Understanding HL2: Lost Coast and HDR Lighting
It's okay if you don't know what HDR lighting stands for or why it's important to Half-Life 2: Lost Coast; it's a relatively new idea that's now garnering some major press. Luckily for you, Bit-tech.net did an extensive overview of the tech and provided plenty of screenshots to show off its benefits. HDR stands for High Dynamic Range and its being touted as the next big thing in visual realism for gaming.
HDR facilitates the use of colour values way outside the normal range in an effort to produce a more realistic rendering of a typical 3D scene. If you have ever driven through a dark tunnel in your car, and then emerged out the other side into blazing sunshine, temporarily blinded by the difference in light levels - that oversaturation is one example of what is possible with HDRValve has been working on a showcase level called Lost Coast that is supposed to make dramatic use of HDR. However, at this point, it is a performance-hog, so enabling it even on high-powered rigs can bring the action to a crawl. Still, you can see it in motion with the 1.3 patch of Far Cry (media here) and in these incredibly stylistic shots of HL2 characters placed in real-life photography.
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hirez
replyHDR sounds interesting. But I wonder if its "too much" realism? Do I really want to have to squint at my monitor to try and see past the oversaturation (can I even see past it by squinting?)
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If its overdone (like bloom) then I agree. However, I think it would be cool to squint while looking into the sun or a spotlight and be blinded to what is behind it.
