Skyrim SE vs. Anti-Aliasing

[Adonsa]

Hi,

 

Anti-aliasing ruins my character's appearance.

 

GEForce RTX2070 Super

Intel i7-10700 Super

Acer X27 P

MSI Z490

SKSE 64 (up to date according to Loot)

Skyrim SE (up to date according to Loot)

CBBE v1.5.7

RaceMenu Special Edition v0-4-12

Vortex 1.2.20

Loot v0.15.1

SSEEdit.exe (not yet learned how to use it)

TES5Edit (not yet learned how to use it)

 

Signs and symptoms.

 

If I turn on Anti-Aliasing, either within SkyrimSE, or via the GeForce Experience app,

Skyrim boots up normally, but my character has dark streaks on the side and face.

No errors are returned. These are the only detrimental effects of anti-aliasing,

NPCs and scenes are normal.

 

I cannot improve the quality scale above about 33% without anti-aliasing turned on,

the Skyrim settings and the GeForce Experience app won't let me improve the

settings without anti-aliasing turned on.

 

And so, I have to ask if CBBE, and/or RaceMenu, and/or other mods are

incompatible with Anti-Aliasing.

 

And so, I have to ask you for guidance in how I should trouble-shoot this.

Any info will be most graciously appreciated.

 

Thanks very much.

 

 

[Algabar]

Don't use the GeForce Experience settings. At least for Skyrim, their "recommended" settings are bad anyway. You can control all graphics driver settings from the Windows system settings: System settings > Display > Nvidia display settings (I don't know the exact wording in English, I'm on a non-English version of Windows).

 

What works for me:

In Skyrim: Leave only the game's TAA antialising on. Disable the built in FXAA.

 

Now you can either test different AA settings in the Nvidia Settings - or use ENBs AA options. I tend to let ENB take over - but OFC that depends on the ENB preset you're using...

 

EDIT: On a side note: "Strange dark somethings" on body textures can also be caused by SSAO. If teh problem persists, you should also have a look at your SSAO settings. As with AA - only use one (Skyrim OR Nvidai OR ENB).

[Adonsa]

Hi Algabar,

Many thanks for your fast reply.

I'm don't have ENB and the ENB download site is a bit elusive as to
what to download.

Resolution: 3840x2160
AA: TAA enabled,

 

Then I turned everything to Ultra, clicked Advance and unchecked SSAO.

 

Wow, big improvement in graphic detail.

 

I'm not sure what to conclude. From my perspective, I would suspect an

incompatibility between either CBBE or mods within CBBE and AA with SSAO turned on.

 

From within Windows settings, I changed the FPS from 98 to 120, but with Skyrim running

it fell back to 60,. No big deal given that SkyrimSE isn't a raid type MMO game.

 

I had to read up on SSAO to find out what it is; I never would have thought to turn it off,

and I appreciate that info.

 

Thanks again.

[Algabar]

Glad to be of service. :cool:

 

Some additional thoughts:

1. Skyrim (and all games based on Bethesda's engine, e.g. the whole "Elder Scrolls" series and Fallout 1-4) aren't meant to be run above 60 FPS. You can run into some glitches, especially with the game's havok physics system. If you want to play Skyrim at framerates above 60, you should use a tool like this:

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/34705

TBH, I simply cap my FPS at 60, which can be done through the Nvidia driver settings (or ENB).

 

2. Try setting your resolution to 1920x1080 instead of 4K. IMHO the visual difference is hardly noticeable, but the work load on your GPU is vastly reduced. With a massively modded Skyrim and 4K you can bring even a high end GPU to its knees... Remember Skyrim is basically a 9 years old game. Its engine won't take advantage of contemporary hardware (CPU, GPU) the same way as more modern games.

 

3. Body textures in Skyrim are a special case. They work differently from other textures in the game. On bodies, you got several "layers" of textures (diffuse maps, subsurface textures, specular maps). So bodies react differently to graphics settings than the rest of the game. It IS possible though to get an overall decent looking game.

 

4. I'd encourage you to try ENB. IMHO, it's the most impactful single graphics modification you can get for Skyrim. I admit their pages are a bit difficult to navigate. Having to click on "news", if in fact you want a download is somewhat counter intuitive... Here's a direct link to the download page for Skyrim SE:

http://enbdev.com/download_mod_tesskyrimse.htm

Iistalling an ENB preset also may be challenging if you do it for the first time, but there are tons of tutorial videos and it's definitely worth the hassle.

I'd definitely recommend using ENB - the visual difference can be night and day...

[Adonsa]

Hi Algabar,

Thanks for your advice on ENB. I installed ENB according to the youtube video GNj386sBZQ8

 

Upon launching SKyrimSE, via SKSE, SkyrimSE was foggy or milky and with minimum contrast.

 

When loading, a message flashed in the upper left corner, something about Shadercache=true, and something about enblocal.ini, but it disappeared to fast to read.

There's a 2013 message thread that suggested editing some ini files, for which I am totally lost as to where to find them and how to edit them.

 

I clicked shift enter, and got the ENB menu, found Shadercache under Performance, and unchecked it, upon clicking Apply Changes ShaderCache became checked again.

It made no difference anyway.

 

I experimented with some of the settings. Under Effect if I uncheck EnablePostPassShader, it gets much worse.

 

Under the enbseries.ini menu, I unchecked Global useeffect, and it seems to be sort of back to normal, or the way it was before ENB.

Contrast is normal closeup, but a bit blurry distant.

Next I searched for a tutorial on how to use ENB, search engine searches only provided install tutorials.

The help and shortcut menu doesn't work.

 

If you can point me to a tutorial or guide on how to properly use ENB, I'll much appreciate.

 

Thanks.

 

 

 

 

[Algabar]

Hi,

 

 

Upon launching SKyrimSE, via SKSE, SkyrimSE was foggy or milky and with minimum contrast.

 

I experimented with some of the settings. Under Effect if I uncheck EnablePostPassShader, it gets much worse.

 

Under the enbseries.ini menu, I unchecked Global useeffect, and it seems to be sort of back to normal, or the way it was before ENB.

Contrast is normal closeup, but a bit blurry distant.

 

the "ENB" you download from enbdev.com is only the "framework". You basically only download a set of tools there. The ENB filese themselves won't make your game look good. In addition to them, you also need a so-called "preset". "Presets" are settings that tell ENB which effects to use and how to apply them. OFC you can create your own preset from scratch. This requires quite a bit of knowledge and experience with ENB though. I wouldn't recommend that for the beginning. BTW, unchecking "Global useeffect" disables all graphic modifications done by ENB. :ermm:

 

So, to make your game look beautiful with ENB you should download and install a preset. There's a whole section for these here on the Nexus:

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/categories/97/

 

Most presets are designed to work together with certain weather mods. If you want to use e.g. an ENB preset made for "Obsidian Weathers", you should also install Obsidian.

 

 

If you can point me to a tutorial or guide on how to properly use ENB, I'll much appreciate.

 

 

Regarding installing ENB presets, you will find anything you need to know in the description of "Re-Engaged". Scroll down the page a bit. There's a video link and also written step by step instructions.

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/1089

 

BTW, "Re-Engaged" is quite a "classic". Definitely an excellent preset. On the download page, choose the "Vanilla" version for the beginning. "Vanilla" in general means "unmodified base game", for ENB this means "no weather mods used".

 

When loading, a message flashed in the upper left corner, something about Shadercache=true, and something about enblocal.ini, but it disappeared to fast to read.

There's a 2013 message thread that suggested editing some ini files, for which I am totally lost as to where to find them and how to edit them.

 

I clicked shift enter, and got the ENB menu, found Shadercache under Performance, and unchecked it, upon clicking Apply Changes ShaderCache became checked again.

It made no difference anyway.

 

 

This message is normal. It basically tells you that ENB is about to pre-load shaders ("graphic effects"). Pre-loading them enhances performance once the game runs. You should always enable "Shader cache" in you Nvidia graphics settings (usually already enabled by default) and also leave it checked in the ENB configuration menu (also the default setting). This setting didn't make a difference because you loaded a more or less empty or very basic preset. With a full preset, shader cache settings WILL make a difference.

[Adonsa]

Hi Algabar,

Many thanks for your advice and links,

toward making me a better gamer.

 

The Obsidian Weather is way awesome.

Lots to do, and fun doing them.

 

Thanks again!!!