Pixels and supersampling

[Adam1984]

Im a little confused about the way you can supersample and create a higher resolution from say 1080p. 

So does each pixel display more than one colour? If so if you supersampled 1080p upto 4k would each pixel be split into 4 colours?

Is this how it works?

And what does supersample look like in comparison to the resolution it is trying to emulate?

[thebrownieguy]

No, a pixel cant just show 4 colors and therefore become a 4k display. I believe it smoothens edges and stuff similar to msaa, but on a greater scale.

[Adam1984]

Its very wierd, if anyone has any images that display how it works that would be cool. Im interested because arma 3 looked amazing with supersampling but the fps was about 8 lol but yeah I was impressed with what it does

[Verrierr]

Supersampling is just another type of anitaliasing which is process of smoothing the edges mostly. One pixel can only display one colour at any given time, there's no helping that.

[Verrierr]

 

1 minute ago, Adam1984 said:

Its very wierd, if anyone has any images that display how it works that would be cool. Im interested because arma 3 looked amazing with supersampling but the fps was about 8 lol but yeah I was impressed with what it does

Here you go 

 

[Adam1984]

So am I even talking about the correct thing, im sure I remember luke saying that using supersampling you can display an image at a higher resolution than your monitor

[Adam1984]

1 minute ago, Verrierr said:

 

Here you go 

 

Thanks, I have actually seen that video but not all of it so maybe missed something, I understand what anti aliasing does, I thought supersampling was different, or is it just uber msaa?

[Verrierr]

1 minute ago, Adam1984 said:

So am I even talking about the correct thing, im sure I remember luke saying that using supersampling you can display an image at a higher resolution than your monitor

That's something else entirely. You can render images at higher resolutions and then downscale it so it can actually fit your monitors resolution. You still get one colour per pixel but it looks better.

[Adam1984]

3 minutes ago, Verrierr said:

That's something else entirely. You can render images at higher resolutions and then downscale it so it can actually fit your monitors resolution. You still get one colour per pixel but it looks better.

so on arma 3 and im pretty sure bf4 you can scale to whatever percent and make it way sharper, thats what I thought was supersampling, what is it? And how does it work?

[Adam1984]

I think downsampling is what im talking about, how does that work? I cant understand how you can make single colour pixels do that

[minibois]

10 minutes ago, Adam1984 said:

I think downsampling is what im talking about, how does that work? I cant understand how you can make single colour pixels do that

well you just take an image and you make it smaller. If you push together a yellow and a red pixel, you get an orange pixel. Kinda like that stuff.

Of course the algorithms are much much more complicated, to form an image that looks alright, but that's the basis of it.

[Glenwing]

19 minutes ago, Adam1984 said:

Im a little confused about the way you can supersample and create a higher resolution from say 1080p. 

So does each pixel display more than one colour? If so if you supersampled 1080p upto 4k would each pixel be split into 4 colours?

Is this how it works?

And what does supersample look like in comparison to the resolution it is trying to emulate?

Supersampling is just a form of anti-aliasing, you can look up that term if you want a more detailed explanation of what it does.

 

Anti-aliasing, including supersampling, doesn't change the resolution of an image. The whole thing about "displaying a 4K image on a 1080p monitor" is just marketing nonsense thrown around by NVIDIA with the introduction of DSR because "4K" is a popular term now. Supersampling is the oldest, most simplistic, and least efficient anti-aliasing techniques that exists, it's just been re-introduced with some NVIDIA marketing sprinkled on top.

 

Supersampling runs the game at a higher resolution internally, such as 4K. However, this does not mean you are "displaying 4K on a 1080p monitor" or something like that. The higher resolution image is never shown on the screen. Instead, it is simply used to calculate a more accurate 1080p image. What you see on the screen in the end is still a 1080p image, just slightly more accurate, it looks nothing like what an actual 4K image would look like, but it takes the same performance hit as 4K (four times the graphics power). Like I said, supersampling is the least efficient form of AA. Most other forms of AA are based on the same thing, just with some more advanced techniques for figuring out which parts of the image can be ignored, such as a large field that's all the same color or something like that, so you don't waste graphics power supersampling that part.

 

The only unique benefit of DSR / VSR is that it's a driver level application of AA, which means you can trick Windows into running at a higher resolution than your monitor. Like I said, this does not mean your monitor is displaying a higher resolution image, what you see is just a 1080p version of that image. But it can be useful for getting a feel for the size and scale of UI elements at higher resolutions, and it can also be used to simulate framerates at higher resolutions (since the performance of DSR / VSR at 4x on a 1080p monitor is the same performance as 4K), so it's easy to test whether your rig can handle 4K before you get a 4K monitor.

 

11 minutes ago, Verrierr said:

That's something else entirely. You can render images at higher resolutions and then downscale it so it can actually fit your monitors resolution. You still get one colour per pixel but it looks better.

That's what anti-aliasing is, in its most basic form.

 

6 minutes ago, Adam1984 said:

I think downsampling is what im talking about, how does that work? I cant understand how you can make single colour pixels do that

Both are correct actually, super-sampling is the name of the AA technique, although what it is actually doing is downsampling from a higher resolution image internally.

[Verrierr]

2 minutes ago, Glenwing said:

That's what anti-aliasing is.

I thought that he was asking about anti-aliasing. I realize my post isn't exactly well edited and detailed but it's meant to say pretty much the same thing.

[Adam1984]

12 minutes ago, Glenwing said:

Supersampling is just a form of anti-aliasing, you can look up that term if you want a more detailed explanation of what it does.

 

Anti-aliasing, including supersampling, doesn't change the resolution of an image. The whole thing about "displaying a 4K image on a 1080p monitor" is just marketing nonsense thrown around by NVIDIA with the introduction of DSR because "4K" is a popular term now. Supersampling is the oldest, most simplistic, and least efficient anti-aliasing techniques that exists, it's just been re-introduced with some NVIDIA marketing sprinkled on top.

 

Supersampling runs the game at a higher resolution internally, such as 4K. However, this does not mean you are "displaying 4K on a 1080p monitor" or something like that. The higher resolution image is never shown on the screen. Instead, it is simply used to calculate a more accurate 1080p image. What you see on the screen in the end is still a 1080p image, just slightly more accurate, it looks nothing like what an actual 4K image would look like, but it takes the same performance hit as 4K (four times the graphics power). Like I said, supersampling is the least efficient form of AA. Most other forms of AA are based on the same thing, just with some more advanced techniques for figuring out which parts of the image can be ignored, such as a large field that's all the same color or something like that, so you don't waste graphics power supersampling that part.

 

The only unique benefit of DSR / VSR is that it's a driver level application of AA, which means you can trick Windows into running at a higher resolution than your monitor. Like I said, this does not mean your monitor is displaying a higher resolution image, what you see is just a 1080p version of that image. But it can be useful for getting a feel for the size and scale of UI elements at higher resolutions, and it can also be used to simulate framerates at higher resolutions (since the performance of DSR / VSR at 4x on a 1080p monitor is the same performance as 4K), so it's easy to test whether your rig can handle 4K before you get a 4K monitor.

 

That's what anti-aliasing is.

 

Both are correct actually, super-sampling is the name of the AA technique, although what it is actually doing is downsampling from a higher resolution image internally.

Thanks thats starting to make a lot of sense now, the fact that it doesnt change the resolution but kind of changes the image size like the windows icons in 4k are tiny because of the amount of real estate is how im understanding it

[Glenwing]

1 minute ago, Verrierr said:

I thought that he was asking about anti-aliasing. I realize my post isn't exactly well edited and detailed but it's meant to say pretty much the same thing.

I thought you were saying the thing about running at a higher resolution than your monitor was something different than anti-aliasing, but it isn't; Rending at a higher resolution internally and using it to calculate a more accurate native resolution image is the basis of a lot of AA techniques.

[Adam1984]

Id love to see real images of anti aliasing working on pixels up close, that would really help me to understand it. I mean its not like I dont know what it does, the first time I hit 8xmsaa on a game I was just in awe and ready to throw away my gtx 580 for a 780 (not that it helped much) I just would love to be fully knowledgable about how it works and what it looks like up close

[Adam1984]

Think im being a doosh, found some images of the edges of some very laddery curves being lightened with grey pixels to make them smoother. Off to dip my head in a bucket of ice water B)

[Glenwing]

2 minutes ago, Adam1984 said:

Think im being a doosh, found some images of the edges of some very laddery curves being lightened with grey pixels to make them smoother. Off to dip my head in a bucket of ice water B)

That's pretty much what it does