RTX HDR for games!

[Nexus18]

Gaming tech shows the figures of peak brightness and so on here:

I've done the windows hdr calibration too and even then, I find RTX hdr way better than auto hdr (in supported games). Perhaps end results are different depending on the display though. Haven't tried it on my lg e7 yet, only the aw 34 qd-oled.

Youtube is just awful for HDR, both from uploading it to playing it back, so much that I give up on recording HDR and watching HDR content on YT.

 

[Nexus18]

Pretty sure that Gaming Tech vid is only for the official RTX HDR video feature that's in the new drivers, not the mod for games we've been talking about. There's no way the gaming mod is locked at 650nits (as described in the video description) from my testing, as that's only a little bit above my monitors peak HDR brightness, and it wouldn't look so blown out if so. And to be honest, these days I don't always take the words and findings of any youtuber including this guy and DF vs my own testing and my own eyes.

Your monitor has a peak of 1000nits doesn't it? If so you won't be seeing the issues that I am with the mod. All it needs is few tweaks to be able to control the peak brightness, and also the 'saturation' levels as these are falsely overly boosted in some games too, and it has a ton of potential....

EDIT - looks like there is a way to control peak brightness and saturation now!...

TrueHDRTWeaks v0.6 "Allows tweaking TrueHDR peak brightness/saturation/contrast/quality..."

See the optional files at:

NvTrueHDR - RTX HDR for games

Nvidia's AI-powered HDR converter, now for games too. (alternative for Windows AutoHDR)

www.nexusmods.com

Should be using similar concept/methods I would have thought but might be a few differences tbf. Probably is down to my monitor being HDR 1000, there is a 400 mode but it's not the best mode to use for HDR regardless anyway.

Yes there is that tool. It's by the same guy who made the control HDR mod, which he posted his thoughts on the tool etc. a few times e.g.

Damn, thank you so much for this. I had tried RTX HDR on youtube videos and wasn't happy with how much it shifts colors and adds saturation. It seems like it does the same in games, but it can also look wonderful , and it's on the right path to beating MS AutoHDR.
I wrote a comprehensive (but fast) review after trying it for a bit

• From a quick test, it looks better than AutoHDR
• Good gamma (~2.2, maybe a mix between 2.2 and sRGB) (massive advantage over AutoHDR as there's no raised blacks anymore)
• Shifts colors a bit too much. The brighter the color, the more it's shifted. Hopefully they will add a toggle for that, as I personally don't like it, it often ruins the artistic look
• It has a paper white of about 250-300 nits based on my perception (that doesn't mean that SDR 1 1 1 becomes 250-300 nits, it's remapped around mid gray or so)
• The peak seems to be between 750-1000 nits based on my perception. I don't know if it follows the Windows 11 HDR calibration profile
• The SDR to HDR Windows brightness slider value is ignored, there's no way to change the average picture brightness
• It's purely a straight forward pixel by pixel remapping, with no temporal or positional awareness
• The UI doesn't seem to be detected by AI or anything like that, so pure white UI will go to 1000 nits
• It doesn't seem to try to generate missing/clipped detail on highlights (in case you thought AI could do that)
• Cannot be captured by Game Bar screenshots nor NV screenshots (probably it happens at the end, at driver level)
• Games need to start in SDR for it to ever engage. Enabling native HDR in the game breaks the native HDR, but you can always toggle back to SDR and RTX HDR starts applying again
• For it to engage, you need to enable it with emoose tool before starting the game. Having RTX HDR enabled in the NV control panel is not necessary
• It only works when the game is borderless fullscreen and fullscreen exclusive (at least in DX11 and 12). Any kind of overlay temporarily disables it
• I could not see any banding on the few games I tried, it's possible it adds debanding filters due to upgrading 8 bit buffers to 10 bit
• It works with DX9, DX10, DX11 and DX12 games. Vulkan and OpenGL are untested: supposedly they also work if they are presented with DXGI swapchain

If anybody wants to discuss this further, they are welcome to join our HDR focused discord: https://discord.gg/55ySUgZ7YD

 

[Nexus18]

Now in the new NV driver CP! Still beta atm though but wo wo we ah very nice!

 

[Nexus18]

Ha! I was just about to post I've been experimenting with the TrueHDR tweaks files and managed to get it working in some games so I could control peak brightness etc etc. However for some games it just won't work at all.

Which drivers are these then???

Test Drive The New NVIDIA App Beta: The Essential Companion For PC Gamers & Creators

The NVIDIA app is the easiest way to keep your drivers up to date, discover NVIDIA applications, capture your greatest moments, and configure GPU settings.

www.nvidia.com

 

[Nexus18]

Got this working at last with the Nvidia App after unplugging my other monitor, disabling AutoHDR then doing a reboot.

It looks nice but has a massive performance hit for me on my 4090. On Starfield for example, Afterburner is reporting the usual 100+ FPS but it feels more like 30 FPS.

Tried a few other games like Singularity and Dark Souls and it's the same with high reported FPS but with some weird lag/jerkyness.

Does anyone else have that?

Noticed a performance hit (seems to depend on the game though) and worse perf. due to slightly less fps but it's certainly nothing like that with the lag/jerkyness

 

[Nexus18]

I tried the hack with Enshrouded but as it was Vulkan it basically ran at 2FPS.

Tried the official beta app with the recommended drivers and Enshrouded worked straight away. The performance hit must be small because I didn't really notice however the highlights really pop like in HDR enabled BG3/Avatar.

I'm still using a ReShade as well for Enshrouded as it's as bad as I found Starfield to be for contrast. Not way to edit it, shame on you devs!

Probably worthwhile trying out the digital vibrance feature.

 

[Nexus18]

I saw 15% performance hit on Darktide so AUTOHDR still has it's uses as you don't lose any performance.

I wouldn't use auto hdr even with no performance hit. Not having proper black levels as well as banding especially on an oled is a no go.

 

[Nexus18]

Tried this with Cyberpunk and prefer it to the native hdr implementation. No more raised blacks and the peak brightness is tracking correctly. I'm still over 100fps at 3440x1440 with the performance penalty, so will keep using rtx hdr.

CP 2077 HDR is already pretty much spot on, just need to make sure you set it correctly:

Having said that, seems even games with decent/good native hdr support can sometimes not be as good as RTX HDR!

https://www.reddit.com/r/nvidia/comments/1az4odm/rtx_hdr_can_even_look_better_than_native_hdr_in/

 

[Nexus18]

The video you linked says that unfortunately the black level raise isn't improved and the reviewer was disappointed it hadn't been addressed. I definitely played with settings and am confident it was all set correctly.

Ah maybe it has changed since then/got broken with a new update as could have sworn I remember him saying it was fixed in one of his CP videos or maybe it was just improved slightly.

I remember the issues with avatar hdr though and having just tried RTX HDR in it, wow, it looks far better than that games HDR

Problem is it only works properly in exclusive full screen (I play all games in full screen windowed for easy switching)

Works in borderless mode too, I just tested it with avatar there, same for dying light 2 as well (that games doesn't have proper exclusive fullscreen mode)

 

[Nexus18]

Another game worth using this in is helldivers 2. Native HDR is pretty good in it but blacks/contrast isn't quite right but with RTX hdr, it handles the highlights and dark areas much better I find. About a 10 fps hit.

 

[Nexus18]

I finallyi heard the native hdr in helldivers 2 is bad

It's pretty good but the brightness needs to be set to what looks right and good to your monitor and room:

 

[Nexus18]

https://www.reddit.com/r/nvidia/comments/1b03yfg/rtx_hdr_paper_white_gamma_reference_settings/

 

[Nexus18]

Reddit user has worked out how RTX HDR settings work so if you want an accurate image you need to change the default settings

* When you enable RTX HDR, the saturation slider is set to 0. This is adding extra color saturation. If you want a color correct image, set the slider to -50. At minus 50 the colors are accurate.

* The default contrast slider is 0, this translates to a gamma of 2.0. Most people use 2.2 gamma, so change the slider to +25. This gamma curve option is the real reason why RTX HDR looks better than Windows AutoHDR, AutoHDR doesn't use a gamma curve and is why it raises the blacks.


* The mid grey slider controls the exposure of the image. This is similar to a HDR paper white setting that some games have and you calculate the correct value to use: the formula is: targetPaperWhiteNits * (0.5 ^ targetGamma), so if you usually enjoy gaming with a paper white of 200 nits and a 2.2 gamma then this mid grey slider should be set to 200 * (0.5 ^ 2.2) = 44, so I should set the Mid Grey slider to +44 and if I wanted 200 nits paper white and a 2.0 gamma then I should set the slider to +25 etc


For most people the about correct values to use would be: Mid grey = 44, Contrast = 25 and Saturation = minus 50

Apparently it very much depends on the game, some are reporting those settings crush details. I've found the default to look pretty good so far.

 

[Nexus18]

Updated thread title and OP since no longer a mod.

@Baddass will you be doing any articles summarising your thoughts or/and best settings to use for this?

 

[Nexus18]

Reddit user has worked out how RTX HDR settings work so if you want an accurate image you need to change the default settings

* When you enable RTX HDR, the saturation slider is set to 0. This is adding extra color saturation. If you want a color correct image, set the slider to -50. At minus 50 the colors are accurate.

* The default contrast slider is 0, this translates to a gamma of 2.0. Most people use 2.2 gamma, so change the slider to +25. This gamma curve option is the real reason why RTX HDR looks better than Windows AutoHDR, AutoHDR doesn't use a gamma curve and is why it raises the blacks.


* The mid grey slider controls the exposure of the image. This is similar to a HDR paper white setting that some games have and you calculate the correct value to use: the formula is: targetPaperWhiteNits * (0.5 ^ targetGamma), so if you usually enjoy gaming with a paper white of 200 nits and a 2.2 gamma then this mid grey slider should be set to 200 * (0.5 ^ 2.2) = 44, so I should set the Mid Grey slider to +44 and if I wanted 200 nits paper white and a 2.0 gamma then I should set the slider to +25 etc


For most people the about correct values to use would be: Mid grey = 44, Contrast = 25 and Saturation = minus 50

https://www.reddit.com/r/nvidia/comments/1b03yfg/rtx_hdr_paper_white_gamma_reference_settings/

Nvidia taking note

May give these a go myself to see what is what. Most comments are positive but some saying it can crush details in other games....

 

[Nexus18]

Tried those reddit settings in a range of games and it's very good, definetly much more "accurate" in terms of colours like sRGB level but I also prefer a bit more punch perhaps so may put saturation to -20 but obviously depends on the game.

The whole HDR scene really needs proper standardisation though, it's been a mess for years and it really isn't that difficult.

Yup, it's a joke, people say it's just PC which is a mess, which is true to some extent but as shown in gamingtech videos, consoles suffer just as badly too.

This is why RTX HDR is now the new must have feature for me as so far it has solved the issues in a lot of games I've played with either lacklustre hdr where I have had to put up with raised blacks or where I have ended up just using SDR. Sure, redux, special k are about and do work well especially with the custom filters but it's such a faff and can cause issues or just outright not work based on my experience, with rtx hdr "it just works".

 

[Nexus18]

Yes and no - the official one "just does not work" for me as I have a multi monitor setup.

The RTX HDR mod however does work for me, but not in everything, and the TrueHDRTweaks files are also hit and miss depending on the game. So it's still all a mess really!

You know what I mean

Out of all the options we have, rtx hdr is by far the most easy and less faff method there is now if you want to get an even remotely good hdr experience (as in windows auto hdr is easier to apply but as we all know, it's not worthwhile with the raised blacks etc.), of course, if you want absolutely perfect output and to get things exactly how it should be then special k with its filters etc. is there but as said, it's a mess that based on my experience, it more often causes issues than is worth the faff.

Obviously nvidia have work to do to make it even better but for a first iteration, it's very good. They have confirmed the multi monitor thing with non hdr monitors will be sorted. The only thing I want to see is the ability to use rtx hdr with dldsr and less of a performance hit although this seems very game dependent, dying light 2 has the biggest performance hit where as avatar is hardly any performance hit.

 

[Nexus18]

 

[Nexus18]

Going to have to do a replay of batman arkham series from the start I think!

 

[Nexus18]

A big tick on my next upgrade.

Yup, this is my biggest must have feature now. As people have said themselves, HDR is the best thing to have for IQ improvement and well now, nvidia are kings for HDR gamers given how poor the majority of games official HDR implementation is, I'm even using this over games which have somewhat passable hdr too e.g. avatar, helldivers.