(H)ybrid high-(Q)uality (A)nti-(A)liasing (HQAA)

Ah, I appreciate the help!

EFermi wrote:

It's a hidden hyperlink in the first page, first post, letters HQAA at the start.
Or, yes, it would be better if it was an actual link, like  github.com/lordbean-git/HQAA , since forum does not highlight hyperlinks for some ungodly reason, so the only way to see one is to point a cursor at it.
 

Yeah, if I could change that I would. Crosire, if you happen to read this, can you please change my OP so the link at the top shows the full URL? It definitely doesn't really stand out the way I did it.

v26.4 now available. For those using the presets, this version should correct the slight ghosting that previous versions with edge detection temporal aggregation can cause. For those using advanced mode setup, you can now choose between 3 methods of edge data aggregation - Loose, which treats any positive in the last 3 frames as an edge, Balanced, which treats a detection in any 2 of the last 3 frames as an edge, and Strict, which requires all 3 checked frames to have detected an edge in order to pass it. Loose was the baked-in method prior to this version and is occasionally responsible for causing mild ghosting in fast-moving scenes or objects. This largely disappears on Balanced, which does a fairly neat job of things for the most part in my testing so far. On the other end, Strict will definitely miss edges during movement, but it should also cut down significantly on false positive detections.

v26.5 is now available. If you do not use optional features in HQAA, you can safely skip it. 26.5 has a new optional feature I call Image Softening that uses an error-controlled average of the neighborhood around each pixel to try to zap spurious pixels (like raster lighting artifacts). It has a reasonably high success rate in the test environment I used to build it (cave interiors in no man's sky). Be warned, however, there is a definite risk that this feature may eat stars.

Edit: Updated to 26.5.1, which uses an improved version of the math in the image softener. The feature now retains more detail when in use and still works fairly well (though it may still eat stars).

v27.0 is now available. This version sports a large increase to SMAA correction accuracy thanks to implementation of a new split-path method of calculating dynamic thresholding during edge detection in addition to a better method of selecting whether to use the luma path or the chroma path. Internals and presets have been adjusted to fit the new detection method. There are also some minor improvements to the image softening optional effect.

Edit: updated to 27.1, which corrects a bug in the chroma weight function that was causing chroma detection to be preferred in many cases luma detection would work better and additionally was causing a lot of false positives in the edge data.

v27.2 update available now. I made some improvements to the error reduction process of SMAA edge detection and have also fine-tuned edge-detection as a whole.

v27.3 now available. Image Softening has had more improvements and when enabled, it now runs right after the first FXAA pass to allow use of multisampled FXAA passes to blend the result with the scene. This can allow HQAA to successfully correct certain types of edge scenarios that are extremely difficult for non-temporal solutions (see first example below). This is likely not desirable in a fast-paced game as it causes some side effect blur, but it can look very good in slower-paced exploration-focused games. Overall effect on UIs and text is visible, but does not stop the text or UI elements from being readable (see second example below).

HQAA now has a Lite version available. It retains the core functionality and most of the improvements in full HQAA in a stripped-down package. The lite version:
-performs the full HQAA version of SMAA edge detection including dynamic luma/chroma path select and dynamic threshold calculation for both paths
-includes two-frame temporal edge aggregation and error reduction without the need for an extra texture (only the edges and weights textures are used)
-includes HDR support
-includes presets and the option to change to advanced mode setup
-includes FXAA multisampling (still defaults to 2x)
-performs dynamic luma / chroma selection during FXAA

The lite version does not:
-include optional features
-include debug outputs
-include hysteresis detail reconstruction
-perform dynamic thresholding during FXAA (it relies instead mostly on skipping early exit if SMAA detected edges)
-conflict with HQAA - both can be loaded and running at once, if for some reason you want to

v27.4 now available (lite version also updated to match). This version contains a slew of miscellaneous fixes, improvements, and optimizations mostly centered in the edge detection function. I have successfully corrected a problem where previous versions would often mark a horizontal edge with red pixels (red is interpreted as a vertical edge by the blending weight calculation function) and improved the method used to calculate the local contrast adaptation multiplier, the combination of which allowed for an increase in aggressiveness of edge detection as a whole. As a result, the output quality in 27.4 is notably higher than previous versions.

I've discovered a fairly major problem while experimenting with a derivative shader - in current (and an unknown number of past versions) of HQAA, SMAA blending does more or less nothing. If you comment out the FXAA passes and disable optional effects, HQAA leaves the scene looking basically the same as it started. Until I figure out what I did to break it, I've posted version 27.B (broken) which disables all affected code since you might as well reclaim the available performance until I can sort it out. Visuals are pretty much unchanged since FXAA was already carrying all the weight.

This problem took me less time than I anticipated to sort out. I'm currently pushing updates to 27.5, which has a fully-functional SMAA implementation.

Edit: the really embarrassing part is I discovered a major omission from the blending weight function which went unnoticed ever since I merged the SMAA.fxh header into HQAA (portions of this bug have been present in the code for a very long time) which was effectively skipping diagonal edge processing entirely. At least it's fixed now...

Minor update to 27.5.1 available. You can safely skip it if you don't use any of the optional effects (and indeed there is no change to the lite version). HQAA 27.5.1 merges the image softener code from TSMAA as the changes I made to that particular pixel shader while working on TSMAA were actually very successful. It no longer has a contrast threshold and instead samples the SMAA blending weights to determine whether and how to run.

Thank you for all of your work on this project! HQAA is my go to AA (and a lot more) shader. Previously, I had seven shaders in my preset, but now it's down to three. I really appreciate everything you've done.

Other developers, have sponsor-this-project tab on the github page. I've sponsored and donated to other projects/developers. And I'd like to talk with you about some ideas.

Although I've considered a donate button, I'm honestly doing this as much for myself as everyone else. I really don't like seeing jaggies, but I find that the side effects of the current best modern solution (TAA) are also equally undesirable. Ideas are always welcome, as is feedback in general (as long as it's constructive).

Fair enough. I’ve been very impressed with the development of HQAA. I have a very unique setup. Simply put, I use a capture card and inject reshade (as well as upscaling, motion interpolation and other video enhancements) on pc and console hdmi signals. Ultimately, I’m able to get a picture that is significantly better than the original, with only about a total 28ms of latency, which is acceptable for non-competitive console gaming.

With my setup, I have some issues. For instance, I have to use NV12 colorspace (4:2:0), and I use vibrance to re-saturate the colors to offset the color compression. I’d like to talk to you about incorporating some features into HQAA’s vibrance settings that would intelligently re-saturate the colors. In addition, I do a lot of upscaling. With console games, I can’t change render resolution, so I end up with some upscaling artifacts. I’d like to talk to you about incorporating some features to address those artifacts.

I know that these are very user-specific requests and that they will take some time/work. As a result, I’m willing to sponsor your project. If you’re interested, please message me through my profile.

Strangely enough this board doesn't appear to have PM support that I can find. I'm going to look into the color space issue to see if there's something I can do for you there - artifact control is a trickier issue and depends a lot on the conditions, frequency, and appearance of the artifacts whether I can try anything with them (artifact control is very difficult to do without adding in a whole lot of extra blurring if you're not using a deep learning setup).

v27.5.2 update now available incorporating NV12 saturation feature requested above. It works by converting the backbuffer color format to YUV, then adjusting saturation of the Cb and Cr channels without altering Y (altering Y changes the scene brightness), then converting back to ARGB and returning the output. It should theoretically be able to correct for contrast balance problems when displaying a component signal on an ARGB device.

Updated again to v27.5.3. After correcting a bug in the calculations, the saturation adjustment actually behaves exactly like a driver-based saturation slider, so I've rolled it into the brightness & vibrance setting and included fairly detailed descriptions in the tooltips for vibrance and saturation explaining why they're different and how they work. Yay learning things!

On a side note, HQAA can now produce some pretty interesting grayscale scenes if you're into that kind of thing. If you set saturation to 0 and wiggle the vibrance slider around, you can get a pretty visible change in the appearance of the scene, despite it being grayscale.

Strange, check my profile now (make sure that you're logged in; it won't show anything unless you're logged in with a verified account).

Weird, I pretty much just don't see any PM functionality at all. I sent a friend request on discord, so feel free to edit out your tag.