New Meshbuilder Budget

A few more hours trying different shader parameter settings, and the only thing that changes it is completely disabling the shaders. It's interesting that only some areas (e.g. steep slopes) show the effect, so the underlying surface data may have something to do with it, and the shader's shadows just make it more visible. There is definitely some overall smoothing function that kicks in when you get above the altitude it's looking for.
 
MajorMagee, can you show a screenshot of what is wrong? Of course I can try myself, but don't have much time :)

If I understand you correctly the terrain doesn't appears smooth unless you fly at higher altitudes?
I don't remember all details but this may be related to the way my shaders create normal map for terrain. Since there is no way to know terrain mesh resolution in the code I tuned normal map it manually for the default settings. Maybe now it just doesn't play well with higher resolution.
And normal map is resized depending on AGL but has some hysteresis which may explain why it is different depending on whether you climb or dive.

On the other hand I'm not sure how any of this may cause issues with terrain shadows, but maybe I just forgot some details.
 
Below threshold altitude

8jqmBaI.jpg


Above

6g1Trfx.jpg
 
Thanks!
This is exactly what I thought.
Those edges are there even with default settings, but they normally appear too far to be noticeable.

But looks like I need to download the add-on and see it myself now, because I still don't understand why it happens.
I'll see what can be done, but the resolution or altitude levels are likely hardcoded in the dll.
 
Based on all the parameters I've adjusted to no effect I agree that it seems to be hard coded.

Two things that make that a bit odd are the hysteresis of the surface rendering change happening at a lower altitude when you're descending than when climbing, and that it only is visible when the shaders are enabled. Using the Numpad0Switch to turn them off, the surface rendering is smooth at all altitudes.
 
Palm Trees. That's in PTO over Henderson Field.

In this case the altitude seems to correspond to 2500 m going up, and 2100 m going down.
 
So, looked at the code, no straightforward solution here. That terrain "smoothing" code in my shaders is one of the oldest pieces, probably from 2014, and since then I figured out a way to use the data directly calculated by CFS3 instead. Those have worse quality in some cases, but at least they always works. So maybe I will look into it.

However, this mod has an issue with limited terrain "render" distance. The terrain is actually there, just without height variation.
I can't figure out how to add an image, just try my favorite testing location: France, Barcelonnette at 40K feet and you'll see :)

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Hmm, can't see the attachments and can't test anything right now, but it does seem that only a single ring is defined in the budget file, which might explain the issue.
 
Yes only a single ring as modelled on Charlie's original file. I must say for 95% of the time I'm quite happy with it but perfectly plausible that with a bit of ring smoothing a better result can be achieved.
 
I have not been able to make very much sense of how the meshbuilder budget works, but if the ring is only defining mesh detail within a certain radius, everything left undefined may be left with no detail at all. For some view distances this may not be a problem, and even desirable since resources aren't being wasted providing detail to areas behind the fog wall. In my more recent experiments with expanding the visible area, it would be important to make sure that the full area has one or more rings defining it.
 
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