Cone-culled soft shadows
US7755626B2 · kind B2 · utility
Assignee
Inventors
Key dates
| Filing date | May 3, 2006 |
| Grant date | Jul 13, 2010 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Apr 6, 2027 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC G)Physics
- CPC primaryG06T15/60
- WIPO fieldComputer technology
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
Soft shadows in computer graphics images are created by rendering the scene from the camera viewpoint and at least one light viewpoint. The positions of scene fragments and light fragments in the scene are stored. For each scene fragment, a frustum is defined between the position of the scene fragment and the light source. Light fragments are evaluated with respect to the frustum to select light fragments blocking light between the light source and the scene fragment. A color or monochromatic shading value is determined for each scene fragment that indicates the amount of light blocked or transmitted by the light fragments. The shading values are then used to alter scene fragments accordingly. Computer graphics images with soft shadows can be created entirely by a graphics processing subsystem or by a graphics processing subsystem in conjunction with a central processing unit using a pipelined, deferred shading approach.
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.