About anti-aliasing.

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I hope I spelled that correctly and I hope this has not been asked before...

But what is the difference between FXAA, TAA, MSAA and other options many games now have? What is the best one to chose and does it matter when going above 1080p.

I know it removes the jagged edges of the screen, but that is about it.

Thanks in advance.

(If this is in the wrong forum, please move thank you.)

[Illusion of Progress]

I imagine it's for more than the Sims 2?

Anyway, I wanted to add a few things since the chosen answer isn't entirely correct. That being said, I don't know a whole lot about FXAA and TAA in particular so someone feel free to correct me if something is amiss.

MSAA doesn't render the scene at a higher resolution and scale it down. There is a method that does that but it's not MSAA but rather SSAA, which you seldom ever see anymore, at least traditionally. Games are now more and more including "internal resolution" sliders which I would want to say would act as a pseudo equivalent but I've been rather unimpressed with the results I've seen by it in a few games that have employed it so it seems it doesn't work the same. Using something like DSR would be pretty much the same though.

MSAA itself could be likened to "traditional" anti-aliasing, and often it'll yield the best visual results so I'd call it the "Gold standard" of sorts... at least the old one. Unfortunately, in modern times, it doesn't work on all games well or at all (like those with deferred rendering). When it does work, you sometimes need to pair it with transparency AA to cover stuff that MSAA won't (such as, as the name implies, transparency things like power lines, chain link fences, etc.), which adds further to demands.

FXAA is practically a blur filter as far as I'm concerned, yet the only mention of blurring was by associating it with TAA? FXAA has the nickname "Vaseline filter" for a reason.

As for TAA, it has some serious drawbacks. Namely, it can cause ghosting trails (most noticeable on slow moving objects) which is a deal breaker for most. This is probably what people are confusing for blurriness, but they are different. It tends to do rather good at anti-aliasing a scene, as long as you can tolerate the ghosting trails. It has a moderate performance hit (above FXAA, but generally below that of MSAA or SSAA).

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Escrito originalmente por Illusion of Progress:

I imagine it's for more than the Sims 2?

Anyway, I wanted to add a few things since the chosen answer isn't entirely correct. That being said, I don't know a whole lot about FXAA and TAA in particular so someone feel free to correct me if something is amiss.

MSAA doesn't render the scene at a higher resolution and scale it down. There is a method that does that but it's not MSAA but rather SSAA, which you seldom ever see anymore, at least traditionally. Games are now more and more including "internal resolution" sliders which I would want to say would act as a pseudo equivalent but I've been rather unimpressed with the results I've seen by it in a few games that have employed it so it seems it doesn't work the same. Using something like DSR would be pretty much the same though.

MSAA itself could be likened to "traditional" anti-aliasing, and often it'll yield the best visual results so I'd call it the "Gold standard" of sorts... at least the old one. Unfortunately, in modern times, it doesn't work on all games well or at all (like those with deferred rendering). When it does work, you sometimes need to pair it with transparency AA to cover stuff that MSAA won't (such as, as the name implies, transparency things like power lines, chain link fences, etc.), which adds further to demands.

FXAA is practically a blur filter as far as I'm concerned, yet the only mention of blurring was by associating it with TAA? FXAA has the nickname "Vaseline filter" for a reason.

As for TAA, it has some serious drawbacks. Namely, it can cause ghosting trails (most noticeable on slow moving objects) which is a deal breaker for most. This is probably what people are confusing for blurriness, but they are different. It tends to do rather good at anti-aliasing a scene, as long as you can tolerate the ghosting trails. It has a moderate performance hit (above FXAA, but generally below that of MSAA or SSAA).

I will take this into consideration and thank you for your valuable input !

And no the Sims did not destroy my realtionships :p

[Illusion of Progress]

Oh, no, I was guessing that maybe the PC is probably for more than the Sims 2? The Sims 3 in particular (do I ever know with this one) and I guess even The Sims 2 can have some woeful performance at times but it's (usually) not really something that gets much better with newer, faster PCs.

[76561198343548661]

good anti aliasing methods

1.SMAA
2.MLAA or FXAA
3.MSAA

[Andrius227]

The best AA right now is DLSS, but very few games have it. Not only it removes jaggies, it also gives a big performance boost.

[Illusion of Progress]

Escrito originalmente por Andrius227:

The best AA right now is DLSS, but very few games have it. Not only it removes jaggies, it also gives a big performance boost.

That's not an anti-aliasing method. It's an upscaling method.

Yes it may have good quality for an upscaler but that is the key part, as it's still worse quality than native which is the base point you should compare it to. Saying it gets rid of aliasing because it scales it away doesn't make it a proper anti-aliasing method since quality still goes down as well.

I'm not saying you can't use it, forgo anti-aliasing, and find it good enough. DLSS is great for what it is but it's not an anti-aliasing replacement by any means. What I mean is, if you're not already using DLSS for the performance boost then I can't imagine why'd you look to it solely as an anti-aliasing method, thus I wouldn't consider it one.

[Andrius227]

Escrito originalmente por Illusion of Progress:

Escrito originalmente por Andrius227:

The best AA right now is DLSS, but very few games have it. Not only it removes jaggies, it also gives a big performance boost.

That's not an anti-aliasing method. It's an upscaling method.

Yes it may have good quality for an upscaler but that is the key part, as it's still worse quality than native which is the base point you should compare it to. Saying it gets rid of aliasing because it scales it away doesn't make it a proper anti-aliasing method since quality still goes down as well.

I'm not saying you can't use it, forgo anti-aliasing, and find it good enough. DLSS is great for what it is but it's not an anti-aliasing replacement by any means. What I mean is, if you're not already using DLSS for the performance boost then I can't imagine why'd you look to it solely as an anti-aliasing method, thus I wouldn't consider it one.

DLSS literally IMPROVES image quality. And even though its not advertised as a form of anti aliasing, it does it as a side effect.

I mean look at supersampling AA. It renders higher res and downscales. The scaling process removes jaggies. DLSS is the same except that it upscales from a lower res, but it removed jaggies just the same.

[Arthur]

FXAA and TAA are post processing AA methods while MSAA is not, it's done when processing the image.

Modern implementation of FXAA can be effective in some cases especially for older games but for modern games, FXAA alone is not enough. FXAA is the least resource intensive. This leads to a slightly softer/blurrier image.

TAA is also a post processing method but is far more advanced than FXAA as it uses temporal data and motion vectors. depending on the implementation, It can be highly effective at not just reducing jagged edges and temporal aliasing but also act as a de-noiser at the same time, in computer graphics this is our go to method. Eventhough it can lead to a softer/blurrier image. this is also why most TAA implementation as a sharpening pass. Depending on the implementation, can either be resource heavy or not.

MSAA is essentially a more resource friendly version of straight up super sampling the image. Is extremely good at cleaning jagged edges on geometry BUT entirely misses temporal artifacts and temporal aliasing. Is also not good at anti aliasing transparency effects and foliage. Always Very resource heavy. This can lead to a sharper less aliased image but with the downside of having lots of shimmering especially on foliage.

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Thank you for all this nice information guys !

I did not even hear about DLSS up until now.

Only thing iI was pretty sure about is that FXAA alone uses the least resources, I had to use it in most newer games.(Because of an older videocard, Geforce 1060.)

As of tomorrow I will be rocking a Geforce RTX 3070. So that's probably gonna bring some changes. That is why I was asking :)

[Illusion of Progress]

Escrito originalmente por Andrius227:

DLSS literally IMPROVES image quality.

Compared to what? That is the important part.

I addressed this. If you were upscaling anyway, then yes DLSS is a "quality improvement" versus upscaling without it, but to say it improves quality compared to no upscaling is just wrong. It is an upscaler and a quality loss at the end of the day.

Escrito originalmente por Andrius227:

And even though its not advertised as a form of anti aliasing, it does it as a side effect.

Right, and I addressed this too.

I said if you are using DLSS anyway, it is fine to not feel like you need anti-aliasing along with it. But, if you're NOT already using DLSS, it makes a poor substitute for the sole purpose of dealing with aliasing. That alone makes claiming it the best anti-aliasing method a tall task.

Escrito originalmente por Andrius227:

I mean look at supersampling AA. It renders higher res and downscales. The scaling process removes jaggies. DLSS is the same except that it upscales from a lower res, but it removed jaggies just the same.

Yes, scaling both ways removes aliasing, but that doesn't make them equal in being methods of anti-aliasing. You can't say that just because they both scale from a different source resolution that they are the same or equals. The fact that one scales down and one scales up is a BIG difference that sort of matters.

If you give someone money, you are paying them, but if you are taking it, you are charging them. Both are transfers of money but in opposite directions and they are VASTLY different things, no? You can't say that because one aspect is the same that they are equally viable as a result when they have other fundamental differences; namely in this case, DLSS is upscaling and as a result is a quality loss relative to not upscaling.

Yes, it is a good upscaler and if you are using it you may not feel the need to use anti-aliasing I agree. But that does not make it the best (let alone even a good) anti-aliasing replacement for those ONLY wanting an anti-aliasing solution. That is the part you are seemingly missing.