Ever since the emergence of three-dimensional computer graphics in the early 1960s, graphics specialists have dreamed of creating photorealistic virtual worlds indistinguishable from the real world.
Figure 1. Consumer demand combined with algorithmic artistry and muscled-up hardware have driven computer graphics far toward the long-imagined goal of photorealistic animation. The state-of-the-art animated feature movie Ratatouille, released by Pixar Animation Studios in 2007, was produced by an arsenal of about 850 computers hosting nearly 3,200 processors. The average rendering time for each frame of animation was about 23,000 seconds per frame. Today’s video gamers want the same visual quality—at 60 frames per second. And they are on the road to getting it, as can be seen in the Electronic Arts 2008 action and adventure game Mirror’s Edge, which delivers dazzling interactive play at more than 60 frames per second on personal computers. (The image above from that game was rendered offline with additional resolution to achieve print quality.) The authors review the roadmap to a future in which advances in speed and photorealism finally achieve the goal of perfectly convincing interactive computer graphics in real time.
Image courtesy of EA Digital Illusions Creative Entertainment.
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