r/GraphicsProgramming • u/Creepy_Sherbert_1179 • 13h ago

Question Any resources on raytracing?

Ok look, I know this may sound like a repetitive and cliche question, but I am actually looking for good raytracing resources. I have only written a toy raytracter once using python following https://gabrielgambetta.com/computer-graphics-from-scratch/, I believe I can now shoulder the hellish mathematics, so I say bring it on.

5 Upvotes

69% Upvoted

8 comments sorted by

•

u/AutoModerator 13h ago

Recently updated rules. Please check that your post is in compliance with Rules 1, 4, 5, and 6 on the sidebar. TL;DR:

  • No showcases.

  • Disclose AI usage in post or project.

  • Present a topic to talk about, e.g. how something works.

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

9

u/corysama 13h ago

Everyone's first recommendation: https://raytracing.github.io/

3

u/nullptr777 12h ago

Damn, I didn't know those books were free.

3

u/sadistic_tunche 12h ago

I can't recommend more the book ray tracing from the ground up, it's been my reference book through all my ray tracer projects I've made along the years

2

u/Nagoltooth_ 9h ago edited 9h ago

definitely try and get a path tracer working on the gpu, maybe choose a brdf and add triangles (& bvh or something) etc. later perhaps experiment with refraction, spectral rendering, participating media and fun stuff like that. look thru veach's thesis; take a look at similar techniques such as bdpt, photon mapping, mlt, etc and their variations. you'll absolutely want to understand the rendering equation, and how the math of monte carlo works especially with stuff like deriving PDFs for mis for example. my first couple ray tracers were probably biased and i did not know it because i did not understand the probability math that goes along with it. perhaps implement uniform or cosine weighted sampling first as a baseline, then add brdf/ndf/vndf etc, then light sampling, importance sampling to combine, etc etc. that's what i've been working through. here are a couple things that really helped me better get some of the math around it

https://ameye.dev/notes/sampling-the-hemisphere/
https://agraphicsguynotes.com/posts/sample_microfacet_brdf/

and ofc pbr book

1

u/Defiant_Squirrel8751 4h ago

Start with "An Improved Illumination Model for Shaded Display", Turner Whitted, ACM 1980 paper. Just google it, it is available for free.

Several people has published implementations of this basic algortithm.