Bo3b's School For Shaderhackers
  9 / 87    
Just finished Lesson 1. After moving the Dumps folder to the correct location, things started working again. Ran into a slight snag on Lesson 2, where I couldn't find a shader that disabled the bloom effect. I'd initially skipped the video, but I'm watching it now to see where I've gone wrong - I looked at that purple effect, but I hadn't made the connection that it would be the one needed. It would be great if the text lessons could have notes about those things if possible. You've got a good teaching voice though, and the video is very clear. Oh, I'd also wonder if it's possible to disable or lower the volume of in-game sound for videos, it's a little distracting.
Just finished Lesson 1. After moving the Dumps folder to the correct location, things started working again.

Ran into a slight snag on Lesson 2, where I couldn't find a shader that disabled the bloom effect. I'd initially skipped the video, but I'm watching it now to see where I've gone wrong - I looked at that purple effect, but I hadn't made the connection that it would be the one needed. It would be great if the text lessons could have notes about those things if possible. You've got a good teaching voice though, and the video is very clear.

Oh, I'd also wonder if it's possible to disable or lower the volume of in-game sound for videos, it's a little distracting.

Posted 08/31/2014 02:24 PM   
OK, ran into another snag, but decided to add it as part of the Lesson, because it seemed like great information, and the type of stuff you are definitely going to run into. This wound up being longer than I expected at 33 minutes, which put a crimp in my lesson plan. My ability to predict how long these will be is a work in progress. :-> I want to keep each lesson at 30m or less, because that seems like the chunk of time that nearly everyone can get to. I think I'm going to break up my planned lesson into another piece instead, which will delay me getting the web page up. In the interim, I've put up the piece that is complete. The web page will change a little as I clean this up, and it won't exactly match the video, but I think it's still worthwhile. Not positive this Lesson will be that interesting for you more advanced people, so let me know. This one is on using HelixMod constants and setting up a keyboard toggle. If you want an early look before I get it cleaned up, you can go to the YouTube at: [url]http://youtu.be/O2pafLpepsk[/url] [url]http://wiki.bo3b.net/index.php?title=Lesson_3_-_Const[/url]
OK, ran into another snag, but decided to add it as part of the Lesson, because it seemed like great information, and the type of stuff you are definitely going to run into.

This wound up being longer than I expected at 33 minutes, which put a crimp in my lesson plan. My ability to predict how long these will be is a work in progress. :->


I want to keep each lesson at 30m or less, because that seems like the chunk of time that nearly everyone can get to.

I think I'm going to break up my planned lesson into another piece instead, which will delay me getting the web page up. In the interim, I've put up the piece that is complete. The web page will change a little as I clean this up, and it won't exactly match the video, but I think it's still worthwhile.


Not positive this Lesson will be that interesting for you more advanced people, so let me know. This one is on using HelixMod constants and setting up a keyboard toggle.

If you want an early look before I get it cleaned up, you can go to the YouTube at: http://youtu.be/O2pafLpepsk

http://wiki.bo3b.net/index.php?title=Lesson_3_-_Const

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Bo3b's School for ShaderHackers

Posted 08/31/2014 02:28 PM   
[quote="andysonofbob"]bo3b Any chance you could update the first post with the wiki please? 'some![/quote]Good idea, added the link at the first post. You can also subscribe to my YouTube channel for notice when I upload a video. I think I could also get email notification working for page notifications on the wiki if people thought that would be useful. At present I think email is not working off the wiki. [quote="Pirateguybrush"]Just finished Lesson 1. After moving the Dumps folder to the correct location, things started working again.[/quote]Weird. Not sure why that would be different for the regular game. I have seen the LOG show up in different directories. Unfortunately that is part of the weirdness of the tool/game interactions. Sometimes we have to jack with it to get it to work. [quote="Pirateguybrush"]Ran into a slight snag on Lesson 2, where I couldn't find a shader that disabled the bloom effect. I'd initially skipped the video, but I'm watching it now to see where I've gone wrong - I looked at that purple effect, but I hadn't made the connection that it would be the one needed. It would be great if the text lessons could have notes about those things if possible. You've got a good teaching voice though, and the video is very clear. Oh, I'd also wonder if it's possible to disable or lower the volume of in-game sound for videos, it's a little distracting.[/quote]Great! Thanks for the feedback. I will tweak the volume even lower for the in-game sound, I also think it's a bit much. I'll tweak the text on Lesson 2 based on your suggestion. I usually write the text as a script for the video, so there are some surprises for me that don't always make it back. I don't think I have enough time to do both video and text justice, so in general I am leaning toward the video as being the definitive help, as I can add a lot more detail quickly. Later on with much more complicated stuff where video doesn't work as well, I'll probably swing back to better text, lesser video. Please do keep letting me know what is working for you, and what is not that good. I'll keep trying to improve it.
andysonofbob said:bo3b

Any chance you could update the first post with the wiki please?

'some!
Good idea, added the link at the first post. You can also subscribe to my YouTube channel for notice when I upload a video.

I think I could also get email notification working for page notifications on the wiki if people thought that would be useful. At present I think email is not working off the wiki.

Pirateguybrush said:Just finished Lesson 1. After moving the Dumps folder to the correct location, things started working again.
Weird. Not sure why that would be different for the regular game. I have seen the LOG show up in different directories. Unfortunately that is part of the weirdness of the tool/game interactions. Sometimes we have to jack with it to get it to work.

Pirateguybrush said:Ran into a slight snag on Lesson 2, where I couldn't find a shader that disabled the bloom effect. I'd initially skipped the video, but I'm watching it now to see where I've gone wrong - I looked at that purple effect, but I hadn't made the connection that it would be the one needed. It would be great if the text lessons could have notes about those things if possible. You've got a good teaching voice though, and the video is very clear.

Oh, I'd also wonder if it's possible to disable or lower the volume of in-game sound for videos, it's a little distracting.
Great! Thanks for the feedback. I will tweak the volume even lower for the in-game sound, I also think it's a bit much.

I'll tweak the text on Lesson 2 based on your suggestion. I usually write the text as a script for the video, so there are some surprises for me that don't always make it back. I don't think I have enough time to do both video and text justice, so in general I am leaning toward the video as being the definitive help, as I can add a lot more detail quickly. Later on with much more complicated stuff where video doesn't work as well, I'll probably swing back to better text, lesser video.


Please do keep letting me know what is working for you, and what is not that good. I'll keep trying to improve it.

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Bo3b's School for ShaderHackers

Posted 08/31/2014 02:53 PM   
Finished Lesson 2, that was pretty fun. :) Looking forward to the next one, thanks bo3b!
Finished Lesson 2, that was pretty fun. :)

Looking forward to the next one, thanks bo3b!

Posted 08/31/2014 03:00 PM   
Hey bo3b, I just gave this school a shoutout on the Steam nVidia 3D Vision Gamers group - hopefully we can get a few more students who may not have seen the thread on the Geforce forums: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/3dvisiongamers/discussions/0/35222218835381975/ It might also be a good idea to post about it on the Helix blog, since heaps of 3D gamers follow that.
Hey bo3b, I just gave this school a shoutout on the Steam nVidia 3D Vision Gamers group - hopefully we can get a few more students who may not have seen the thread on the Geforce forums:

http://steamcommunity.com/groups/3dvisiongamers/discussions/0/35222218835381975/


It might also be a good idea to post about it on the Helix blog, since heaps of 3D gamers follow that.

2x Geforce GTX 980 in SLI provided by NVIDIA, i7 6700K 4GHz CPU, Asus 27" VG278HE 144Hz 3D Monitor, BenQ W1070 3D Projector, 120" Elite Screens YardMaster 2, 32GB Corsair DDR4 3200MHz RAM, Samsung 850 EVO 500G SSD, 4x750GB HDD in RAID5, Gigabyte Z170X-Gaming 7 Motherboard, Corsair Obsidian 750D Airflow Edition Case, Corsair RM850i PSU, HTC Vive, Win 10 64bit

Alienware M17x R4 w/ built in 3D, Intel i7 3740QM, GTX 680m 2GB, 16GB DDR3 1600MHz RAM, Win7 64bit, 1TB SSD, 1TB HDD, 750GB HDD

Pre-release 3D fixes, shadertool.py and other goodies: http://github.com/DarkStarSword/3d-fixes
Support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/DarkStarSword or PayPal: https://www.paypal.me/DarkStarSword

Posted 08/31/2014 03:41 PM   
[quote="bo3b"]If you want an early look before I get it cleaned up, you can go to the YouTube at: [url]http://youtu.be/O2pafLpepsk[/url][/quote]Nice, I got a little if/else going to swap between colors ... of course it had to be a stubborn game(anti-c250) and not work right away, but I'm getting used to that sort of thing. At least you said something about it so I was prepared. :)
bo3b said:If you want an early look before I get it cleaned up, you can go to the YouTube at: http://youtu.be/O2pafLpepsk
Nice, I got a little if/else going to swap between colors ... of course it had to be a stubborn game(anti-c250) and not work right away, but I'm getting used to that sort of thing. At least you said something about it so I was prepared. :)
Posted 08/31/2014 10:19 PM   
Nice, on to shader constants :) I see you have linked to the online float to hex converter. Personally I found it a bit clunky to use, so I wrote my own that I could run from the command line (you need Python to use it): https://github.com/DarkStarSword/junk/blob/master/float_to_hex.py You can give it a range of values on the command line and it will convert them from floats to hex and vice versa: [code] $ ./float_to_hex.py 1 0 0.5 0.95 0.995 0x40000000 from float double ---- ----- ------ 1 0x3f800000 0x3ff0000000000000 0 0x00000000 0x0000000000000000 0.5 0x3f000000 0x3fe0000000000000 0.95 0x3f733333 0x3fee666666666666 0.995 0x3f7eb852 0x3fefd70a3d70a3d7 0x40000000 2.0 5.30498947741e-315 [/code]
Nice, on to shader constants :)

I see you have linked to the online float to hex converter. Personally I found it a bit clunky to use, so I wrote my own that I could run from the command line (you need Python to use it):

https://github.com/DarkStarSword/junk/blob/master/float_to_hex.py


You can give it a range of values on the command line and it will convert them from floats to hex and vice versa:

$ ./float_to_hex.py 1 0 0.5 0.95 0.995 0x40000000
from float double
---- ----- ------
1 0x3f800000 0x3ff0000000000000
0 0x00000000 0x0000000000000000
0.5 0x3f000000 0x3fe0000000000000
0.95 0x3f733333 0x3fee666666666666
0.995 0x3f7eb852 0x3fefd70a3d70a3d7
0x40000000 2.0 5.30498947741e-315

2x Geforce GTX 980 in SLI provided by NVIDIA, i7 6700K 4GHz CPU, Asus 27" VG278HE 144Hz 3D Monitor, BenQ W1070 3D Projector, 120" Elite Screens YardMaster 2, 32GB Corsair DDR4 3200MHz RAM, Samsung 850 EVO 500G SSD, 4x750GB HDD in RAID5, Gigabyte Z170X-Gaming 7 Motherboard, Corsair Obsidian 750D Airflow Edition Case, Corsair RM850i PSU, HTC Vive, Win 10 64bit

Alienware M17x R4 w/ built in 3D, Intel i7 3740QM, GTX 680m 2GB, 16GB DDR3 1600MHz RAM, Win7 64bit, 1TB SSD, 1TB HDD, 750GB HDD

Pre-release 3D fixes, shadertool.py and other goodies: http://github.com/DarkStarSword/3d-fixes
Support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/DarkStarSword or PayPal: https://www.paypal.me/DarkStarSword

Posted 09/01/2014 01:19 AM   
[quote="DarkStarSword"]Hey bo3b, I just gave this school a shoutout on the Steam nVidia 3D Vision Gamers group - hopefully we can get a few more students who may not have seen the thread on the Geforce forums: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/3dvisiongamers/discussions/0/35222218835381975/ It might also be a good idea to post about it on the Helix blog, since heaps of 3D gamers follow that.[/quote]Super great writeup, thanks for doing that! I think adding something to HelixModBlog is a good idea too, so I'll post that tomorrow.
DarkStarSword said:Hey bo3b, I just gave this school a shoutout on the Steam nVidia 3D Vision Gamers group - hopefully we can get a few more students who may not have seen the thread on the Geforce forums:

http://steamcommunity.com/groups/3dvisiongamers/discussions/0/35222218835381975/


It might also be a good idea to post about it on the Helix blog, since heaps of 3D gamers follow that.
Super great writeup, thanks for doing that! I think adding something to HelixModBlog is a good idea too, so I'll post that tomorrow.

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Latest 3Dmigoto Release
Bo3b's School for ShaderHackers

Posted 09/01/2014 01:37 AM   
OK folks, Lesson 3 is up! [url]http://wiki.bo3b.net/index.php?title=Lesson_3_-_Const[/url] This is our first taste of changing and writing a tiny bit of ASM code. The video goes into depth on the details. Includes a Quiz now too, much harder than the previous ones, but should interesting. Enjoy!
OK folks, Lesson 3 is up!

http://wiki.bo3b.net/index.php?title=Lesson_3_-_Const


This is our first taste of changing and writing a tiny bit of ASM code. The video goes into depth on the details.

Includes a Quiz now too, much harder than the previous ones, but should interesting. Enjoy!

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GTX 970 - i5-4670K@4.2GHz - 12GB RAM - Win7x64+evilKB2670838 - 4 Disk X25 RAID
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Bo3b's School for ShaderHackers

Posted 09/01/2014 08:24 AM   
Cool, I've done lesson 3 :) Lesson learned - don't choose F7 as the toggle key, since that causes Helix mod to rewrite DX9Settings.ini without preserving comments.
Cool, I've done lesson 3 :)

Lesson learned - don't choose F7 as the toggle key, since that causes Helix mod to rewrite DX9Settings.ini without preserving comments.

2x Geforce GTX 980 in SLI provided by NVIDIA, i7 6700K 4GHz CPU, Asus 27" VG278HE 144Hz 3D Monitor, BenQ W1070 3D Projector, 120" Elite Screens YardMaster 2, 32GB Corsair DDR4 3200MHz RAM, Samsung 850 EVO 500G SSD, 4x750GB HDD in RAID5, Gigabyte Z170X-Gaming 7 Motherboard, Corsair Obsidian 750D Airflow Edition Case, Corsair RM850i PSU, HTC Vive, Win 10 64bit

Alienware M17x R4 w/ built in 3D, Intel i7 3740QM, GTX 680m 2GB, 16GB DDR3 1600MHz RAM, Win7 64bit, 1TB SSD, 1TB HDD, 750GB HDD

Pre-release 3D fixes, shadertool.py and other goodies: http://github.com/DarkStarSword/3d-fixes
Support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/DarkStarSword or PayPal: https://www.paypal.me/DarkStarSword

Posted 09/01/2014 11:53 AM   
Here's something that surprised me - the order of the presets in the "Presets = x;y;" list seems to be ignored. The only thing that seems to matter is the presets numeric number - for a type 2 key toggle it seems to use the lower numbered preset while the button is held and the higher numbered preset when the button is released. Also, how do I set a default value for Const1 (say, if I want it to start with a value other than 0 before I've pressed the button)? In old versions of Helix mod it used to be DefPreset=x, but that doesn't seem to work anymore...
Here's something that surprised me - the order of the presets in the "Presets = x;y;" list seems to be ignored. The only thing that seems to matter is the presets numeric number - for a type 2 key toggle it seems to use the lower numbered preset while the button is held and the higher numbered preset when the button is released.

Also, how do I set a default value for Const1 (say, if I want it to start with a value other than 0 before I've pressed the button)? In old versions of Helix mod it used to be DefPreset=x, but that doesn't seem to work anymore...

2x Geforce GTX 980 in SLI provided by NVIDIA, i7 6700K 4GHz CPU, Asus 27" VG278HE 144Hz 3D Monitor, BenQ W1070 3D Projector, 120" Elite Screens YardMaster 2, 32GB Corsair DDR4 3200MHz RAM, Samsung 850 EVO 500G SSD, 4x750GB HDD in RAID5, Gigabyte Z170X-Gaming 7 Motherboard, Corsair Obsidian 750D Airflow Edition Case, Corsair RM850i PSU, HTC Vive, Win 10 64bit

Alienware M17x R4 w/ built in 3D, Intel i7 3740QM, GTX 680m 2GB, 16GB DDR3 1600MHz RAM, Win7 64bit, 1TB SSD, 1TB HDD, 750GB HDD

Pre-release 3D fixes, shadertool.py and other goodies: http://github.com/DarkStarSword/3d-fixes
Support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/DarkStarSword or PayPal: https://www.paypal.me/DarkStarSword

Posted 09/01/2014 01:49 PM   
[quote="DarkStarSword"]Also, how do I set a default value for Const1 (say, if I want it to start with a value other than 0 before I've pressed the button)? In old versions of Helix mod it used to be DefPreset=x, but that doesn't seem to work anymore...[/quote][PRES1] Const1 = 0x3f800000 UseByDef=True ?
DarkStarSword said:Also, how do I set a default value for Const1 (say, if I want it to start with a value other than 0 before I've pressed the button)? In old versions of Helix mod it used to be DefPreset=x, but that doesn't seem to work anymore...
[PRES1]
Const1 = 0x3f800000
UseByDef=True
?
Posted 09/01/2014 05:28 PM   
bo3b, can You read my mind?! I wanted to add the possibility to the "Mind: Path to Thalamus"-fix to disable and enable the light shafts with a hotkey. When I was going to ask about this in the forum I just discovered Your 3rd lesson :) So instead of doing Your quiz I first tried to use this method in Mind and it worked. I even learned to use 2 different hotkeys in the same shader to change either the color or the alpha values (this changes different aspects of the light shafts). Mind is also a good example why it could be useful to offer the option to disable a shader with by hotkeys. There seems to be no way to fix the light shafts. But removing them generally would change the complete amtosphere of the game. Besides from that depending on the situation (and the sensibility of the player) the (different aspects of the) light shafts are more or less annoying. So in this case a hotkey seems to me to be the best solution. So thank You for Your very intersting lesson that came just in time :)
bo3b, can You read my mind?! I wanted to add the possibility to the "Mind: Path to Thalamus"-fix to disable and enable the light shafts with a hotkey. When I was going to ask about this in the forum I just discovered Your 3rd lesson :) So instead of doing Your quiz I first tried to use this method in Mind and it worked. I even learned to use 2 different hotkeys in the same shader to change either the color or the alpha values (this changes different aspects of the light shafts). Mind is also a good example why it could be useful to offer the option to disable a shader with by hotkeys. There seems to be no way to fix the light shafts. But removing them generally would change the complete amtosphere of the game. Besides from that depending on the situation (and the sensibility of the player) the (different aspects of the) light shafts are more or less annoying. So in this case a hotkey seems to me to be the best solution.
So thank You for Your very intersting lesson that came just in time :)

My original display name is 3d4dd - for some reason Nvidia changed it..?!

Posted 09/01/2014 07:17 PM   
Thank you for this very interesting lesson/demo Bo3b. I truly enjoyed it. I had to study the different sections of the code a few times to properly understand the connections, but thanks to your great video tutorial and text examples, I managed to follow through. I also find it really fun to memorize the code. Maybe I'm just strange? haha. Anyhow, just uploaded my results to the wiki page. I'm looking forward to the next lesson. Thank you so much once again for all the effort you put into this. ;)
Thank you for this very interesting lesson/demo Bo3b.

I truly enjoyed it. I had to study the different sections of the code a few times to properly understand the connections, but thanks to your great video tutorial and text examples, I managed to follow through. I also find it really fun to memorize the code. Maybe I'm just strange? haha. Anyhow, just uploaded my results to the wiki page.

I'm looking forward to the next lesson.

Thank you so much once again for all the effort you put into this. ;)

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Posted 09/01/2014 11:33 PM   
[quote="TsaebehT"][quote="DarkStarSword"]Also, how do I set a default value for Const1 (say, if I want it to start with a value other than 0 before I've pressed the button)? In old versions of Helix mod it used to be DefPreset=x, but that doesn't seem to work anymore...[/quote][PRES1] Const1 = 0x3f800000 UseByDef=True ?[/quote]Heh! Thanks for posting that. I actually looked around for the default just a bit and could not remember where I'd seen it. If I remember my experiments in the past correctly, without the UseByDef= setting, it will use the last one seen as the default, so lowest in the file. I'm not a fan of invisible stuff, so I'll add the UseByDef to the default page on the Wiki. Thanks!
TsaebehT said:
DarkStarSword said:Also, how do I set a default value for Const1 (say, if I want it to start with a value other than 0 before I've pressed the button)? In old versions of Helix mod it used to be DefPreset=x, but that doesn't seem to work anymore...
[PRES1]
Const1 = 0x3f800000
UseByDef=True
?
Heh! Thanks for posting that. I actually looked around for the default just a bit and could not remember where I'd seen it.

If I remember my experiments in the past correctly, without the UseByDef= setting, it will use the last one seen as the default, so lowest in the file. I'm not a fan of invisible stuff, so I'll add the UseByDef to the default page on the Wiki. Thanks!

Acer H5360 (1280x720@120Hz) - ASUS VG248QE with GSync mod - 3D Vision 1&2 - Driver 372.54
GTX 970 - i5-4670K@4.2GHz - 12GB RAM - Win7x64+evilKB2670838 - 4 Disk X25 RAID
SAGER NP9870-S - GTX 980 - i7-6700K - Win10 Pro 1607
Latest 3Dmigoto Release
Bo3b's School for ShaderHackers

Posted 09/02/2014 12:09 AM   
  9 / 87    
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