Light Transport Theory
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Light Transport Theory
Light transport theory deals with the mathematics behind calculating the energy transfers between media that affect visibility. This article is currently specific to light transport in rendering processes such as global illumination and High dynamic range imaging, HDRI. Light Light Transport The amount of light transported is measured by flux density, or luminous flux per unit area on the point of the surface at which it is measured. Radiometry Energy Transfer Media Models Hemisphere Given a surface S, a hemisphere H can be projected on to S to calculate the amount of incoming and outgoing light. If a point P is selected at random on the surface S, the amount of incoming and outgoing light can be calculated by its projection onto the hemisphere. Hemicube The hemicube model works in a similar way that the hemisphere model works, with the exception that a hemicube is projected as opposed to a hemisphere. The similarity is only in concept, the actual calculation done by i ...
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Global Illumination
Global illumination (GI), or indirect illumination, is a group of algorithms used in 3D computer graphics that are meant to add more realistic lighting to 3D scenes. Such algorithms take into account not only the light that comes directly from a light source (''direct illumination''), but also subsequent cases in which light rays from the same source are reflected by other surfaces in the scene, whether reflective or not (''indirect illumination''). Theoretically, reflections, refractions, and shadows are all examples of global illumination, because when simulating them, one object affects the rendering of another (as opposed to an object being affected only by a direct source of light). In practice, however, only the simulation of diffuse inter-reflection or caustics is called global illumination. Algorithms Images rendered using global illumination algorithms often appear more photorealistic than those using only direct illumination algorithms. However, such images are co ...
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High Dynamic Range Imaging
In photography and videography, multi-exposure HDR capture is a technique that creates extended or high dynamic range (HDR) images by taking and combining multiple exposures of the same subject matter at different exposure levels. Combining multiple images in this way results in an image with a greater dynamic range than what would be possible by taking one single image. The technique can also be used to capture video by taking and combining multiple exposures for each frame of the video. The term "HDR" is used frequently to refer to the process of creating HDR images from multiple exposures. Many smartphones have an automated HDR feature that relies on computational imaging techniques to capture and combine multiple exposures. A single image captured by a camera provides a finite range of luminosity inherent to the medium, whether it is a digital sensor or film. Outside this range, tonal information is lost and no features are visible; tones that exceed the range are "burned ...
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Luminous Flux
In photometry, luminous flux or luminous power is the measure of the perceived power of light. It differs from radiant flux, the measure of the total power of electromagnetic radiation (including infrared, ultraviolet, and visible light), in that luminous flux is adjusted to reflect the varying sensitivity of the human eye to different wavelengths of light. Units The SI unit of luminous flux is the lumen (lm). One lumen is defined as the luminous flux of light produced by a light source that emits one candela of luminous intensity over a solid angle of one steradian. 1\ \text = 1\ \text \times 1\ \text In other systems of units, luminous flux may have units of power. Weighting The luminous flux accounts for the sensitivity of the eye by weighting the power at each wavelength with the luminosity function, which represents the eye's response to different wavelengths. The luminous flux is a weighted sum of the power at all wavelengths in the visible band. Light outside the vi ...
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Rendering (computer Graphics)
Rendering or image synthesis is the process of generating a photorealistic or non-photorealistic image from a 2D or 3D model by means of a computer program. The resulting image is referred to as the render. Multiple models can be defined in a ''scene file'' containing objects in a strictly defined language or data structure. The scene file contains geometry, viewpoint, texture, lighting, and shading information describing the virtual scene. The data contained in the scene file is then passed to a rendering program to be processed and output to a digital image or raster graphics image file. The term "rendering" is analogous to the concept of an artist's impression of a scene. The term "rendering" is also used to describe the process of calculating effects in a video editing program to produce the final video output. Rendering is one of the major sub-topics of 3D computer graphics, and in practice it is always connected to the others. It is the last major step in the gr ...
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3D Modeling
In 3D computer graphics, 3D modeling is the process of developing a mathematical coordinate-based representation of any surface of an object (inanimate or living) in three dimensions via specialized software by manipulating edges, vertices, and polygons in a simulated 3D space. Three-dimensional (3D) models represent a physical body using a collection of points in 3D space, connected by various geometric entities such as triangles, lines, curved surfaces, etc. Being a collection of data ( points and other information), 3D models can be created manually, algorithmically (procedural modeling), or by scanning. Their surfaces may be further defined with texture mapping. Outline The product is called a 3D model. Someone who works with 3D models may be referred to as a 3D artist or a 3D modeler. A 3D Model can also be displayed as a two-dimensional image through a process called 3D rendering or used in a computer simulation of physical phenomena. 3D Models may be created au ...
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Digital Image
A digital image is an image composed of picture elements, also known as ''pixels'', each with ''finite'', '' discrete quantities'' of numeric representation for its intensity or gray level that is an output from its two-dimensional functions fed as input by its spatial coordinates denoted with ''x'', ''y'' on the x-axis and y-axis, respectively. Depending on whether the image resolution is fixed, it may be of vector or raster type. Raster Raster images have a finite set of digital values, called ''picture elements'' or pixels. The digital image contains a fixed number of rows and columns of pixels. Pixels are the smallest individual element in an image, holding antiquated values that represent the brightness of a given color at any specific point. Typically, the pixels are stored in computer memory as a raster image or raster map, a two-dimensional array of small integers. These values are often transmitted or stored in a compressed form. Raster images can be created b ...
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Non-photorealistic Rendering
Non-photorealistic rendering (NPR) is an area of computer graphics that focuses on enabling a wide variety of expressive styles for digital art, in contrast to traditional computer graphics, which focuses on photorealism. NPR is inspired by other artistic modes such as painting, drawing, technical illustration, and animated cartoons. NPR has appeared in movies and video games in the form of cel-shaded animation (also known as " toon" shading) as well as in scientific visualization, architectural illustration and experimental animation. History and criticism of the term The term ''non-photorealistic rendering'' is believed to have been coined by the SIGGRAPH 1990 papers committee, who held a session entitled "Non Photo Realistic Rendering". The term has received some criticism: * The term "photorealism" has different meanings for graphics researchers (see "photorealistic rendering") and artists. For artists—who are the target consumers of NPR techniques—it refers to a schoo ...
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Path Tracing
Path tracing is a computer graphics Monte Carlo method of rendering images of three-dimensional scenes such that the global illumination is faithful to reality. Fundamentally, the algorithm is integrating over all the illuminance arriving to a single point on the surface of an object. This illuminance is then reduced by a surface reflectance function (BRDF) to determine how much of it will go towards the viewpoint camera. This integration procedure is repeated for every pixel in the output image. When combined with physically accurate models of surfaces, accurate models of real light sources (light bulbs), and optically correct cameras, path tracing can produce still images that are indistinguishable from photographs. Path tracing naturally simulates many effects that have to be specifically added to other methods (conventional ray tracing or scanline rendering), such as soft shadows, depth of field, motion blur, caustics, ambient occlusion, and indirect lighting. Implementa ...
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Global Illumination
Global illumination (GI), or indirect illumination, is a group of algorithms used in 3D computer graphics that are meant to add more realistic lighting to 3D scenes. Such algorithms take into account not only the light that comes directly from a light source (''direct illumination''), but also subsequent cases in which light rays from the same source are reflected by other surfaces in the scene, whether reflective or not (''indirect illumination''). Theoretically, reflections, refractions, and shadows are all examples of global illumination, because when simulating them, one object affects the rendering of another (as opposed to an object being affected only by a direct source of light). In practice, however, only the simulation of diffuse inter-reflection or caustics is called global illumination. Algorithms Images rendered using global illumination algorithms often appear more photorealistic than those using only direct illumination algorithms. However, such images are co ...
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Monte Carlo Method
Monte Carlo methods, or Monte Carlo experiments, are a broad class of computational algorithms that rely on repeated random sampling to obtain numerical results. The underlying concept is to use randomness to solve problems that might be deterministic in principle. They are often used in physical and mathematical problems and are most useful when it is difficult or impossible to use other approaches. Monte Carlo methods are mainly used in three problem classes: optimization, numerical integration, and generating draws from a probability distribution. In physics-related problems, Monte Carlo methods are useful for simulating systems with many coupled degrees of freedom, such as fluids, disordered materials, strongly coupled solids, and cellular structures (see cellular Potts model, interacting particle systems, McKean–Vlasov processes, kinetic models of gases). Other examples include modeling phenomena with significant uncertainty in inputs such as the calculation of ris ...
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Photon Mapping
In computer graphics, photon mapping is a two-pass global illumination rendering algorithm developed by Henrik Wann Jensen between 1995 and 2001Jensen, H. (1996). ''Global Illumination using Photon Maps''. nlineAvailable at: http://graphics.stanford.edu/~henrik/papers/ewr7/egwr96.pdf that approximately solves the rendering equation for integrating light radiance at a given point in space. Rays from the light source (like photons) and rays from the camera are traced independently until some termination criterion is met, then they are connected in a second step to produce a radiance value. The algorithm is used to realistically simulate the interaction of light with different types of objects (similar to other photorealistic rendering techniques). Specifically, it is capable of simulating the refraction of light through a transparent substance such as glass or water (including caustics), diffuse interreflection between illuminated objects, the subsurface scattering of light in tr ...
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Radiosity (computer Graphics)
In 3D computer graphics, radiosity is an application of the finite element method to solving the rendering equation for scenes with surfaces that reflect light diffusely. Unlike rendering methods that use Monte Carlo algorithms (such as path tracing), which handle all types of light paths, typical radiosity only account for paths (represented by the code "LD*E") which leave a light source and are reflected diffusely some number of times (possibly zero) before hitting the eye. Radiosity is a global illumination algorithm in the sense that the illumination arriving on a surface comes not just directly from the light sources, but also from other surfaces reflecting light. Radiosity is viewpoint independent, which increases the calculations involved, but makes them useful for all viewpoints. Radiosity methods were first developed in about 1950 in the engineering field of heat transfer. They were later refined specifically for the problem of rendering computer graphics in 1984 by ...
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