[Skyrim] PNENB
Posted: 18 Oct 2012, 11:54
IMPOTANT NOTE: The author of ENB, Boris Vorontsov, continues to work on new features and improvements all the time and thus, versions are regularly removed and updated on his website. Because of this, I will be hosting (with permission) the versions needed by current versions of my configuration on the PNENB mirror site. These mirror versions are identical to the ones available on the ENB website.
Also, user Mindflux at the ENB forums has developed a mod that fixes many of the issues with too bright plants, glowing water, invisible doors, and other similar model-based issues that can crop up with ENB in general. If you are experiencing such issues it may be worth it to take a look at his forum thread and download/test out the mod.
UPDATE: PNENB has now been completely rebuilt for the latest ENB v0.152! The latest version is slightly more performance intensive than previous, due to new and much better quality features. However, if you are looking to eek out a few more FPS for minimal impact, you can try changing EnableSkyLighting to false in the [EFFECT] section of enbseries.ini.
NVIDIA users: The latest 313.96 beta drivers (and newer) officially fix the “flickering” problem forever, so grab them now. Also, please do NOT apply the enbeffect.fx “fix” for this that has been floating around, as even though people say they didn’t notice, it had a horrible impact on color balance in many situations and is now completely unnecessary.
Also, 1.40+ fixes the CK-generated issue with water levels being too high in certain cells. Thanks ObliviBeau for pointing that out, and thanks to everyone that uploaded images for previous versions. I hope you enjoy the latest 1.40+ which I believe is the best yet!
EDIT: One last thing. Until I have time between the job searching to update again and do more compatibility testing, the best bet for load order is to have my mod last. This is definitely the case with CoT and RLO, and likely other mods. If something looks out of place with the mods you are using you can try putting mine before it in the load order, so their changes overwrite mine, in the rare instance where another mod alters interior image spaces and fog color, which is basically all mine does.
Current screen shots begin with THIS post.
INTRODUCTION:
What is this mod? A complete visual overhaul of the world of Skyrim, made possible by the power of ENB. For those not in the know, this allows dramatic, powerful graphical enhancement without changing the fundamental lighting and mechanics of the game itself.
But this is much more than just another mix of settings. I have incorporated code from several leading programmers (HD6, Matso, and others), as well as several of my own additions, palette edits, and now a new custom plugin I've designed that balances every single interior cell for optimal compatibility. Unlike virtually every other ENB, you will not encounter cells that are too bright, too dark, hazy, washed out, or otherwise unnatural looking. That is due to my unique "triple pass" approach to optical balancing:
- CODE PASS: Complete overhaul of the ENB files themselves adding new shader effects, custom interior/exterior eye adaptation separation, and a unique configuration for brightness, contrast, saturation, tint/hue, bloom, sharpness, and all ENB settings for night, day, and interiors to set the baseline.
- PALETTE PASS: Custom palette edits softly lift shadows without overcompensating, eliminates much of the common ENB "haze" by hand-edits to the atmospheric areas responsible, and adds a very subtle vibrancy and warmth without straying from the default Skyrim mood.
- PLUGIN PASS: My new companion plugin balances EVERY SINGLE INTERIOR one by one to the previous settings by hand, using Skyrim image space (and other) settings in the CK to finalize adjustments, to create the absolute best possible appearance on a per-cell basis.
Download at Skyrim Nexus
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For the longest time I was reluctant to jump into the ENB scene. There were so many configurations out there, and while I have seen some truly incredible screenshots, none seemed quite right for my own personal taste of how I would like to actually play the game. I wanted something I could leave on all the time, something that would enrich my game experience without sacrificing immersion or quality of other elements, or totally destroying performance in the process. No matter how many configurations I tried, it seemed where one thing looked really good another would suffer in the balance. So, I set out on the long journey to create my own unique combination of the best of all possible options.
I knew if I got started I would end up making something special, and along the way I have made several significant advances and innovations. I have put considerable time and effort into perfecting this configuration, so that the final results meet my own standards of both visual balance and playable performance. I have sought to create a world both vibrant and alive, yet loyal to Skyrim's spirit and color scheme, one that looks good and feels right no matter where your travels take you.
I hope you enjoy testing it out as much as I have seeing it come together!
COMPATIBILITY:
In the future I hope to include compatibility patches for some of the more popular lighting and environmental mods out there, however truth be told this ENB does the job of many of these mods. Generally speaking, you should not need to worry about installing mods that alter lighting, mods that alter atmospheric fog, mods that remove clouds from the in-game map, or mods that alter night-time brightness. That said, some of those popular mods may conflict while others may look really good. It is a matter of testing each one with the changes this mod makes. If you like the changes of another mod more than the ones my own makes, have it load after my plugin. Beyond that, it would be easier to list those mods that ARE verified compatible:
Enhanced Lights and FX: Testing...
Realistic Lighting Overhaul: Testing...
RCRN: Not compatible, as it uses its own post-process injector d3d9.dll.
CLIMATES OF TAMRIEL: I have made certain to balance this mod with both Vanilla Skyrim AND Climates of Tamriel in mind, and I am happy to say that it is fully compatible and looks great! Just make sure that you install the "ClimatesOfTamriel-VanillaNights-Lvl-4.esp" optional file from "CoT Patches" (in the main Climates of Tamriel download). Any other optional files from CoT are totally your preference, just make sure they load after my mod if you want to see their changes to interiors.
I have uploaded a short montage showing off some of the Climates of Tamriel environments with this ENB running. Keep in mind, many of these effects will never appear in vanilla Skyrim. All of my screenshots were taken with just my ENB and vanilla Skyrim, so I thought a Climates of Tamriel video would be a nice comparison. =)
(1080p HD version available at YouTube.)
INSTALLATION:
Please bookmark this page and check here first for installation instructions. I pack a readme with the file, but these will always be the most current instructions.
- First of all, download ENBSeries v0.152 from the enbdev.com website. Copy d3d9.dll from the "WrapperVersion" folder to your main Skyrim folder, saying yes to overwrite (this will also make sure you are using the right version and not one from another ENB, which is important).
- Next, copy everything from this mod's "1-ToSkyrimFolder" directory to your main Skyrim directory (should end in \Steam\steamapps\common\skyrim) saying yes to overwrite when prompted. I also suggest you check out the -no lens flare- version of Skyrim Sunglare V4 as it looks best with PNENB's latest sun changes.
- Now you need to choose the version of the PNENB plugin appropriate to your installation from "2-ToDataFolder". If you have Dawnguard installed, copy PNENB.esp from the "WithDawnguard" folder to your Skyrim/Data directory. If you don't have Dawnguard, copy PNENB.esp from "NoDawnguard" to your Skyrim/Data directory instead. Whichever you use, make sure it is checked in your plugins list from the launcher or whatever mod manager you use. It should also load after any other lighting or environment-related mods (unless you prefer the interior cell changes from those mods).
- Recommended: Open the enbeffectprepass.fx file in a text editor like notepad (I suggest the free notepad++) and on line 323 that starts " float2 fvTexelSize = " change the resolution to match your playing resolution for optimal results. You can see your resolution by loading the Skyrim launcher and hitting options. Change 1920 in the above file to your width (the first, larger value listed in the launcher options) and change 1080 to your height (the 2nd smaller value.)
In your video card settings make sure both Antialiasing and Anisotropic Filtering are either off or set to "Application Controlled," and the "Texture Filtering - Negative LOD Bias" (or something similar) is set to "Clamp" or "Off" (this is taken from the official ENB documentation.) Also, if your video card settings support Ambient Occlusion for Skyrim, make sure that is off as well as it is worse and will conflict with the version from this mod. Lastly, open your SkyrimPrefs.ini file from your Documents\My Games\Skyrim directory, and change bTreesReceiveShadows, bDrawLandShadows, and bFloatPointRenderTarget all to 1. (This is required for all ENB configurations.)
One final consideration: If you have any color/saturation/vibrancy settings enabled through your video drivers, or any mod that adjusts fog, lights, or lets you configure color and other values in-game, I highly recommend turning them off until you have decided how you like this ENB configuration by itself. This mod was designed to handle the work of all those type solutions itself. You can turn them back on and re-tweak them if you decide this mod needs further fine-tuning, but leaving them on without testing first will likely make things look bad.
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Optional Depth of Field: If you would prefer to use Depth of Field, which actually looks pretty cool (especially for screenshots), copy the enbseries.ini from the "_optionalDOF" folder inside "3-Options" to your main Skyrim folder, overwriting the one from the above install.
NOTE: This ENB configuration uses SubPixel Morphological Anti Aliasing (included), which is better than FXAA with less performance cost! If you would prefer to use a different screen space anti-aliasing (like a custom FXAA), you will need to change the PROXY setting in enbseries.ini to point to the correct .DLL. Or if you would prefer to turn off this mod's AA altogether, for example to force another method through video drivers, you can edit enbseries.ini and set EnableProxyLibrary to false.
Screenshots: By default, the key to take a screenshot showing all of this mod's ENB effects is "Insert", which is just below the normal "Print Screen" button. I left it this way to avoid the common problem of mapping it to the actual Print Screen button and ending up with two of every screenshot since the default game screenshot key is also often bound to that key. If you still want to change it, edit "enbseries.ini" and under the [INPUT] section change "KeyScreenshot=45" to 44 instead, which is the Print Screen key.
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Performance Options: I have included two higher performance options for people to try, located in the "_optionalPerformance" folder within "3-Options". My recommendation is that if you find the default version too slow, first test the "1-HigherPerformance" option as this results in a significant performance increase with minimal detail loss. The "2-HighestPerformance" option results in an even more significant performance increase, however at the loss of SSAO entirely which is a more noticeable difference, though still an improvement over Vanilla.
To install a higher performance option, first install the mod as normal and then copy the "enbseries.ini" from one of the folders in "_optionalPerformance", overwriting the one in your Skyrim directory from the main install. There is also an "_optionalDOF" in each performance folder, which you can copy over last to enable Depth of Field just as with the normal install. Remember, "1-HigherPerformance" is a significant performance increase with minimal detail loss, so try this first! Only use "2-HighestPerformance" if your system is really suffering even using the "1-HigherPerformance" option.
I have included some comparison images you can view HERE and HERE.
CREDITS:
- Boris Vorontsov, for the core ENB that makes all these amazing post-processing effects possible!
- PNENB uses SMAA (SubPixel Morphological Anti Aliasing), Copyright © 2011 by Jorge Jimenez, Jose I. Echevarria, Belen Masia, Fernando Navarro, and Diego Gutierrez.
- HeliosDoubleSix, author of Cinematic Lighting ENB, for the Post Process Mode 5 effects and his outstanding work on the enbeffect.fx file.
- TES5Edit and everyone who has contributed to its development. This tool has been absolutely indispensable in correcting conflicts and quirks in the .ESP.
- Matso, author of Imvisio ENB, for his excellent Depth of Field effect which finally changed my mind about playing with a depth blur!
- --JawZ--, for the helpful guides and examples of interior separation code for ENB v0.119.
- KyokushinOyama, Staind716, and solsikke737, authors of Countervibe ENB, which served as an early inspiration and reference for combining various community code contributions to certain files.
- Midhras, Bronze316, Tapioks, and countless forum posts and helpful information from the modding community...
PERMISSION:
As always when creating derivative ENB configurations, please credit those who's work served as template or reference to your own. I would also ask you not re-post or mirror this configuration, or distribute my balance plugin without asking.
Best, and enjoy!
(if I may ask for something though - keep supporting Project Reality :3).
