Do you use shadows?

[Ozwell Wayfarer]

I am just curious. I was discussing how different shadows can make windlight look with someone recently and it made me wonder how many people actually use shadows on a regular basis?

For me it really depends on the region. If its a fairly sparse build my machine can cope, but in dense builds where I would normally be getting +40 FPS, shadows cut it right down to low 20s and make walking and chatting pretty frustrating. My card is a GTX 780, so not the top of the line, but not too shabby either. Shadows are a notorious framerate killer, even in video games, if things are laggy one of the first things you do is turn the shadows off or the quality down.

Most people I have talked to dont use shadows for much beyond photography. I think this is good information for people building regions to know, so I would like to get more views on the subject

[Dot Matrix]

I don't use shadows.

I don't find they add that much to a region's visual appearance, and they definitely slow things down to the point where I can't do what I came inworld to do. Not fun.

[Freda Frostbite]

I do not even know HOW to use shadows.

[Keith Selmes]

I don't feel the need

[Louis-Francis De_Beauharnois]

I do use Shadow as much as I can, it change the feel you get walking in a forest and inside homes you have the desired feeling, let say a room with only one small wndow should be dark, not full bright...
Anyway I now find a nice in between by setting Shadow to NONE( yes there is a différence between Uncheck Shadow and make it to NONE) and keep Ambient Occlusion on. Maybe one day we will have a viewer that will be graphic optimized and allow us to use the full potential of the scene.

[Dot Matrix]

I now find a nice in between by setting Shadow to NONE ... and keep Ambient Occlusion on.

Thanks for this tip, Louis-Francis. It works nicely on my Mac, and the fps rate stays up -- my avie can still move around easily.

[Ozwell Wayfarer]

Thank you everyone for your respones!

I agree with Louis on the realisim side. I prefer shadows for sure.

Just some builds (including some of my own, so not criticizing anyone) become impractical to use and enjoy with them turned on in my experience. As I mentioned in my "Fixes for Firestorm issues" post here in the forums, you can turn the quality of the shadows down. But this only helps so much. My graphics card is not bad. Just a little older than last gen. So I am surprised shadows still lead to such a performance hit.

I always have ambient occlusion on. No performance hit there at all and definitely helps ease the "full bright" effect.

Anyone else want to share their views? I am trying to build up a picture of the "average" user and so far it seems most tend to not use them regularly.

[Moonrise Azalee]

I prefer shadows, but then again I take a lot of photos and shadows are necessary for me to get the correct ambiance. This is coupled with a environment setting that benefits. If you are in a dense forest or if sun is mid day, the shadow effect isnt as noticeable and ambient occlusion works well .
Ex: here is a photo I did last week in another grid, due to the sun position etc, the shadow effect does play well


So I guess long story short, if I want the full immersive ambiance of a place, if I want to almost 'feel' the light playing against my skin, etc then yes, all of it is on (tho lower draw distance) - If I'm at a dance, a party , landscaping, hanging out and blabbing.. everything is turned way down.

[Louis-Francis De_Beauharnois]

Thanks for this tip, Louis-Francis. It works nicely on my Mac, and the fps rate stays up -- my avie can still move around easily.

I know it is out of topic but may help some people:
I also have a Mac and have the same problem with FPS/Quality (for mac it is even worst as the viewer are stuck to OpenGL 2.1.... even if mac support higher) anyway... I solve my problem by using BootCamp, so when I wish to use shadow and bigger draw distance I switch to Windows otherwise I use those settings. And if you haven't tried, Alchemy Viewer is faster on both MAc and Windows to render scene and improve image/color quality. So when i build I use Firestorm but when I only play or wander or take picture I use Alchemyviewer.

[beverly Zauberflote]

Great question Oz! I use shadows. I have to have a high performance computer for my RL job so I am lucky I can turn up, and on all the toys in graphics.