Compact visibility state for GPUs compatible with hardware instancing

US10672182B2 · kind B2 · utility

Assignee

• MICROSOFT TECHNOLOGY LICENSING, LLC · US

Inventors

• John D. White · Toledo, US
• Martin Jon Irwin Fuller · Hamilton, BM

Key dates

• Filing date: Apr 19, 2018
• Grant date: Jun 2, 2020
• Expiry date: May 25, 2038

Classification

• Technology area (CPC G): Physics
• CPC primary: G06T17/10
• WIPO field: Computer technology
• WIPO sector: Electrical engineering

Abstract

Methods and devices for rendering visible primitives in a scene of an application may include loading a primitive visibility buffer that includes a plurality of primitives representing at least one instance in a scene of the application. The primitive visibility buffer may include for each primitive of the plurality of primitives a visibility bit that describes a visibility state as visible or not visible for each of the plurality primitives. The methods and devices may include determining whether each of the plurality of primitives are visible in the scene based on the visibility bit, rendering a primitive when the visibility bit for the primitive indicates that the primitive is visible, and skipping the rendering of the primitive when the visibility bit indicates that the primitive is not visible. The methods and devices may also include combing pre-computed visibility states with runtime visibility testing when rendering the visibility bits.