Highlight

• Reworked ReSTIR GI reuse and denoising to reduce fireflies, specular instability, and temporal artifacts
• Optimized the reuse texture pipeline to lower overhead while keeping clustered spatial reuse effective

New

• Added water wave frequency and speed settings
• Added a PowerShell shadesmith runner for configured local execution

Improvement

• Improved ReSTIR spatial reuse with quad-group / 8-sample grouping, tighter pass limits, and reuse-texture packing changes
• Improved specular GI stability with better temporal reprojection, pairwise MIS metadata handling, and specular-lobe-biased resampling
• Reduced blur and flicker in denoising, TAA, RTWSM, diffuse AO, water surfaces, and auto exposure behavior at low FPS
• Optimized shadow sampling and removed unnecessary work from specular reprojection and caustics filtering
• Updated shader/options/program generation scripts for the current pass layout and multi-properties workflow

Fix

• Fixed ReSTIR spatial reuse texture tiling and continue-trace discard issues
• Fixed specular reprojection failure noise and over-blurred smooth reflections in the denoiser
• Fixed the SETTING_DENOISER_ACCUM switch and the spatial-filter disabling setting
• Fixed TAA edge-pixel out-of-bounds artifacts
• Fixed screen-space shadow acne on very flat surfaces
• Fixed indirect/program pass generation issues

Misc

• Merged GI edge classification with volumetrics depth layers
• Moved ReprojectInfo out of GI common utilities and cleaned up related reuse / temporal code
• Removed obsolete caustics filter, redundant surface-position specular reprojection, and unused GI helper paths

Highlight

• Reworked ReSTIR GI reuse and denoising to reduce fireflies, specular instability, and temporal artifacts
• Optimized the reuse texture pipeline to lower overhead while keeping clustered spatial reuse effective

New

• Added water wave frequency and speed settings
• Added a PowerShell shadesmith runner for configured local execution

Improvement

• Improved ReSTIR spatial reuse with quad-group / 8-sample grouping, tighter pass limits, and reuse-texture packing changes
• Improved specular GI stability with better temporal reprojection, pairwise MIS metadata handling, and specular-lobe-biased resampling
• Reduced blur and flicker in denoising, TAA, RTWSM, diffuse AO, water surfaces, and auto exposure behavior at low FPS
• Optimized shadow sampling and removed unnecessary work from specular reprojection and caustics filtering
• Updated shader/options/program generation scripts for the current pass layout and multi-properties workflow

Fix

• Fixed ReSTIR spatial reuse texture tiling and continue-trace discard issues
• Fixed specular reprojection failure noise and over-blurred smooth reflections in the denoiser
• Fixed the SETTING_DENOISER_ACCUM switch and the spatial-filter disabling setting
• Fixed TAA edge-pixel out-of-bounds artifacts
• Fixed screen-space shadow acne on very flat surfaces
• Fixed indirect/program pass generation issues

Misc

• Merged GI edge classification with volumetrics depth layers
• Moved ReprojectInfo out of GI common utilities and cleaned up related reuse / temporal code
• Removed obsolete caustics filter, redundant surface-position specular reprojection, and unused GI helper paths

Highlight

• Added specular GI

New

• Added specular GI

Fix

• Increased AE speed at low fps
• Fixed screenspace shadow uninitialized warnings
• Fixed handheld alpha test shadow
• Fixed Voxy before 0.2.6

Highlight

• Added specular GI

New

• Added specular GI

Fix

• Increased AE speed at low fps
• Fixed screenspace shadow uninitialized warnings
• Fixed handheld alpha test shadow

Fix

• Fixed no voxy bug

Highlight

• Added Voxy support
• Switched to Adobe f82 Schlick fresnel, replacing the previous HCM model for more accurate specular appearance

New

• Added video render mode setting

Improvement

• Switched to regular spherical cap GGX VNDF sampling for translucent
• Shadow sample optimization for improved performance

Fix

• Fixed temporal reuse exploding after zooming in
• Fixed shadow rendering on SSS (subsurface scattering) surfaces
• Fixed water scattering overflow near sunset/sunrise
• Fixed time_interpolate behavior
• Fixed atmosphere depth break indirect dispatch

Misc

• Cleaned up SST and ReSTIR temporal reuse logic

Highlight

• Voxy integration merged — distant terrain from the Voxy mod is now supported
• Switched to Adobe f82 Schlick fresnel, replacing the previous HCM model for more accurate specular appearance

New

• Added video render mode setting for cinematic/recording workflows

Improvement

• Switched to regular spherical cap GGX VNDF sampling for translucent specular
• Shadow sample optimization for improved performance
• Cleaned up SST and ReSTIR temporal reuse logic

Fix

• Fixed temporal reuse exploding after zooming in
• Fixed shadow rendering on SSS (subsurface scattering) surfaces
• Fixed water scattering overflow near sunset/sunrise
• Fixed time_interpolate behavior
• Fixed atmosphere depth break indirect dispatch

Highlight

• Major improvements to ReSTIR SSGI stability and quality

New

• Readded RCRS anti firefly to GI denoiser pipeline
• Added ReSTIR Temporal Reuse Limit setting for better user control on GI responsiveness
• Added FXAA as TAA history missing fallback

Improvement

• Combined sun and moon Sky-View LUT
• Optimized colored shadow precondition check
• Uses blue noises in ReSTIR for better noise distribution
• Reduced denoiser history fix leaks
• Improved shadow AABB calculation and cleanup
• ReSTIR uses full bilateral bilinear temporal resampling to improve stability and quality
• Updated default accumulation settings for less lighting lags
• Reduced GI reprojection false anti-stretching history kills
• GI denoiser history fix skips first 3 LODs for fewer fireflies
• Replaced bloom hard clipping with soft clipping
• Switch TAA variance AABB history ratification from clamping to clipping
• Optimized ReSTIR reuse passes
• Water volume tweak
• Use AABB clipping for fast history clamping
• Use bilinear on fast history for free blurring and fewer noises
• Use distance between probe pixel position and origin position as fade distance

Fix

• Fixed atmosphere mie coefficient calculation for low turbidity value
• Fixed DH water material detection
• Fixed DH water shadow blending
• Fixed random emissive from DH solid
• Slightly mitigated shadow acne
• Fixed SSS singularity bug in SRGB rendering working space
• Removed denoiser stabilization pass to fix bleeding
• Fixed GI grid pattern artifacts caused by bad reprojectInfo.curr2PrevScreenPos precision
• Fixed TAA reset missing
• Fixed emissive bug on 0 albedo material

Misc

• Migrated cloud ambient LUT to shadesmith tiles for optimized texture management
• Cleaned up SSBO usage
• Removed env probe setup clearing
• Fixed make zip naming

New

• Added FXAA as TAA history missing fallback

Improvement

• Replaced bloom hard clipping with soft clipping
• Switch TAA variance AABB history ratification from clamping to clipping
• Optimized ReSTIR reuse passes
• Water volume tweak

Fix

• Fixed SSS singularity bug in SRGB rendering working space
• Removed denoiser stabilization pass to fix bleeding
• Fixed RGBA16F atlas size

Highlight

• Major improvements to ReSTIR SSGI stability and quality

New

• Readded RCRS anti firefly to GI denoiser pipeline
• Added ReSTIR Temporal Reuse Limit setting for better user control on GI responsiveness

Improvement

• Combined sun and moon Sky-View LUT
• Optimized colored shadow precondition check
• Uses blue noises in ReSTIR for better noise distribution
• Reduced denoiser history fix leaks
• Improved shadow AABB calculation and cleanup
• ReSTIR uses full bilateral bilinear temporal resampling to improve stability and quality
• Updated default accumulation settings for less lighting lags
• Reduced GI reprojection false anti-stretching history kills
• GI denoiser history fix skips first 3 LODs for fewer fireflies

Fix

• Fixed atmosphere mie coefficient calculation for low turbidity value
• Fixed DH water material detection
• Fixed DH water shadow blending
• Fixed random emissive from DH solid
• Slightly mitigated shadow acne

Misc

• Migrated cloud ambient LUT to shadesmith tiles for optimized texture management
• Cleaned up SSBO usage

Highlight

• Added limited Built-in PBR support
• Improved translucent rendering with double refraction

New

• Added limited Built-in PBR support (Foliage SSS, Translucent, and Emissive)
• Added double refraction for non-water translucents for more accurate light bending
• Added more per-material translucent absorption settings

Improvement

• Migrated TranslucentSST to the new SST implementation, greatly simplifying the code
• Improved cloud spherical shell setup
• Improved water scattering with new phase function based on Petzold data

Fix

• Fixed translucent sky reflection error
• Fixed DH (Distant Horizons) support
• Fixed missing TAA clamp mix logic
• Fixed cloud spherical shell setup
• Fixed insanely bright emissive from end rod and charged lightning rod

Misc

• Increased default PCSS sample count for better shadow softness

Highlight

• Major performance optimizations on rasterization pass
• Config profiles for different quality/performance tiers

New

• Added config profiles for different quality/performance tiers
• Added Assume NV GPU option for NVIDIA-specific optimizations
• Separated SSS sample count from blocker search count for better control

Improvement

• Optimized gbuffer pass viewZ attribute by computing from gl_FragCoord.w
• Optimized terrain draw normal vertex attributes
• Optimized shadow pass attributes
• Optimized denoiser reproject register usage
• Optimized denoiser stabilization pass occupancy
• Removed some vertex attributes for passes that don't need them
• Optimized SST register usage and ray sorting key layout
• Optimized GI5 storing handle register usage
• DenoiseBlur FP16 optimization
• ReSTIR temporal reuse math simplification
• Early return branching optimization
• Updated TAA filter kernel for lower quality profile
• Reduced TAA motion blur
• Tone mapping tweak
• Moved cloud clear from GIReproject to ShadowSample pass to balance VRAM loads
• Moved fast history storing to history fix pass to balance VRAM loads
• Emissive color curve now performed in input color space for better consistency
• Removed spatial reuse feedback due to firefly artifacts

Fix

• Fixed hit distance on disocclusion
• Fixed backward analysis distance check
• Fixed GBufferTranslucent material id reading
• Fixed RTWSM forward analysis writing position
• Fixed extra water tinting
• Fixed history length diffusion killing disocclusion fix

Misc

• Removed unused shadow specular output and associated references
• Removed reservoir age reset

Highlight

• SSS rewrite
• Improved cumulus modeling

New

• Added Shadow hardening filter

Improvement

• SSS Rewrite
• Improved RTWSM Backward Perpendicular Function
• Reduced shadow bias
• Improved cumulus modeling
• Optimized ShadowSample pass register usages
• GI history length filter tweak
• TAA YCog conversion optimization
• Optimized RCAS
• Optimized cumulus base coverage noise
• Optimized ray sorting by skipping empty bins
• ReSTIR temporal reuse register usage optimization
• Optimized TAA SM usage

Misc

• Removed old SSS settings
• Updated file walking to follow symbolic links in addStuff function
• Detail noise toggle for debug
• GBuffer debug scaling

New

• Added GI SST steps options
• Added Color McSpaceFace colorspace for rendering

Improvement

• Improved Water Caustics and make it enabled by default
• Improved PCSS
• Improved denoiser to reduce fireflies
• Increased environment probe range setting maximum
• Adjusted water wave
• Improved shadesmith tilling algorithm to reduce VRAM usage

Fix

• Fixed potential cloud banding caused by bad randoms
• Fixed cloud multi-scattering radius setting
• Fixed solid shadow and caustics mixing
• Fixed randomly appeared black line in GI accumulation
• Fixed missing denoiser stabilization
• Fixed twilight color banding

Misc

• Updated sponsor list
• Removed unused CSR32F tile

Highlights

• Diffuse GI overhaul with ReSTIR SSGI
• Denoiser overhaul with ReBLUR-based denoiser

New

• Integrated Shadesmith for shader release optimization
• Added translucent absorption saturation setting

Improvement

• Diffuse GI overhaul with ReSTIR SSGI
• Denoiser overhaul with ReBLUR-based denoiser
• Optimized various passes with custom Z-order thread group tiling
• Optimized various passes's VRAM bandwidth usage
• Optimized Hi-Z SST
• Replaced imageLoad with texelFetch for performance
• Refactored post-processing pipeline
• Improved HiZ mip tiles
• Enhanced TAA with more filter options
• Improved TAA sharpness, reduced motion blur and ghosting
• Improved image sharpening
• Updated default tonemap setting
• Migrated various images to Shadesmith tiles
• Improved bloom stability
• Tweaked auto exposure
• Tweaked emissive default settings
• Adjusted translucent SST thickness factor for less flickering and false hits
• Removed unused skylut

Fix

• Fixed backward SST (Screen-Space Tracing) near camera
• Fixed HiZ backward tracing failing in some cases
• Fixed missing sky reflection at night
• Fixed ghosting over sky
• Fixed cloud curl noise default strength
• Fixed incorrect cloud multiple scattering math

Misc

• Updated build scripts to include branch names in zip files
• Updated release script to support beta releases on dev branch
• Improved shift-program script to handle different worlds and no-suffix passes
• Removed old unused CAS code
• Added dynamic range to debug text

New

• Added settings for spatial denoiser sample counts

Improvement

• Improved spatial with grazing angle based kernel stretching
• Reimplemented vanilla skylight attenuation
• Reimplemented env probe in diffuse GI
• Optimized temporal reuse pass VRAM usage and tiling
• Replaced imageLoad with texelFetch for performance
• Improved dithering for GI pipeline
• Added dithering to history fix color output
• Reduced denoiser light leaks
• Tweaked history fix for less light popping
• Tweaked denoiser stabilization
• Tweaked mip history fix edge weight
• Limited hit distance to avoid self hit

Fix

• Fixed GI shadowing ghosting
• Fixed over blurring GI on leaves

Misc

• Code cleanup for denoiser blur
• Removed old unused CAS code
• Added shader type macro

New

• Added luminance difference based firefly suppression
• Added optional dynamic spatial reuse sample count (disabled by default, previously always enabled)

Improvement

• Optimized GI SSRT with ray sorting and compaction
• Optimized various passes with custom Z-order thread group tiling
• Optimized various passes's VRAM bandwidth usage
• Optimized denoiser history fix pass
• Improved denoiser shadow sharpening
• Enhanced TAA with more filter options
• Improved TAA anti-motion blur
• Tweaked auto exposure speed
• Tweaked emissive default settings
• Adjusted translucent SST thickness factor for less flickering and false hits
• Migrated various images to Shadesmith
• Merged post final composite
• Removed unused skylut
• Added kernel center pixel skip optimization
• Added GI denoiser dithering

Fix

• Fixed AE distance weighting decaying too fast
• Fixed missing sky reflection at night
• Fixed GI sky border
• Fixed/reduced temporal reuse biases and errors
• Fixed TAA screenshot mode history reset

Misc

• Code cleanup for GI system

New

• Implemented denoiser stabilization pass
• Added SST thickness setting
• Added translucent absorption saturation setting

Improvement

• Optimized denoiser variance filtering using shared memory
• Optimized hit distance filtering
• Optimized fast history clamping with shared memory
• Optimized Hi-Z SST
• Improved HiZ mip tiles
• Improved disocclusion fix
• Improved denoiser fast history clamping
• Reduced bloom intensity
• Tweaked auto exposure default settings
• Adjusted auto exposure speed
• Relax history fix edge weighting for initial frames
• Removed RCRS anti-firefly (replaced with better solution)
• Added clip check to TAA
• Improved TAA sharpness

Fix

• Fixed denoiser dissolution fix causing dark edges
• Fixed low FPS auto exposure flashing
• Fixed ghosting over sky
• Fixed auto exposure overshoot
• Fixed broken temporal reuse
• Fixed HiZ backward tracing
• Fixed random history reset near camera
• Fixed hit distance filtering
• Fixed denoiser stabilization motion blur handling
• Reimplemented environment probe radiance updating

New

• Integrated Shadesmith for shader release optimization
• Diffuse GI overhaul with ReSTIR SSGI
• Denoiser overhaul with ReBLUR-based denoiser

Improvement

• Refactored post-processing pipeline

Fix

• Fixed GI light lag during sudden time changes
• Fixed backward SST (Screen-Space Tracing) near camera
• Fixed cloud curl noise default strength
• Fixed incorrect cloud multiple scattering math

Misc

• Updated build scripts to include branch names in zip files
• Updated release script to support beta releases on dev branch
• Improved shift-program script to handle different worlds and no-suffix passes

Fixed atmospheric scattering layering hotfix

New

• Added more cloud modeling settings
• Added installation guide (Thanks to @loveghosties on Discord)

Improvement

• Improved water wave at smaller water body with more high-frequency water wave
• Improved sky view LUT encoding
• Refactored volumetrics setting menu to reduce depth
• Adjusted default cloud settings for better out-of-the-box experience
• Improved cloud ambient lighting

Fix

• Fixed normal mapped TBN with reorthogonalization

Misc

• Added automated release script

New

• Added Time Speed History Reset Threshold setting
• Added more documentation to settings

Improvement

• Optimized cumulus base coverage noise performance using LUT for higher octaves
• Tweaked default history reset for less light lag
• Updated Chinese translation

Fix

• Fixed water side face parallax glitch
• Fixed SRGB to Rec709 conversions
• Fixed cross-product handedness for bitangent calculation
• Added missing cumulus base noise LUT

New

• Added water volumetrics scattering refraction approximation
• Added underwater bloom boost

Improvement

• Improved water volumetrics shadow using importance sampling

Fix

• Fixed water shadow glitching
• Fixed missing cumulus curl noise
• Fixed translucent exploding z
• Fixed GlobalData modifier in VolumetricsDepthLayers.comp.glsl
• Fixed shadow AABB missing translucent

Misc

• Renamed min3 and max3 to avoid conflicts in Vulkan
• Renamed input colorspace functions

Improvement

• Cumulus cloud overhaul: modeling, lighting, upscaling

Fix

• Corrected daylight sky brightness

New

• Added ground albedo to atmosphere

Improvement

• Improved cloud multiple scattering
• Improved cloud phase encoding precision

Fix

• Fixed atmosphere multiple scattering parametrization
• Fixed atmosphere LUT quantization and noise flickering

Misc

• Moved epipolar slice/sample count setting out from air sub category

This is likely going to be the last release for 1.6, and we will then move on to the 1.7 shadow update.

New

• Added option for entity/particle emissive multiplier

Improvement

• Added depth write to water parallax
• Improved water volumetrics with multiple scattering approximation

Fix

• Fixed wave parallax at larger scale setting
• Fixed caustics

https://github.com/Luna5ama/Alpha-Piscium/releases/tag/1.6.5

Without multiple scattering approximation:

With multiple scattering approximation:

Without multiple scattering approximation:

With multiple scattering approximation:

Without multiple scattering approximation:

With multiple scattering approximation:

Improvement

• Improved water parallax quality with secant search (which should fix the random lines on water waves)
• Improved water wave

New

• Added option for emissive particle

Improvement

• Better Fix for downward-facing reflection direction
• Tweaked water wave detail noise
• Tweaked water wave large scale curl
• Added PBR fallback for DH

Fix

• Fixed wave normal grid pattern artifacts
• Fixed epipolar scattering shadow vector setup
• Fixed random exploding water scattering
• Fixed Hi-Z SST max mip clamping
• Fixed shadow AABB detection when using DH
• Fixed TBN for DH translucents

Misc

• Removed garbage hf curl data

https://github.com/Luna5ama/Alpha-Piscium/releases/tag/1.6.3

Fix

• Fixed the malfunctioned environment probe reprojection caused by the wrong deferred pass name
• Fixed accidentally disabled water epipolar scattering shadow sampling

Fix

• Fixed distant horizon support
• Fixed AMD && bvec compilation error
• Fixed env probe not resetting on time change

https://github.com/Luna5ama/Alpha-Piscium/releases/tag/1.6.1