[warb]

The Halo 3 beta was a lot sharper than PGR3.

[kyleb]

I agree, but contrast often has as much if not more to do with sharpness than resolution does. Regardless, it doesn't change what the captures prove.

[AlStrong]

Originally Posted by one

Do you think Tap In didn't? I don't think so as he think it settled something.

Personally, I don't think Frankie's post settles anything... It's just more side-stepping for whatever reason he has.

My guess is that they haven't finished optimizing and are trying to decide AA level and would rather wait until things are absolutely final before confirming resolution and AA at the same time for the public.

Then again, you could take that single player screenshot and Frankie's mention of how it was taken in that Weekly Update (I previously posted in this thread) as evidence enough of what Halo 3 will be rendering in-game.

I can't recall if I mentioned it before (one of those posts that I start writing and then abandon), but did you try recreating the line edge in say, MS Paint, just with a simple line tool and then count (you can use "show grid" when you zoom in)? I'd do it, but I'm not sure what you mean by 39 steps for 45 pixels. What was the size of the grid you used to count?

Instead you may want to check out the smallest resolvable stair step or edge aliasing... Which is a problem anyway because the image isn't very clear. Even the lower resolution offerings of the video exhibit poor image quality...

[rbushner]

Here's a thought.

Why would Bungie directly respond to what some fanboy came up with in some forum. I know B3D likes to be above this stuff, but frankly this isn't. Frankie's post basically says 700k+ people played it months ago, and this 'guy' is revealing it wasn't really HD based off of a cherry picked frame in a movie. It's pretty hard to believe no one, including the fanboys didn't see this months ago. The burden of proof at this point is on one, not Bungie.

I'm all for technical discussion, but the cherry picked frame and the constant trolling barbs are not really technical, and show a large amount of bias.

Proelite does have a point too, cutscenes have always been done 2.35:1 so there is some evidence that some of the video had to be resized, which completely invalidates anything one is doing.

We will see when the game comes out, I played the beta many times on my 60" SXRD and the fact I could find people across Valhalla without the scope doesn't imply a reduced resolution to me. Now if Halo is not rendering in 720p, but manages to look like the Beta or better. Well I say that technically proves that rendering in a lower resolution can be done without hurting visuals. If you need photoshop to zoom in to see it, what is the point?

[one]

Originally Posted by rbushner

Here's a thought.

Why would Bungie directly respond to what some fanboy came up with in some forum. I know B3D likes to be above this stuff, but frankly this isn't. Frankie's post basically says 700k+ people played it months ago, and this 'guy' is revealing it wasn't really HD based off of a cherry picked frame in a movie. It's pretty hard to believe no one, including the fanboys didn't see this months ago. The burden of proof at this point is on one, not Bungie.

I'm all for technical discussion, but the cherry picked frame and the constant trolling barbs are not really technical, and show a large amount of bias.

Proelite does have a point too, cutscenes have always been done 2.35:1 so there is some evidence that some of the video had to be resized, which completely invalidates anything one is doing.

We will see when the game comes out, I played the beta many times on my 60" SXRD and the fact I could find people across Valhalla without the scope doesn't imply a reduced resolution to me. Now if Halo is not rendering in 720p, but manages to look like the Beta or better. Well I say that technically proves that rendering in a lower resolution can be done without hurting visuals. If you need photoshop to zoom in to see it, what is the point?

Cherry picked? Gimme a break. Using Photoshop was to show it to those who can't feel the coarse granularity with their own weak eyes.

You say it's a 2.35:1 cut scene upscaled and then say it's not upscaled, WTF? If I could see your imaginary upscaling for a 2.35:1 cut scene, how do I miss upscaling in Beta? Just make up your mind before posting a schizophrenic "thought".

[StefanS]

The upscale discussion has been moved here. Since this is the technology forum I expect only the best behaviour from everyone.

[AlStrong]

Thanks Stefan.

Originally Posted by rbushner

Proelite does have a point too, cutscenes have always been done 2.35:1 so there is some evidence that some of the video had to be resized, which completely invalidates anything one is doing.

Always You mean the one and only E3 2006 trailer? Besides that, none of the material Bungie has released has been in that aspect ratio.

[nAo]

Wait guys..I lost the beginning of this discussion, what's going on here?? where and when did this discussion start!?

[mrcorbo]

Originally Posted by nAo

Wait guys..I lost the beginning of this discussion, what's going on here?? where and when did this discussion start!?

Right about here.

[kyleb]

For those that don't understand what One is talking about with counting pixels to prove the difference between upscaled an native, here are some example shots:

Halo rendered at 1088x612 and then upscaled to 720p

Halo rendered at 720p

Note how the angled edges in the upscaled shot show jaggies thicker than one pixel, while shot rendered at 720p shows jaggies which are all exactly one pixel thick. This difference is because the first image is upscaled while the latter image is presented at it's native resolution.

[-tkf-]

Originally Posted by kyleb

For those that don't understand what One is talking about with counting pixels to prove the difference between upscaled an native, here are some example shots:

Halo rendered at 1088x612 and then upscaled to 720p

Halo rendered at 720p

Notehow the angled edges in the upscaled shot show jaggies thicker than one pixel, while shot rendered at 720p shows jaggies which are all exactly one pixel thick. This difference is because the first image is upscaled while the latter image is presented at at it's native resolution.

Same picture in ur links

[Rys]

Originally Posted by kyleb

For those that don't understand what One is talking about with counting pixels to prove the difference between upscaled an native, here are some example shots:

Halo rendered at 1088x612 and then upscaled to 720p

Halo rendered at 720p

Notehow the angled edges in the upscaled shot show jaggies thicker than one pixel, while shot rendered at 720p shows jaggies which are all exactly one pixel thick. This difference is because the first image is upscaled while the latter image is presented at at it's native resolution.

Your links both go to the same image.

[rbushner]

Originally Posted by AlStrong

You mean the one and only E3 2006 trailer? Besides that, none of the material Bungie has released has been in that aspect ratio.

As i recall, Halo and Halo 2 cutscenes were letter boxed. Now that you mention it though, Halo wasn't widescreen, so it may have been 1.77 there.

[Todd33]

Originally Posted by warb

The Halo 3 beta was a lot sharper than PGR3.

Does the MP beta prove anything about the SP game? Wasn't the video that started all of this from a E3 SP video?

[TurnDragoZeroV2G]

Beaten twice over.

Does anyone know if we have access to some beta screenshots that are low on the compression (those gamersyde pics?)? The beta ran without any AA whatsoever, and we now know that both the beta and the final game are/will run at the same res, so we'd immediately know whether the final resolution will be 720p or significantly less (barring last-month changes, which are extremely unlikely).

Edit: and assuming Frankie isn't completely ignorant of what res the beta internally rendered at.

[kyleb]

Originally Posted by -tkf-

Same picture in ur links

Doh, fixed.

[ihamoitc2005]

Originally Posted by kyleb

It certainly isn't technical when SD is defined as 480 lines in NTSC and 576 lines in PAL, while all the shots show Halo 3 obviously rendered at a higher resolution than that. I am surprised though that all the 720p captures from the trailer and the beta posted here show upscaling. I played the beta extensively and I do recall noticing at first that the fidelity was rather lacking but I quickly got sucked into the gameplay and never paid it much more mind then that. I had just been crossing my fingers that the full game will feature at least some AA and AF, without ever considering the possibility that the beta wasn't actually even pushing 720p.

My friends, I feel resolution is not so important if AA is good and motion blur makes non blur areas look more sharp because other area is blurred. Between 1080P game and 480P game, I prefer 480p game with 4xAA and 5x effects for more realistic look. Look at video broadcast of real life (like news show), it is only 480i but is more realistic than any 1080P game! Lower resolution with more effects can have more real lighting and effects to be more like 480i video news broadcast. I think 5x effect is great! Even 1080P games have not so great textures so why not have 480P upscaled. Same blurry textures but 5x effects! Am I crazy?

[Falkster]

Originally Posted by mrcorbo

Right about here.

I counted 44 steps in this picture, not 39. Here's the same image in black and white to make it easier to count.

As for Frankie not disproving this, I wouldn't read too much into it as they don't comment on every rumour. If they only disproved false rumours, then we would know which rumours were true when they don't deny them.

[-tkf-]

So a picture like this tells us?

http://www.xboxportugal.com/cutenews..._bungie_04.jpg

[kyleb]

Originally Posted by Falkster

I counted 44 steps in this picture, not 39. Here's the same image in black and white to make it easier to count.

Jacking the contrrast simply hides the upscaling, you'll get the same result doing that to my upscaled to 720p shot from the orignal Halo above.

Originally Posted by -tkf-

So a picture like this tells us?

http://www.xboxportugal.com/cutenews..._bungie_04.jpg

It tells us that they can run the game at 720p without uscaling, unlike what the captures from the beta and trailer show.

[Falkster]

Originally Posted by kyleb

Jacking the contrrast simply hides the upscaling, you'll get the same result doing that to my upscaled to 720p shot from the orignal Halo above.

Ahhh, I see.

[TurnDragoZeroV2G]

Originally Posted by ihamoitc2005

My friends, I feel resolution is not so important if AA is good and motion blur makes non blur areas look more sharp because other area is blurred. Between 1080P game and 480P game, I prefer 480p game with 4xAA and 5x effects for more realistic look. Look at video broadcast of real life (like news show), it is only 480i but is more realistic than any 1080P game! Lower resolution with more effects can have more real lighting and effects to be more like 480i video news broadcast. I think 5x effect is great! Even 1080P games have not so great textures so why not have 480P upscaled. Same blurry textures but 5x effects! Am I crazy?

Agreed (my friend )

The huge problem will be if Halo 3 is like 600p, and doesn't ship with any AA whatsoever, has poor texture filtering, no good motion blur (vector based) and effects everywhere... nevermind good poly counts on characters getting close-ups and shadows...

Personally, I wouldn't mind seeing a 480p game, if it had excellent AA, texture filtering, and justified the lower res with technically demanding effects. I think such exceptions should be allowed to be made...

[AlStrong]

Thanks for the images Kyleb.

Originally Posted by rbushner

As i recall, Halo and Halo 2 cutscenes were letter boxed. Now that you mention it though, Halo wasn't widescreen, so it may have been 1.77 there.

Yup, Halo:CE's cutscenes were letterboxed, and the remaining image worked out to be 16:9 cropped from the in-game image (you see the black bars settle in or out). Halo 2's cut-scenes were letterboxed for 4:3 TVs and were fullscreen when you set the Xbox to widescreen.


Edit: Kyleb, would you mind trying 1280x544 and scaling to 720p?

[rbushner]

Originally Posted by AlStrong

Yup, Halo:CE's cutscenes were letterboxed, and the remaining image worked out to be 16:9 cropped from the in-game image (you see the black bars settle in or out). Halo 2's cut-scenes were letterboxed for 4:3 TVs and were fullscreen when you set the Xbox to widescreen.

My bad then...

We will see the truth in 7 weeks or so.

[kyleb]

Originally Posted by AlStrong

Edit: Kyleb, would you mind trying 1280x544 and scaling to 720p?

Sure, I don't know any way in Halo to adjust the vertical FOV independently though, so the anaphoric scaling results in everything looking tall and skinny:

Halo rendered at 1280x720 and scaled to 720p

If you were looking for an example that turns out with the proper aspect ratio, I could make take some shots from a different game like Silent Hill 3 as I know it has an FOV hack which allows for that.