TRULY Realistic Lighting?

[bar333]

Hi guys.

Here's the thing about me - I want my Skyrim to be dark. Truly, realistically dark, and no RLWC ini that I've tried has done that.

I've tried a lot of the presets on the nexus, set my brightness to the lowest level and calibrated my screen but nothing is good enough for me. Dungeons and nights are too bright, it just looks magically lit by... nothing, really. Moon and star light are not enough to have full visibility at night and that's what you get with every configuration I've tried. I want nights that actually give me reason to avoid travelling late at night beyond role playing, or at least force me to use a torch or lantern. Dungeons are also unreasonably bright.

 

For example, here's a screenshot in the Barrow near Ivarstead, using RLWC 3.31 and Dinky's ini.

 

http://i255.photobucket.com/albums/hh121/bar333/ScreenShot15.jpg

 

There is no reason for me to be able to see the fine details of the stones on the ground around the doorway - there is no source of light close enough to cast this light on it.

I guess my problem is I can't achieve "true" darkness, true black, only shades of grey. I would like to only be able to see stuff in the immediate vicinity of torches etc in dungeons like that.

I remember getting pretty close to that, but I've taken a break off Skyrim since then, returned and updated my mods and can't achieve the same thing again.

 

Any suggestions? Recommendations for good RLWC configs, or anything else really?

Thanks.

[rowtjack07]

What you are forgetting is what artist are very aware of, reflective light. You see light is photons, and when photons his a solid object they are ever consumed (create light on a surface), reject (bounce away), or go through (glass). Photons are reflected off nearly all objects, and this creates a slight illumination in areas that don't have direct light hitting them.

A way to see this in real life is to look at a torch hitting the floor of a pitch black room. The area where the torch hits the floor will not be a perfect circle of light, but instead a general illumination around the area of the light.

[rowtjack07]

http://zonalandeducation.com/mstm/physics/light/rayOptics/reflection/r1.jpg

 

http://www.noir.org/tutorials/2dTutorials/General/Shea/AirbrushShading/images/step7.jpg

 

http://dxyner2000.com/tutorials/assetts/radiosity.jpg

 

Here are some good diagrams to explain this.

[ResolveThatChord]

I don't mind the constant night vision, but I can definitely respect where you're coming from. It would be interesting to have light sources and torches have an actual effect on gameplay.

Have you played the Theives Guild storyline? There is a dungeon in that which has very dark, impenetrable shadows. I would start by inspeting that interior in the creation kit, and finding out how it gets this effect. It could be that removing the ambient lighting from a dungeon would do the trick.

[bar333]

Knocking my Gamma back on my monitor's settings actually achieves the look I want for dungeons, but naturally it makes the outdoors look way too dark as well.

Not really sure what to do about it, I've been spending more than 2 hours now trying to calibrate my monitor properly using various websites and guides, but no luck, my monitor just doesn't give me enough flexibility with my Gamma settings, I only get 3 preset options.

 

I'm going to try and make some changes to the ini myself following Pluto's guide, hopefully I can darken the dungeons and nights while still maintaining the brightness of the sunlight.

[gasti89]

First: 3.31 isn't the last RL version, those version was still very very vanilla like

 

Second: interiors will be worked for 4.0 RL version

 

So, i suggest to first update your mod, and then start complaining at "no realism". And anyway interiors don't count, since they haven't been worked yet.

[bar333]

I thought that by saying I have tried every configuration, it would be obvious that I have also tried 3.4a.

I reverted back to 3.31 to use Dinky's ini which only supports that version, and it's not the only one.

It's just an example. I didn't get better results with 3.4a.

[gasti89]

Oh, ok. I misunderstood your post then.

 

It's strage cause i get really dark interiors with 3.4.

 

Anyway interiors will be improved with 4.0 so you could wait for it