On LFSworld, the skins are stored in 1024x1024 format, but only download and display in 512x512. I assume this is to keep the detail to a sensible level.

I think PCs these days are getting fast enough to cope with 20 or so 1024x1024 textures so we should have the option to download the hires versions when we enter a multiplayer game.

Quote from Crashgate3 :

On LFSworld, the skins are stored in 1024x1024 format, but only download and display in 512x512. I assume this is to keep the detail to a sensible level.

I think PCs these days are getting fast enough to cope with 20 or so 1024x1024 textures so we should have the option to download the hires versions when we enter a multiplayer game.

I assume the skins in question are detailed skins therfore they will be skins that have been worked on in the skins forum, so why not just pull them off the forum and place the higher res skins in your folder?

I think that this is for saving lfsw bandwith, and so moneys...

Quote from SpaceMarineITA :

I think that this is for saving lfsw bandwith, and so moneys...

-1 anyway some noob makes ugly stupid skins so I prefer to choose what skin I want in high resolution

-1 as always

only reason i have auto skin download on is to make it a little more realistic (sometimes i may add)

A word Riders Motion and XCNuse have missed from Crashgate's post is 'option'. He doesn't want us to be forced to have high-resolution skins from everyone being displayed, but for us to have the option to display them - which I think is a good idea. : +1

DE

i guess.. but that would still mean there would have to be more checks in the system and overall lag up the servers/users more .. so i still say -1

Fair point - but that would only happen to one person when that one person joined the server - as your skins aren't downloaded from you, but from LFSW, it wouldn't affect you. So, if you don't join the race for a minute or so after connecting, it won't make a difference

If low FPS is an issue, you could turn off the high-resolution mode.

DE

yes, but when users join, they lag up the server, and if someone needs to pit or whatever, and they have high res skins turned on, that means it would take even longer for that to happen, which.. is already a problem now

SpaceMarine is the only one who got it right (shame on XCN for not pointing it out!)...

Transfer of images increases EXPONENTIALLY to their size... So, if you double the size of those skins, you'll quadruplicate the transfer! In view of people endlessly complaining about lags to load a skin and the cost for this quadruplicated transfer for every skin stored at LfSW, this would be nothing but suicide...

Crashgate, make sure you have compressed skins "off" in your options... And if that doesn't help, you're way too slow on track...

bah... i hardly skin anyway

my next reason would be i dont think anyone wants to fill up 1gb of space every week on most likely crappy/unusable skins

thats close enough to pointing out their size

Most people have good connections these days. As I said, it would be the *option* to download the hires skins. I've never noticed any lag from getting the lowres skins.

It seems a bit pointless to store them on LFSW if they're not going to be used.

As you don't seem to get it: It's not about computers or connections being able to handle it, it's about cost! Now you might have a high enough transfer limit to be able to download the bigger skins without additional costs, but the devs certainly won't! Can you imagine how many thousands of skins have to be transferred from the LfSW-server to all those clients? I don't even wanna know how many TB are shifted every week... Believe me, quadruplicating that figure is a huge impact on the budget of the devs...

Although, if we upload the 1024x1024-sized skins and, ingame, only 512x512 resizes are used, surely the game is downloading 1024x1024 resolution images from LFSW for skins, therefore the bandwidth usage of transferring a 1024x1024 image has already happened before the game resizes the skins?

Thus, allowing the game to display the skins without resizing them would make no difference to the bandwidth/size of files transferred.

Damn. I have just checked out my skins_x folder, seeing that the files there are 512x512.
This now bring about the question - does LFSW store the skin files in 512x512 resolution and send them out to clients at that resolution, or does the game receive them at 1024x1024 resize them to 512x512, saving them afterwards?

DE

LFSworld stores the 1024 versions but only sends the 512 versions to your computers

It stores both, but it just gives out the smaller 512x512... You can download your own skins in both resolutions, so it either generates the "lowres"-skins on the fly when they are needed or it creates them when you're uploading the 1024x1024 files and saves them seperately...

Edith: Damn you Al...

I found out, to my cost, that 1024x and 2048x skins can cost you a race. In a league race, I downloaded all the other drivers' 2048x skins. That was suicidal, it turns out. My 128MB graphics card physically couldn't cope with moving about all that data. In another league race, I downloaded the 1024x skins instead. My PC still had a fit, going in to T1.

Okay, so the skins didn't cost me the race. It was my crap driving but the bigger skin files sure didn't help!

Higher res skins would also be a significant burden on the LFS server. Looking through my skins_x folder, file sizes are typically between 70 and 95kb. The skins I upload at 1024x are targeted around 350-400KB. That's a big leap, and would be costly to deliver to every LFSer.

I would say +1 to the option, if the servers could handle it. I'm sure my card wouldn't have any problems, and if it did I could turn it off. It'd be nice to see higher quality skins when watching replays (I don't pay that much attention to paint jobs during races anyway!).

Why should the devs have to cover the extra cost of storing and distibuting larger high res skins to the general public. Until LFS has a built in P2P file sharing system which each driver can configure I do not see a reason to force the devs to pay the cost for an option like this. If you really want High Resolution skins. Build an insim app and a skins repository to check for high res skins and download the them if they are in the repositiry. You want high res skins then you front the cost.

+1 - but done differently. On LFS world you upload your 512x512 skin as normal, but also have the option to link to a self hosted 1024/2048 image. Then on the client side, an option to view high res skins.

Everyones happy.

This could be very doable via a cuminity Insim application and private database. I woudl post the question in the programing section and see if anyone there thinks its doable.

I'm not sure I like that idea.

Firstly, it'd be much harder to police the ToS. There'd be nothing to stop someone hosting their own porn images or other offensive skin, and no way for racers to stop them. When they're all in one place (LFSW) it's much easier for the devs to do random checks and then remove one if they get complained about.

Secondly, I'd hate to have to wait god knows how long for people to upload their skins to other people's computers. The race would be half finished before you saw the skin It's not just dial-up either, I know a lot of broadband providers seriously limit upload traffic, and unless there was a central storage area (ie, another server), they'd need to upload the skin to every individual in the race. The lag for the uploader would be crazy, too.

Quote from bbman :

SpaceMarine is the only one who got it right (shame on XCN for not pointing it out!)...

Transfer of images increases EXPONENTIALLY to their size... So, if you double the size of those skins, you'll quadruplicate the transfer! In view of people endlessly complaining about lags to load a skin and the cost for this quadruplicated transfer for every skin stored at LfSW, this would be nothing but suicide...

This is not true. Higher res skins are not usually an up-sized version of smaller skins, they are made at the higher resolution from the beginning. Skin sizes vary depending on detail, number of colours, and the level of file compression used by the author. Enlarging a skin is a waste of time, the loss of detail negates the very reason for having a high res texture in the first place. Large skins need to be created at the larger size, not made small and then scaled up.

Some computers could not cope with running a field of 1024 skins, some computers can. Mine can. I also want my LFS to look pretty, call me pinnickity but i've got a ton of track texture packs - I want the same for my cars too. It irks me that I pass cars or watch a replay and see blurred text on them.

LFSW has stored the 1024 skins from the beginning though, so hopefully the devs do plan to do something eventually - it's a question of whether it's S2 final, or S3 when all the graphic updates are coming.

All I know is I can live with 512, but I *want* 1024. That's not a crime, and it's not worth -1 the idea over just because you dont want it. I wont lag you out, i've got 10mbit connection and a PC with 2 of everything plugged into it - I dont believe in wasting my life infront of a busy pointer...

Never mind eh, i'll cope with what we've got.

Gunn I think you missed understood BBman's post what he is saying is that the file size of 1024 x 1024 image is four times larger than a 512 x 512 so a file size of 100kb @ 512 becomes a 400kb File @ 1024 therefore
the cost to the dev's for traffic would be 4 times as much hence the suicide comment

Even Worse a 2048 x 2048 is 16 times larger than a 512 x 512 image = 1.6mb

Just a quick tip to do with skin resolution - when saving skins to jpeg make sure that DPI (dots / Inch) is set to 72 and not 300 as this will keep the file size down.

A DPI of 300 is used in Digital Photos etc When anything above 72 DPI for online use has no effect as 72 DPI is optimum for your monitor output.