Yesterday, Blur Busters (known for their UFO Test Refresh Rate Test Utilityas well as extensive monitor testing and documentation resources) has been released and open source New CRT filter in the form of a GPU shader that fully emulates CRT beams. Blur Busters and others claim this is a true, better-than-black-frame-insertion (BFI) alternative to CRTs as a way to improve motion fidelity on modern LCD and OLED displays. especially Organic light emitting diodes.
If you’re not familiar with CRT, you might not know why the move was so widely celebrated in the retro hardware and retro gaming circles on Twitter, BlueSky, and wherever the announcement was made.
Basically, classic CRT TVs and monitors have one key advantage over almost all modern panel types: perfect motion fidelity and virtually non-existent motion blur, which usually also means no input lag. While CRTs are typically limited to sub-HD resolutions, are heavy, and prone to flicker, they can also have excellent contrast and color depth. Some even believe that the common tube design of CRT screens provides more 3D depth to the internal image, although this is somewhat subjective.
These advantages of CRTs are why they remain so highly regarded among certain groups, particularly the competitive gaming community, e.g. Super Smash Bros. Melee A scene that still relies on CRT TVs, and the vast majority of retro hardware enthusiasts. Some retro gamers have been particularly vocal about the lack of CRT monitors, and it’s not for superficial reasons either – most classic pixel art games were made with the expectation of being displayed on a CRT, and pixel art often looks blocky Much less convincing.
Blur Busters’ CRT simulation shaders were developed by founder Mark Rejhon in collaboration with former AMD and Nvidia employee Timothy Lottes. Shaders have been released on both GitHub and coloring toys The platform’s system requirements are actually quite high.
While this shader is recommended for OLED, it technically can be used for LCD as well. It just doesn’t deliver the same accuracy as a CRT. This shader is specifically designed to smooth 60 Hz content on modern high refresh rate monitors. Higher refresh rates (120 Hz, 240 Hz, etc.) are used to improve the accuracy and fidelity of CRT simulation effects. This should significantly reduce motion blur, especially on 240 Hz+ OLED displays, and ensure that retro games that rely on CRTs for realistic visuals can still be seen as they would on modern monitors.