Bad Dynamic Shadows Quality

[wicked kernel]

Hello hello, i'm currently near the end of my project and still struggling to get my dynamic shadows to look right. as can be seen in the screenshot, my shadows are stuttered and overall very, very ugly. I've tried pretty much every single combination of settings available in the details pannel of my sun and some console commands with the result to all of this being : absolutely no change to my problem. The only setting which changes how these shadows look is the angle of my sun and the time of day.

More info : I'm currently on UE 4.27.1, Precomputed Lighting is completely disabled, I'm using Ultra Dynamic Sky for my lighting, no other plugins, the problem is present both in Editor and Packaged.

I appreciate any help 🐸

[fallow crypt]

https://youtu.be/I2kl-dcPtwI might help out

[wicked kernel]

As mentionned above, i'm not using static lighting, lightmaps don't apply.

[keen lagoon]

Select a light (whichever one is casting the shadow, probably the sun) and in the light's settings find "Num Dynamic Shadow Cascades." The higher you make this variable, the higher quality the shadows are.

It is VERY IMPORTANT to note that Cascaded Shadow Maps (Aka Dynamic Shadows) are VERY expensive on the GPU and can significantly decrease your FPS if set too high.

The reality of the issue is that video games do not have perfect shadows, and that you will probably see jaggies on them. Most gamers, however, never notice this.

A good way to get some FPS back while keeping your CSM is to use Distance Field Shadows after a certain threshold (4500-5000u is a good distance.) If you don't know how to set that up, this video teaches you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vef_ZPLhjt8

Though, Dynamic shadows shouldn't have jagged edges at all.

Which probably means you are using lightmaps without knowing it.

[wicked kernel]

Yeah that's the thing, the shadows shown on the screen are at 5 cascades and 5000 distance

Nope, static lighting is completely disabled

[keen lagoon]

just to make sure, go in to your static mesh with jagged shadows and lower the lightmap resolution signifigantly to see if that causes it to get worse

[wicked kernel]

Yup that's been done too, no change whatsoever

[keen lagoon]

Interesting

Dynamic shadows tend not to have jagged edges, even on 1 cs bounce

[wicked kernel]

Yeah i actually contacted an Epic dude to talk about it and he told me to drop the angle of the sun so that's not a straight projection, it made the shadow a bit smoother but the problem is still clearly there and he didn't answer any more after that

It's relatively old project that's been through 5 different engine versions so maybe that's it, but that'd just be a guess.

[keen lagoon]

It's probably some weird issue caused by like 10 different settings combining to create that issue or something lol

What happens if you create a new level? does that level also have the issue?

[wicked kernel]

Yeah new levels all have the issue, i've also tried different lighting methods ( Even using Ultra Dynamic sky's ) and it's either sharper, jagged edges or blurrier shadows that kind of "slide" when the sun moves

[keen lagoon]

I'm not sure what's up with that, sorry. If I think of anything I'll get back to you

[zenith plank]

have you tried checking your distance field resolution in mesh settings?

and project, if using 8 bit distance fields it can make the shadows look way worse

[keen lagoon]

Oh, yes, I forgot to ask about that. Are you using CSM or Distance field?

I would assume CSM since you were talking about it