Pixels Grouping and Shadow Cache for Faster Integral 3D Ray-Tracing

摘要

This paper presents for the first time, a theory for obtaining the optimum pixel grouping for improving the coherence and the shadow cache in integral 3D ray-tracing in order to reduce execution time. A theoretical study of the number of shadow cache hits with respect to the properties of the lenses and the shadow size and its location is discussed with analysis for three different styles of pixel grouping in order to obtain the optimum grouping. The first style traces rows of pixels in the horizontal direction, the second traces similar pixels in adjacent lenses in the horizontal direction, and the third traces columns of pixels in the vertical direction. The optimum grouping is a combination of all three dependant up on the number of cache hits in each. Experimental results show validation of the theory and tests on benchmark scenes show that up to a 37% improvement in execution time can be achieved by proper pixel grouping.