Pankratous
Member
Sure.
My example is a bit extreme, but I think it gets the idea across.
Ah, so blur pretty much?
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Developers: STOP using Chromatic Aberration
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Ah, so blur pretty much?
Freshmaker
I am Korean.
The reason being it's a camera defect that's undesirable in photography and film which makes adding it into games just to make them blurrier obnoxious and not arty.
The fact it gives people eyestrain should be reason enough to chill out on its use.
It's far worse than mere blur. Blur at least removes aliasing. CA is selective color channel separation. It has the unique power of making images more blurry and more aliased at the same time.
It's also quite similar to divergence issues on CRT monitors, so whenever a game uses it I feel like I'm back in the 90s and have to fix my monitor convergence.
Summer Haze
Banned
I think that's what it's mainly used for, yeah. But sometimes it's used to the point where you can see the colour bleeding/separation, 90s 3D-esque effect without even needing to look for it.
Pankratous
Member
VisceralBowl
Member
I can empathize with the eyestrain and I think it's divisive enough that devs should strongly consider adding a toggle, but the fact that it's considered a flaw doesn't mean it can't be used artistically. Firefly, for example, intentionally switched to cheaper lenses to get more lens flare because that's how they wanted the show to look.
I'm mostly making a stink because I don't like the idea that art should have to exist in a little box where only "good" techniques are used and "flaws" should always be eliminated. That kind of thinking stifles creativity.
BlastProcessing
Member
Firefly also used tons of camera shake to make it's CGI look better.
Camera shake is a defect as well. I wonder how people feel about that in games.
Gtagentleman
Member
Yeah, It's the new Bloom but it's worse. It hurts my eyes.
ALL VIDEO GAME CAMERAS MUST PERFECTLY REPLICATE HUMAN VISION AT ALL TIMES!
But no VR because that's a gimmick. Also don't replicate blind spots, or optical illusions, or any form of shaking, or the way the way human eyes actually focus, or... Listen, just do everything I like all the time and never do anything I dislike. It's not that hard!
Why would you bring up VR as an excuse to use camera defects? You don't want to do any of that shit in a VR environment, beyond the necessary lens correction (and MAYBE some carefully done vision fuckery at times).
Gtagentleman
Member
I cant play Dying Light because of CA and have to mod it out of Payday 2 every time it gets updated, AMA.
Summer Haze
Banned
But that's the thing, there is no 'perfect balance' because everyone's tastes are different. So we end up with threads like these, lol.
BlastProcessing
Member
Actually, from talking to some people who are experimenting with VR at GDC, I would say that you are going to see a ton of vision fuckery in VR. Even going as far as constantly changing the pupillary distances. There are still no real rules about what absolutely does or doesn't work. Funny side note, most of these girls and guys are making accidentally making themselves too sick to work for the rest of the day a few times a week.
Brave new world and all that.
NipplesAndToes23
Member
I'm not even sure what this is. I hate op's, that just assume everyone knows what you're talking about.
Yeah, your examples are quite obnoxious because the effect is rarely ever used like that in games
Yes, let's dial the CA up to three million, to the extent that is barely ever used in actual games, and use that as the barometer....
VisceralBowl
Member
Fully aware.
I like CA / don't mind it. That's intended for the people who "can't" see it or don't get it. Exaggerated on purpose.
Trickster
Member
Nah, the game has that shitty yelllow tint no matter what time of the day it is
ricardo_sousa11
Member
The problem with CA in games, is that the game is applying a filter to the full image or corners (vignette), where it should only happen in high contrast areas.
As you can see, there is no "loss" of detail, nor "blurryness" on the image, it happens around the roses of her head, due to the high contrast between the roses and white sky.
I dont really like this effect, specially in Bloodborne, as it seems its replacing DOF with CA, its really annoying and off putting. But in The order the effect is very very subtle and looks decent. I do believe some games could pull it off, games that have an in-game camera/interface.
As you can see, there is no "loss" of detail, nor "blurryness" on the image, it happens around the roses of her head, due to the high contrast between the roses and white sky.
I dont really like this effect, specially in Bloodborne, as it seems its replacing DOF with CA, its really annoying and off putting. But in The order the effect is very very subtle and looks decent. I do believe some games could pull it off, games that have an in-game camera/interface.
Stitch
Member
It's really stupid that overkill can't put a CA toggle in the options menu. Releasing expensive DLC is more important.
It's possible to mod it out of Dying Light btw.
Freshmaker
I am Korean.
Personally, I'm of the opinion that things should progress naturally if you don't want to hurt immersion. Things that involve sticking a camera into the scene so that you're aware of the camera don't really work well IMO.
So smearing mud on the screen, straw berry jam effects, lens flare, CA, rain pouring on the screen behind the character in a third person action game etc, all instantly fail for me as artistic effects since it's nonsensical to the overall visual narrative.
CA can make sense in certain contexts, but the way it's being used in games lately has no mooring in those.
CA in Destiny is fine to me for example. You're seeing a helmet HUD, so it makes sense that there'd be fringing.
If you're looking through a camera viewfinder or some kind of optical thinggie like a telescope, robotvision or whatever... Ok, whatever.
If you're playing a fantasy game OTOH, there is no implied camera or way for such a camera to be used. There's no reason to be telling the player "HEY! THERE IS A CAMERA BEHIND YOU! IT IS FILMING YOUR ACTIONS!!!!" There is no good reason for wierdo camera effects in such a setting unless they somehow justify it. (And no, saying something is like a dream doesn't cut it.)
Creative uses in such a setting would involve something like seeing through the eyes of a familiar, a crystal ball, or some element within the world that doesn't clash head on with the effect.
They way it's being used now however, it's like you're vehemently defending a broken offset press as the true vision of the artist, and I cannot ever accept that as a reasonable position.
it nearly makes my eyes go cross seeing it in payday, i cant mod it out either because its a huge pain in the ass and every 2 weeks they release an update where I have to go mod it out again and fix my resolution again.
I agree with the anti-camera-effect sentiment, it's probably driven by what it looks like on TV but I don't watch TV, I play videogames.
I mean, you can use camera errors to convey damage or really bad equipment but using them when you're supposed to play as a healthy human makes no sense.
Payday 2 also has that annoying dirt effect when you look at something bright, are the masks supposed to contain dirty glasses or what? Wearing glasses IRL makes me hate having any dirt in my vision.
Also I only recently stopped using a CRT on my PC, extra annoyance points for games that try to "emulate a CRT" when you're playing them on a CRT... that has none of those issues.
I mean, you can use camera errors to convey damage or really bad equipment but using them when you're supposed to play as a healthy human makes no sense.
Payday 2 also has that annoying dirt effect when you look at something bright, are the masks supposed to contain dirty glasses or what? Wearing glasses IRL makes me hate having any dirt in my vision.
Also I only recently stopped using a CRT on my PC, extra annoyance points for games that try to "emulate a CRT" when you're playing them on a CRT... that has none of those issues.
I'm defending the right for it to exist and an option. In this post you admitted there were certain contexts where it wasn't necessarily terrible, whereas your previous post about "polishing a turd" implied that it was always bad and any context/explanation was always an excuse for something that should never be used.
I agree with you that a lot of implementations are inappropriate and look like crap. It's a very easily misused effect that's often implemented for seemingly no reason other than "hey look at this new effect we can do." That said, I still think devs should be able to try it if they think they can make it work as a part of the game's overall look.
airmangataosenai
Member
When it comes to this topic I am really annoyed how ubiquitous the pile-on against the effect is. It's such a small thing, but people here treat it like the most obnoxious thing they've ever seen. I used to see the same shit with motion blur and bloom, both of which I feel are used effectively more often than not. I usually ignore it, but when we see so many threads complaining about it on a regular basis, a backlash it inevitable.
This is making me blind!!!
Summer Haze
Banned
Still not filmic enough.
There we go. 10/10 visuals.
Quoted for truth:
realism
+ chromatic aberration
+ muted colors
+ noise
+ lens flares
+ piss filter
+ black bars
+ motion blur
=
2015 video game
XD
nkarafo
Member
I actually like this in Alien Isolation. I disabled it in the options to see the difference and it felt like something was missing. That's because it blends well with the game's 80's retro-futuristic setting. And it's subtle enough so that it doesn't mess with the quality. I think you can only see the effect around the sides of the screen.
And despite that the effect works well in the game, it still has the option for the player to disable it.
And despite that the effect works well in the game, it still has the option for the player to disable it.
Wowfunhappy
Member
Sure.
My example is a bit extreme, but I think it gets the idea across.
I know you yourself admit that it's an extreme example, but it's.... really extreme. The effect pretty much never looks this bad.
Agree 100% with the OP. It's an obnoxious effect that degrades the image quality.
I wish games would stop trying to do things to graphics that make them appear with image-degrading artifacts, or technical and visual limitations from other mediums (CA, low-fps "cinematic" frame rate, etc). Let video games be their own medium where the most crisp fluid images possible are used because it's an interactive medium. I don't want to play games through a filter that make them look worse or where they pretend to be something they are not. I know when I'm playing a game versus some other medium.
I wish games would stop trying to do things to graphics that make them appear with image-degrading artifacts, or technical and visual limitations from other mediums (CA, low-fps "cinematic" frame rate, etc). Let video games be their own medium where the most crisp fluid images possible are used because it's an interactive medium. I don't want to play games through a filter that make them look worse or where they pretend to be something they are not. I know when I'm playing a game versus some other medium.
Don't mind me saying this, but I find your way of thinking extremely narrow minded and limiting. Who are we to decide what the medium definitively is or isn't, or what things should or should not be permitted for it? Like all media, be it art, TV, cinema, photography, music or anything else, experimentation and diversity in the medium should be accepted, and developers should be able to expand on their artistic vision. Not saying we have to like or commend the results, but this notion you have that just because it's a video game it has to follow this set of rules that dictate it in following this pristine visual aesthetic, just seems limiting.
Warm Machine
Member
Games don't need to be perfectly clear front to back. Everytime a technique becomes available it is usually abused. Bloom was abused initially but I'm looking at Lego Marvel right now and it lends itself so well to the image that the game would look dull without it.
GravityMan
Member
The more extreme cases of CA remind me of looking at an old CRT TV from the 1980s.
Mass Effect
Member
What games are these?
Spiritwalker
Member
Used to think it was a pretty cool effect, but now I despise it. Bloodborne would look better without it imo. Wish they'd add an option to turn it off.
batman2million
Member
I was totally unaware of this and kept thinking that it was something just in the game. It did take away from dying light.
I learn something new everyday. Thank you, Gaf.
I learn something new everyday. Thank you, Gaf.
Moral Panic
Member
That's what gets me about the whole "cinematic" and "realistic" excuses that they use. Actual photographers and filmmakers go out of their way to avoid artifacts like this. And when they do make it onto film... you've used Lightroom? There's a "Remove chromatic aberration" checkbox that's programmed with the exact specifications of the optics of the lens, so it knows exactly how the lens is affecting the image and exactly how to undo it.
I was watching some Bloodborne footage last night (I don't have the game itself), and the biggest thing I noticed about the CA wasn't the color banding directly, but rather that everything outside of the center of the screen looked unnaturally blurry. I can't for the life of me understand how anyone would look at that and claim that it looks "better" than the original clean image would have looked.
Head.spawn
Junior Member
My suggestion; get better at using it.
It's a nice embellishment in some instances (Titanfall) and in some cases it can help aide in getting a particularly stylish look (Cuphead/Ghost Song). I think some developers just need to learn where that line in the sand is. The Order used it perfectly I think, for a realistic take on graphics, it's subtle and non obtrusive. On the other hand, Bloodborne looks like they used it as a substitute for AA, it's bathed in it. Alien looks like they used it to create a certain aesthetic to match the movie, and I see where they were going with it, but I think maybe another approach could have been used that would be more appropriate and get that same aesthetic they were going for but without CA our at least dial it back and use it in a note controlled manner.
/two cents
It's a nice embellishment in some instances (Titanfall) and in some cases it can help aide in getting a particularly stylish look (Cuphead/Ghost Song). I think some developers just need to learn where that line in the sand is. The Order used it perfectly I think, for a realistic take on graphics, it's subtle and non obtrusive. On the other hand, Bloodborne looks like they used it as a substitute for AA, it's bathed in it. Alien looks like they used it to create a certain aesthetic to match the movie, and I see where they were going with it, but I think maybe another approach could have been used that would be more appropriate and get that same aesthetic they were going for but without CA our at least dial it back and use it in a note controlled manner.
/two cents
BlastProcessing
Member
It's less of an obsession with aping cinema and more of an obsession with engaging an audience. People have been trained for years to understand and respond to the vocabulary of cinema. Co-opting those conventions to get people to more easily suspend disbelief is a valid technique. Cinema co-opts plenty of conventions from the stage for similar reasons.
A few other examples of things that games use from other mediums. Soundtracks (Talk about destroying realism, where is the music coming from?), Camera cuts/Scene jumps (People can't really teleport! It destroys realism), Voice over/Narrators (There can't be omnipresent voices. Hell sometimes these Narrators are omniscient!), Non-linear storytelling (So I guess time travel is real now?!), Artificial lighting (You wouldn't really be able to see that clearly at night!) and a thousand other things.
If you made a list, one column of things completely unique to games and another with elements from other mediums it would be a bloodbath. But that's ok! The few things that make games awesome are more than enough! And when we run into problems making a game, we can look at how those issues have been solved elsewhere! We can experiment and modify and create things that couldn't exist in any other medium. Of course we are going to fuck up. Making games is crazy hard, but sometimes it works out pretty good!
There will always be well-suited ways to use such effects and visual choices, but as far as I'm concerned there's too much of a general focus on trying to ape other media and incorporate the inherent faults to the point that many games do not need to do so, because, it is not necessary.
For example, what's the point in Bloodborne for the CA? To emulate film? A camera? The atmosphere and feeling in it is something unique to games. What if they applied a film grain to Bloodborne? Should I like it because it makes it look more like a movie? It's not a movie and is not being seen through a camera lens. It doesn't need these things.
From what I'm reading though, it seems like CA is the gaming equivalence of a 3D version of a movie...except, for most cases, it's the only version.
Freshmaker
I am Korean.
3d serves more of a purpose than CA however.