As a Roblox developer, it is currently impossible to incorporate a color banding effect into my games that is guaranteed to never break. Right now, the only way for developers to have such an effect is by removing any Atmosphere object in Lighting and setting FogColor, FogStart, and FogEnd insanely high. Here’s an example of what that looks like:
The current hack that is used to achieve this effect is undesirable since there’s no guarantee that such high values will always behave the same and will always be allowed. Not only that, but it also lacks control over the intensity of the color banding. This is why there is a need for a dedicated color banding post-processing effect, ensuring a reliable and officially supported solution.
This effect would allow developers to add a distinctive and artistic touch to their visuals, improving the overall aesthetic and mood of their games. I believe horror games would benefit greatly from having such a post-processing effect. Additionally, including this effect would make it easier for developers to achieve the specific look and feel they want in their games.
Off the top of my head, there are two games that use a similar, if not the same, effect outside of Roblox. Here’s what those games look like:
If such a post-processing effect was added, developers would no longer need to rely on a cursed hack that is not guaranteed to always work. In addition, it would also allow the effect to be usable alongside fog, which to my knowledge, is currently impossible.
While I’m not sure what the name would be for game development, in photo editing I’ve seen the term color quantization used to describe the effect needed to create this look! It’d take whatever image is visible, and trim it down to a limited color palette. Return of the Obra Dinn used it (along with some other tricks to keep things clean in motion) to achieve it’s striking artstyle!
Took a few pics around Roblox! After sizing them down and using PaintDotNet’s Quantize color effect, I could get some pretty amazing 16 Color images of what I’d love to see from a feature like this!
I really like the style of those color quantization examples!
It’s an interesting effect that doesn’t seem frequently talked about. Besides color banding, I believe it can be referred to as posterization as well. I know that’s the term I’ve used when doing photo editing.
According to some research I’ve done, color quantization and posterization are similar. However, color quantization is normally used to reduce file sizes by reducing the colors used to a limited color palette. Posterization on the other hand reduces the tones to achieve a specific artistic look. Apparently, posterization can be an unintended artifact of color quantization.
This makes me question if they’d fall under the same post-processing effect or not since they’re not doing the same thing. My gut is telling me they wouldn’t, but I’m no expert when it comes to stuff like this.
That’s an really interesting hack that I never even considered to try. It’s definitely one that is a lot more finicky than the fog one. I will say, it does a way better job at creating a posterization effect than the fog hack. Based on that thread though, it sounds like it could be inconsistent between devices.
That hack is more close to a proper posterization effect since it’s applying to everything on the screen instead of only instances affected by fog. For example, the skybox has color banding, unlike the fog hack. I do like that you don’t need to sacrifice the Atmosphere object with that hack. Too bad it relies on a part to always be in front of the camera and may be inconsistent.
hi! creator of the script and post here. I currently do not have anything to base this on, but I speculate that this is because of how roblox renders differently on macbook. I assume this because I use a macbook and windows is more commonly used.
I changed absolutely nothing. This is one of the reasons why I said the following:
What you’re experiencing is one of the reasons why this feature request was made. There’s no guarantee that these hacks will work nicely between devices and that they will always work.
It’s been 6 months since I’ve been searching any non-sketchy and real effect to achieve this. I would love to develop everyday and expand my creativity/creations if a tool built in the studio would be similar to this. We need more building styles, UI filters, NOT ONLY a Robloxian style to create games. Let’s make experiences, not Roblox typical games. Hope Roblox hears about this and is implemented.
Another post effect which is pretty desirable by tons of devs is a pixelate/resolution downscale effect. This and the colour quantising effect is something I’ve been wanting since 2019.
Roblox needs more lighting and screen post processing effects.
Yeah, the main post-processing effects I’m waiting on are pixelation, chromatic aberration, and most wishfully—color grading. Imagine the possibilities for creativity with color grading: We’d get games with colors as impressionist as Asteroid City, as nostalgic as the Wizard of Oz, or anything else imaginable.
There are already ways to stack different lighting and post-processing effects on one another to try to simulate color-grading, but it doesn’t really come close most of the time.
bumping this, I took a screenshot of my game, and quantized it in paint . net extremely to only two colours. And the two-tone effect it gives looks so cool! It would fit so well for a robot camera, or even just as a visual effect when something happens in game! there are so many use cases I can think of, creating an old VHS camera effect with limited bit-depth, artsy 2d type games with only two colours available, and I’m sure there’s more. please add!
