Hey guys, for those who will be playing on the PC version and are hoping for more graphical enhancements, I edited the first official Xbox screenshot with the following features:

- HDR
- Depth of Field
- Dynamic shadows (granted this feature is probably implemented but not too visible due to Overcast weather)
- Soft particles (for the waterfalls)
- Radiosity
- Ambient Occlusion
- Larger view distance
- Post-processing filters: Color grading, filmgrain
- Tesselation (most noticeable around mountain edges)

This is how it could resemble. Remember it's not official and it's more of a wishlist:
****


Edit: Some people think I went overboard with the shaders, so here's jonwd7's much subtler (and well done) version:

"@OP
I think you went a little overboard...

Here's my attempt:

http://i1022.photobucket.com/albums/af346/jonwd7/Skyrim/Markarth01_EDIT.jpg?t=1295366513

vs Original: http://static.zenimax.com/bethblog/upload/2011/01/Markarth021.jpg

(Toggle between tabs if you can) "

My eyes... they burn!

I think the original looks better. That enhanced image hurts my eyes

That's impressive. It's like a night and day difference. Hopefully the PC version does look like that. Much more realistic.

Really? I didn't think it looked that realistic at all. Felt like Mania on steroids.

I hate Depth of Field, why care about textures if every object more than 20 feet out is blurred? Motion blur can take a hike too.

The rest is fine though, looks good overall... save the DoF.

I'd rather have the original screen shot - you enchantments lost the image a great deal of quality. I like features, but basic quality is more important.

Actually I don't think the original looks realistic at all, I was adding features to the screenshot that are already available for Oblivion using extended shaders. That's what it might look like with extra layers of graphical processing. If you were to make a realistic render of that scene, you'd need to change a whole lot of other things which aren't present in the actual render. I don't think Bethesda is going for full realism, they're aimining for an impressive good looking and immersive game world that is performance friendly while still being a visible upgrade from Oblivion.

As for the brightness hurting your eyes, I may have overdone the blooming. Some people like it, some people hate it, and it can always be turned off. It was admitedly an issue in Oblivion. Same goes for depth of field. I hope there's a great degree of scalability and customization.

It doesn't look bad, but why add HDR? It's already using HDR.

And why did you add filmgrain? Skyrim is not L4D or Mass Effect.

I switched from an Overcast to a Sunny weather in order to highlight the lack of dynamic shadows people were complaining about in the other thread. HDR becomes more visible then.

As for filmgrain, it's not science fiction exclusive. It makes up for lower texture resolutions and adds grittiness and dirt to the whole image, which might actually benefit consoles and those using HD tvs, where pixelation and washed out details from lower resolution textures become more apparent. For the PC it's a matter of taste.

My God! There ARE dynamic shadows! Look beneath the shrubs in the middle. Other than that, there's really nowhere to have drop shadows in the image going by the direction of the light, so there is no shadow issue.

Direct link to gif: http://j.imagehost.org/0670/MySpaceGens_1389929611.gif

Ah. I see. Disregard my statement about filmgrain then.

Anyways, I really love the lighting, as it does look a bit more realistic. The lighting from the original pic seems a little green tinted.

It is a bit on the bright side, in my opinion though. And that's just my opinion.

I know one thing, if you were to make a mod like this for Skyrim (which this seems akin to Fellout and URWL), I'd definitely download it.

Thanks, fixed.

That's alright, I'm sure everyone has their own taste in graphical options, I'm only hoping they will be available instead of streamlined to the lowest denominator.

Here's a screenshot of OBGE for Oblivion, for those unfamiliar with it:

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/images/30054-1-1276513667.jpg

There's also one for Morrowind. I was only hoping this time Bethesda would include all those features (which may and probably will reduce performance) as optional graphical features. Some people don't like them, others do.

I'm sure there are better pics but in that one it just looks like someone futzed around with their contrast settings.

As for the OP, the original looks fine the way it is. The modifications, not so much.

I think the effect in the change makes the colors too truculent and even attacking - it dosen't really look like a cold environment anymore. Nice work though.

I admit it's over the top in some aspects of what he tampered with. However, it's a huge improvement over the bland limitations of the 360.

I'm not entirely sure how you can edit in some of those features accurately without a depth buffer.

Yeah, that's not a good OBGE example at all.

This is admittedly a bit dark, but the bitmaps always turn out darker for me (same goes for the before):

http://i1022.photobucket.com/albums/af346/jonwd7/Oblivion/ScreenShot19.jpg?t=1295365401
http://i1022.photobucket.com/albums/af346/jonwd7/Oblivion/ScreenShot18.jpg?t=1295365402

That is NFAA, SSAO, bleach bypass, and a vignette. I also have Godrays and DoF (in third person, a slight DoF, in conversations a cinematic DoF, and a fast auto-focus DoF for bow usage)

Here is the Bokeh blur shader in conversations:

http://i1022.photobucket.com/albums/af346/jonwd7/Oblivion/ScreenShot20.jpg?t=1295365514

The FPS dives with the bokeh blur, as seen in the shot. I am usually capped at 30FPS. The performance issues with DoF is why I made a mod to turn on/off DoF based on certain events.


@OP
I think you went a little overboard...

Here's my attempt:

http://i1022.photobucket.com/albums/af346/jonwd7/Skyrim/Markarth01_EDIT.jpg?t=1295366513 vs http://static.zenimax.com/bethblog/upload/2011/01/Markarth021.jpg

(Toggle between tabs if you can)

I suggest if you want to fake SSAO you do it so that the SSAO goes where it should. Maybe study the topic, look at some games with just the SSAO applied.

Interesting, but I wouldn't want the game to look like that. It feels very much like a filter (duh!) was placed on it. Kinda like how I feel about filter applier you can use on games. I forgot what the name of the program is called. I had tried it on Morrowind.

What bland limitations?

Now that one looks good.

The Depth of Field is strong with this one. :blink:

I mean, I like DoF too, but that's just a little too intense for my tastes. It definitely doesn't look like the default settings for the OGE shader for it, as I'm using it myself.

I'm not sure if you have a copy of the GI yet, but it's clear all the screen shots were taken from the Xbox 360. Skyrim looks more or less like a slightly upgraded, detailed version of Oblivion on the 360.