Tag: texture
Nvidia Details ‘Neural Texture Compression’, Claims Significant Improvements
Games today use highly-detailed textures that can quickly fill the frame buffer on many graphics cards, leading to stuttering and game crashes in recent AAA titles for many gamers… [T]he most promising development in this direction so far comes from Nvidia — neural texture compression could reduce system requirements for future AAA titles, at least when it comes to VRAM and storage…. In a research paper published this week, the company details a new algorithm for texture compression that is supposedly better than both traditional block compression (BC) methods as well as other advanced compression techniques such as AVIF and JPEG-XL.
The new algorithm is simply called neural texture compression (NTC), and as the name suggests it uses a neural network designed specifically for material textures. To make this fast enough for practical use, Nvidia researchers built several small neural networks optimized for each material… [T]extures compressed with NTC preserve a lot more detail while also being significantly smaller than even these same textures compressed with BC techniques to a quarter of the original resolution… Researchers explain the idea behind their approach is to compress all these maps along with their mipmap chain into a single file, and then have them be decompressed in real time with the same random access as traditional block texture compression…
However, NTC does have some limitations that may limit its appeal. First, as with any lossy compression, it can introduce visual degradation at low bitrates. Researchers observed mild blurring, the removal of fine details, color banding, color shifts, and features leaking between texture channels. Furthermore, game artists won’t be able to optimize textures in all the same ways they do today, for instance, by lowering the resolution of certain texture maps for less important objects or NPCs. Nvidia says all maps need to be the same size before compression, which is bound to complicate workflows. This sounds even worse when you consider that the benefits of NTC don’t apply at larger camera distances.
Perhaps the biggest disadvantages of NTC have to do with texture filtering. As we’ve seen with technologies like DLSS, there is potential for image flickering and other visual artifacts when using textures compressed through NTC. And while games can utilize anisotropic filtering to improve the appearance of textures in the distance at a minimal performance cost, the same isn’t possible with Nvidia’s NTC at this point.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Nvidia details Neural Texture Compression, claims significant improvements over traditional methods
This new Cyberpunk 2077 texture mod makes Night City more eye-popping than ever
The best Minecraft texture packs to download in 2022
The best Minecraft texture packs for 1.19 will turn your world into an entirely new experience. Of course, Minecraft’s low-fi charm is part of the draw, but texture packs range from subtle changes to an all-over reskin, so you can choose just how much you want to leave vanilla Minecraft behind.
Just like the best Minecraft mods and shaders, texture packs can help give an entirely new feel to one of the best PC games of the last decade, and is just one of many ways of keeping the sandbox game feeling fresh after all these years. While some mods can alter gameplay, and shaders change the quality and style of the graphics, texture packs allow you to add a new skin to existing blocks. Included in our list of the best texture packs, you’ll find realistic blocks, cartoonish overhauls, and cute changes to the way Minecraft mobs look.
MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Minecraft seeds, Minecraft skins, Minecraft mods
Fallout 4 mod adds HD texture overhaul to Bethesda RPG
As far as Fallout 4 mods go, there are a lot of them. The 2015 RPG game has been supported heavily by the community since launch, with game wide overhauls like Fallout: London and Fallout: Miami on the way, alongside bizarre creations like a Lego Fallout and a cardboard cutout of the one and only Todd Howard.
RELATED LINKS: Fallout 4 console commands, Fallout 4 mods, Buy Fallout 4