the shadows in the editor and see immediate results, changing shadow resolution shows results in editor. Upon building and running on the Vita however, it always goes back to low resolution. The same build set to high resolution builds and runs as high resolution on Android, etc... so it's just a Vita thing.
     
  22. eriQue

    eriQue

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    Yes, the "Shadow Resolution" setting is currently fixed to "Low Resolution" for Vita - I believe this was done earlier because of memory constraints.
    I will have a look and see if we can expose "Medium/High/Very High" as well.
     
  23. mbowen89

    mbowen89

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    OK, thank you very much for your response!
     
  24. someunityguy

    someunityguy

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    "Yes, the "Shadow Resolution" setting is currently fixed to "Low Resolution" for Vita - I believe this was done earlier because of memory constraints.
    I will have a look and see if we can expose "Medium/High/Very High" as well."

    Is it hard coded and needs to be hotfixed or can we hack our way around this ?
    i ask as i have hit a shadowy wall where my vita build looks awful :(
     
  25. jesusluvsyooh

    jesusluvsyooh

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    Turn down the shadows 'strength' on the light, it blends it in a bit more making it look less bad :)
     
  26. daidokoro

    daidokoro

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    Any news on this problem ? Having the same issue...all good in editor and crap on the Vita...
     
  27. gringo2012

    gringo2012

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    Yes it is true. I am experiencing low quality shadows on the vita, whatever settings I use.
    What I also experience is a huge drop in FPS if I enable shadows.
    My game runs smooth at around 60 FPS constantly with shadows disabled. The scene is not that complicated.
    Once I enable shadows, it rarely gets over 30 FPS.
    I hope you guys can fix this speed problem in the next release of the PSM editor.
     
    Black_Eagle likes this.
  28. daidokoro

    daidokoro

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    Well considering people want to make commercial games on the Vita performance & soft shadows are a must have as it is working fine on mac pc ouya
    Or maybe there is some tricks?
     
  29. Black_Eagle

    Black_Eagle

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    This is a MUST fix
     
  30. eriQue

    eriQue

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    The resolution problem is fixed in the next update.
    But you have to be careful with the performance if you use highres shadowmaps.
     
  31. Black_Eagle

    Black_Eagle

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    ok, so is there a way to optimize shadows for the vita, like an option so we don't notice too much performance drop when we activate it?
     
  32. eriQue

    eriQue

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    As far as I know, not really - the standard shadowmap implementation in Unity is somewhat generic, and not extremely suitable for the Vita.
     
  33. Black_Eagle

    Black_Eagle

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    Aww, alright, so what does it mean by shader model? does that mean i can use good shaders to make the graphics better and there wont be much of a performance drop? and also how do you think i can make performance better? like what assets can i use to optimize my meshes with one click of a button and how does LOD work?
     
  34. daidokoro

    daidokoro

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    Fixed in the next update :) when can we expect this ? Or only after unity 5 launch ?
     
  35. eriQue

    eriQue

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    No, before Unity 5 - I would guess within a couple of weeks.
     
  36. jesusluvsyooh

    jesusluvsyooh

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    A couple of weeks?
    I may have another game and a few updates ready within the next 2 weeks, would it be best for me to wait for the update before submitting?
    Or is it a 'couple of weeks' that could be a lot more than 2? :)

    As Sonys PSM review and publishing time is quite large it would be painful to release all the updates and new game to then find out it all has to be done again with the new version fixes and adjustments a few days after. O_O
    Game developer problems haha.