Texture compression adds a lot of artefacts

[TJ_MkII]

Whats the highest quality texture compression setting within UDK? A lot of my very detailed particle system textures are developing artifacts in the darker areas towards the edges where they fade to black. Realy irritating given the amount of time I've spent on creating them!

[TiGuy]

I have the same problem with my skybox textures, i've heard you can get better result by using float pictures(DXT1) instead of png or tga(DXT5) but i have not tested it yet since im working more on code than visual lately.

[darthviper107]

I think DXT1 is the worst compression

[JessieG]

Using depth bias alpha in the material will help soften out the transition to the transparent parts.

[TiGuy]

I think DXT1 is the worst compression

It's true if you use alpha since DXT1 can only support pure black or pure white in alpha, but other than that you can get the same or better result than DXT5. I dont know how UDK handle it tho so i can't be sure without testing it..

[TJ_MkII]

Using depth bias alpha in the material will help soften out the transition to the transparent parts.

Expensive node though, but thanks for the suggestion

As for DXT1 being the worst compression, that's not true at all. DXT1 just means you don't have an alpha channel (unless you use 1-bit alpha), so it saves file size. All textures are actually 'compressed' to DXT format in every game before they reach the graphics card because it's the only format they handle, UDK just saves the time and does it straight away.