Contained Region Selection for Faster Ray Tracing Intersections
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Existing ray tracing systems face inefficiencies in determining intersections with objects, particularly for non-closed objects and objects with complex geometries, leading to excessive computational effort and power consumption, especially in real-time rendering and on resource-constrained devices.
Innovation Solution
The method involves generating and selecting contained regions within objects to facilitate efficient intersection testing by using surface area metrics and occlusion utility criteria to refine the set of contained regions, allowing early determination of ray intersections without traversing to leaf nodes, thereby reducing the number of box and triangle tests.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If traditional ray tracing systems traverse acceleration structures to determine ray-object intersections, then intersection accuracy is maintained, but computational workload and power consumption increase significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies preliminary action by pre-computing and storing occlusion information in an occlusion map before ray tracing execution. This allows the system to quickly query whether regions are occluded without performing full intersection tests, significantly reducing real-time computational workload and power consumption while maintaining intersection detection accuracy.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent creates a simplified copy of the scene's occlusion information in the form of an occlusion map, which stores pre-computed visibility data. This copy allows rapid queries about occluded regions without traversing the full acceleration structure, reducing computational energy while preserving accurate intersection detection where needed.
2Reliability
If ray tracing systems perform comprehensive intersection tests to ensure accurate rendering, then rendering quality is maintained, but processing time increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary occlusion analysis and stores results in an occlusion map before rendering. During ray tracing, this pre-computed information allows the system to skip unnecessary intersection tests for occluded regions, significantly reducing processing time while maintaining rendering quality by still performing tests where occlusion is not present.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies partial action by performing intersection tests only where necessary - specifically, only in regions not marked as occluded in the pre-computed occlusion map. This selective approach reduces overall processing time while maintaining rendering quality by focusing computational effort only on visible regions that require accurate intersection detection.
3Productivity
If acceleration structures are used to reduce intersection tests, then computational efficiency improves, but memory usage and data structure complexity increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent creates a simplified copy of spatial occlusion information in the form of an occlusion map with a straightforward grid-based data structure. This copy provides computational efficiency by enabling rapid occlusion queries without requiring complex acceleration structure traversals, while using simpler memory organization compared to traditional BVH or kd-tree structures.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent transforms the complex spatial relationship data from acceleration structures into a simplified occlusion map with binary occlusion parameters. This parameter transformation converts complex hierarchical spatial data into a more memory-efficient format that enables faster queries with reduced data structure complexity.
4Loss of time
If more contained regions are generated within objects, then early intersection detection capability improves, but memory storage requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary occlusion analysis and stores results in an occlusion map that effectively creates virtual contained regions without explicitly storing them. This approach achieves early intersection detection by querying the occlusion map, reducing intersection detection time while avoiding the memory overhead of storing actual contained region geometries.
Solution Approach 2:
Instead of storing actual contained region geometries, the patent creates a simplified copy of occlusion information in the occlusion map. This copy enables early detection of intersections with occluded regions without requiring substantial memory storage for detailed region definitions, achieving the benefit of early detection with minimal memory cost.
Data Source
Figure 1
Figure 2a~2b
Figure 3
AI summary
The present disclosure is directed to methods and systems for facilitating intersection testing. There is provided a method of selecting a plurality of contained regions for use in a ray tracing system, wherein each of the plurality of contained regions is arranged to facilitate determining whether a ray intersects an object of a scene, wherein the object is contained within one or more finite bounding regions which form part of an object partitioning hierarchy. The method comprises: obtaining geometry data defining an object and a plurality of candidate contained regions, wherein each of the plurality of candidate contained regions are contained within extents of a geometry defined by the object; selecting a target contained region from the plurality of contained regions; identifying one or more occluded contained regions, of the plurality of contained regions, which the target contained region at least partially occludes; determining a surface area metric of the target contained region; determining whether the surface area metric of the target contained region meets one or more surface area utility criteria, wherein the one or more surface area utility criteria is defined based on at least one of i) a surface area defined by the one or more occluded contained regions; and ii) a surface area defined by with the object; in response to determining that the surface area metric of the target contained region does not meet the one or more surface area utility criteria, discarding the geometry data defining the target contained region to obtain a refined set of contained regions; wherein the refined set of contained regions are arranged to facilitate determining whether a ray intersects the object in dependence on determining that the ray intersects at least one contained region of the refined set of contained regions.