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ShaderBeam; a CRT beam emulator for your PC

VGEsoterica

VGEsoterica

Member
You need to have a 120Hz minimum panel and 240Hz would be even better but now we have ShaderBeam...a CRT beam emulator. Think BFI but less black frame insertion and more the beam draw pattern of a CRT TV on your gaming monitor or OLED tv. Really needs to be seen to be believed as it's a hell of an experience. About as good as you can get without some rich nerd restarting CRT production in some factory somewhere (which is always my dream)

 
Genuine question, how important is it that you always hit that 10 minute mark on your videos? Cause I find some of them tough to watch since there's usually obvious filler so you can hit the 10 minute mark. Is that so you get a mid ad roll or something? Just curious.

I feel like I would engage with and share the vids a lot more if they were shorter and more to the point.
 
Asks for way, waaay to much in order to be operational.

In the browser demo i'm getting some weird colorer horizontal stripes on my 240hz screen.
 
Dacvak said:
Genuine question, how important is it that you always hit that 10 minute mark on your videos? Cause I find some of them tough to watch since there's usually obvious filler so you can hit the 10 minute mark. Is that so you get a mid ad roll or something? Just curious.

I feel like I would engage with and share the vids a lot more if they were shorter and more to the point.
Click to expand...
this is a common misnomer; mid roll ads require a video of 8 minutes in length, not 10 minutes. So if I was trying to get mid rolls I'd stop at 8

10 is the length I enjoy working at. Intro, concept, explanation, vibe, use case, end. I may rearticulate a point earlier in the video but I like to introduce the idea, explain what it is/does, explain the technology, discuss "how it feels", talk about how one would use it then wrap it up
 
It's blurbusters' innovation that retroarch had already implemented too. Good to see it used more but no reason to pretend it's some unheard of unprecedented thing we just now see when it's been in use for about a year for clickbait. Well, the clickbait is the reason, you know what I mean.
Holammer

News Retro  Thread 'New upcoming CRT shader solution.'



Looks like son of BFI.
The tech should work fine on an 120hz LCD display, but the effect improves with more frames. Expect it on Retroarch & Retrotink devices in the future.
Finally a use for the new 480hz screens, play Sonic the Hedgehog as it was meant to be viewed.

edit:
Source is released with an article going over details at Blurbusters.
blurbusters.com

CRT Simulation in a GPU Shader, Looks Better Than BFI - Blur Busters

Who Is this for? CRT Enthusiasts, software & hardware developers, emulator authors, all of who wish to reduce display motion blur of 60 years of legacy 60fps 60Hz content with softer flicker than BFI. UPDATE 2025/11/18: New CRT Simulator Demo on TestUFO 3.0. UPDATE 2024/12/24: CRT Simulator was...
blurbusters.com blurbusters.com

Source code
github.com

GitHub - blurbusters/crt-beam-simulator: A shader that simulates a CRT electron beam in real time.

A shader that simulates a CRT electron beam in real time. - blurbusters/crt-beam-simulator
github.com github.com

Real-time demo
www.shadertoy.com

Shadertoy

www.shadertoy.com www.shadertoy.com
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Last edited:
The shader creates a yellow border around the screen. I had similar issues before with other shaders and it's apparently a Windows10 problem. Which means it's unusable in Windows 10, despite the author saying it's made for Windows 10 as well.

Hard pass.
 
Looks neat, curious how it will develop over time.

I'm thinking next year of selling my older 1440p monitor, moving my current 4k as a secondary, and going with an ultra-wide 240hz or higher OLED panel.
 
Nvidia's "smooth motion" works better for me for running locked 60fps content at 120fps and reducing blurring accordingly.

All without the requirements and jank these shaders come with. I mean they do work, i can see the remove of motion blur, but it's not worth all the added artifacts/bugs and the overall hassle. And i'm certainly not going to use Windows 11 for it.
 
nkarafo said:
I wish there was an easy way to connect a modern PC to this.

Edit: I managed to fix the horizontal stripes but holy hell it looks awful. The colors got much darker and more dithered.

It has to be just me because there is no way it looks like that and it got released.
Click to expand...
It's a steep setup. If you just got that result it's not dialed in yet
 
VGEsoterica said:
It's a steep setup. If you just got that result it's not dialed in yet
Click to expand...
I'm using the default options. I'm also seeing the same results in the testUFO demo.

There are also no instructions about how to dial it in and the darken image and dithering isn't mentioned in the troubleshooting section.

Also, it needs Windows 11. Which is the final nail in the coffin IMO.
 
VGEsoterica said:
this is a common misnomer; mid roll ads require a video of 8 minutes in length, not 10 minutes. So if I was trying to get mid rolls I'd stop at 8

10 is the length I enjoy working at. Intro, concept, explanation, vibe, use case, end. I may rearticulate a point earlier in the video but I like to introduce the idea, explain what it is/does, explain the technology, discuss "how it feels", talk about how one would use it then wrap it up
Click to expand...
Thanks for explaining!
 
Ooh, definitely going to give this a try. I bought a CRT and a bunch of old retro consoles/games this year and am loving it, but it would be cool if I could produce a similar (better?) result on my high-end monitor and emulators.
 
This would be cool to use in combination with the megashaders and megabezels in RetroArch.

Though my hope is that the revival of interest in CRTs will just lead to some insane manufacturer creating brand new CRT screens.
 
nkarafo said:
I'm using the default options. I'm also seeing the same results in the testUFO demo.

There are also no instructions about how to dial it in and the darken image and dithering isn't mentioned in the troubleshooting section.

Also, it needs Windows 11. Which is the final nail in the coffin IMO.
Click to expand...
You don't need Win 11. Win 10 is the same. It just forces an annoying yellow box around the capture window
 
nkarafo said:
I wish there was an easy way to connect a modern PC to this.

Edit: I managed to fix the horizontal stripes but holy hell it looks awful. The colors got much darker and more dithered.

It has to be just me because there is no way it looks like that and it got released.
Click to expand...
I bought real consoles, but I'm quick to buy rep games if the price is stupid. Best little groove for my use.
 
Time to get a 480hz OLED, LCD is less than ideal, but the effect works.

nkarafo said:
The shader creates a yellow border around the screen. I had similar issues before with other shaders and it's apparently a Windows10 problem. Which means it's unusable in Windows 10, despite the author saying it's made for Windows 10 as well.

Hard pass.
Click to expand...
It's a windows feature! A warning to show your screen is being captured.
Maybe you can turn it off? Dunno.
 
Dacvak said:
Genuine question, how important is it that you always hit that 10 minute mark on your videos? Cause I find some of them tough to watch since there's usually obvious filler so you can hit the 10 minute mark. Is that so you get a mid ad roll or something? Just curious.

I feel like I would engage with and share the vids a lot more if they were shorter and more to the point.
Click to expand...
Yeah I usually drop off after a couple minutes.
 
I tried this on my 180hz IPS when it hit RA last year, but didn't manage to get rid of the annoying stuff before giving up. Maybe I'll have to give it another go some day.

I won't be using this unless a Linux version comes, so this may be off the table for me except for those rare occasions where I jump back to W11.
 
Paulistano said:
What's the difference between this and crt royale?
Click to expand...
theyre meant to complement each other. shaderbeam adds the flicker from the CRT which gives it the great motion clarity, shaderglass adds the actual CRT picture quality that blends together the colors and pixels
 
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