An Analysis of Real-Time Ray Tracing Techniques Using the Vulkan® Explicit API

<p>In computer graphics applications, the choice and implementation of a rendering technique is crucial when targeting real-time performance. Traditionally, rasterization-based approaches have dominated the real-time sector. Other algorithms were simply too slow to compete on consumer graphics hardware. With the addition of hardware support for ray-intersection calculations on modern GPUs, hybrid ray tracing/rasterization and purely ray tracing approaches have become possible in real-time as well. Industry real-time graphics applications, namely games, have been exploring these different rendering techniques with great levels of success. The addition of ray tracing into the graphics developer’s toolkit has without a doubt increased what level of graphical fidelity is achievable in real-time.</p> <p>In this thesis, three rendering techniques are implemented in a custom rendering engine built on the Vulkan® Explicit API. Each technique represents a different family of modern real-time rendering algorithms. A largely rasterization-based method, a hybrid ray tracing/rasterization method, and a method solely using ray tracing. Both the hybrid and ray tracing exclusive approach rely on the ReSTIR algorithm for lighting calculations. Analysis of the performance and render quality of these approaches reveals the trade-offs incurred by each approach, alongside the performance viability of each in a real-time setting.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

MS in Computer Science

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Computer Science

Year dc:date.available

2021

Author dc:creator

• Souza, Elleis C

Contributors dc:contributor

• Zoë Wood
• Computer Science
• College of Engineering

• Computer Graphics
• Ray Tracing
• Real-Time Ray Tracing
• Physically-Based Rendering
• Lighting
• Parallelization
• Graphics and Human Computer Interfaces

Identifier

10.15368/theses.2021.96

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:digitalcommons.calpoly.edu:theses-3895