Indigo Renderer is a 3D rendering software that uses

unbiased rendering __NOTOC__ Within the field of computer graphics, unbiased rendering refers to any rendering (computer graphics), rendering technique that does not introduce systematic error, or bias of an estimator, bias, into the rendering equation, radiance ap ...

technologies to create

photo-realistic Photorealism is a genre of art that encompasses painting, drawing and other graphic media, in which an artist studies a photograph and then attempts to reproduce the image as realistically as possible in another medium. Although the term can be ...

images. In doing so, it uses equations that simulate the behaviour of light. By simulating the interactions of light, it can produce effects such as: *

Depth of field The depth of field (DOF) is the distance between the nearest and the furthest objects that are in acceptably sharp focus in an image captured with a camera. Factors affecting depth of field For cameras that can only focus on one object dist ...

, as when a camera is focused on one object and the background is blurred * Spectral effects, as when a beam of light goes through a prism and a rainbow of colours is produced *

Refraction In physics, refraction is the redirection of a wave as it passes from one medium to another. The redirection can be caused by the wave's change in speed or by a change in the medium. Refraction of light is the most commonly observed phenomeno ...

, as when light enters a pool of water and the objects in the pool seem to be "bent" * Reflections, from subtle reflections on a polished concrete floor to the pure reflection of a silvered mirror * Caustics, as in light that has been focused through a magnifying glass and has made a pattern of brightness on a surface It uses methods such as Metropolis light transport (MLT), spectral light calculus, and virtual camera model. Scene data is stored in

XML Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language and file format for storing, transmitting, and reconstructing arbitrary data. It defines a set of rules for encoding documents in a format that is both human-readable and machine-readable ...

or IGS format. It features

Monte-Carlo Monte Carlo (; ; french: Monte-Carlo , or colloquially ''Monte-Carl'' ; lij, Munte Carlu ; ) is officially an administrative area of the Principality of Monaco, specifically the ward of Monte Carlo/Spélugues, where the Monte Carlo Casino is ...

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 ...

bidirectional path tracing In 3D computer graphics, ray tracing is a technique for modeling light transport for use in a wide variety of rendering algorithms for generating digital images. On a spectrum of computational cost and visual fidelity, ray tracing-based ren ...

and MLT on top of bidirectional path tracing, distributed render capabilities, and progressive rendering (image gradually becomes less noisy as rendering progresses). It also supports

subsurface scattering Subsurface scattering (SSS), also known as subsurface light transport (SSLT), is a mechanism of light transport in which light that penetrates the surface of a translucent object is scattered by interacting with the material and exits the surfa ...

and has its own image format (.igi). It was originally released as freeware until the 2.0 release, when it became a commercial product. The Indigo 3 series introduced features such as realtime editing capabilities, while version 4 of the software adds pure

GPU A graphics processing unit (GPU) is a specialized electronic circuit designed to manipulate and alter memory to accelerate the creation of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display device. GPUs are used in embedded systems, mobi ...

rendering through a vendor neutral

OpenCL OpenCL (Open Computing Language) is a framework for writing programs that execute across heterogeneous platforms consisting of central processing units (CPUs), graphics processing units (GPUs), digital signal processors (DSPs), field-progra ...

path tracing engine.

References

External links

*
Glare Technologies website
Global illumination software Rendering systems 3D rendering software for Linux Proprietary commercial software for Linux {{Mac-software-stub