CSE168/CSE274: Rendering Algorithms
Spring 2016

Instructor

Henrik Wann Jensen
Office hours: Tuesdays 1:00pm - 1:50pm

Teaching Assistants

Kun Huang: Friday 9am-11am CSE B240A email: kuh004-at-eng.ucsd.edu
Shanmukha Kuchibhotla: Friday 4pm-6pm CSE B275 email: s1kuchib-at-ucsd.edu

Piazza

signup

Lectures

Tuesday and Thursday 2pm-3:20pm, CSB04

Book

Recommended

Peter Shirley et al., "Fundamentals of Computer Graphics", 2nd or later edition, AK Peters 2005 [Errata]

Optional

Useful book on geometry, ray intersections, transformations etc.
Philip Schneider and David Eberly, "Geometric Tools for Computer Graphics", Morgan Kaufmann 2002

More advanced text on global illumination and photon mapping
Henrik Wann Jensen, "Realistic Image Synthesis Using Photon Mapping, AK Peters, 2001

Slightly dated, but still a very comprehensive overview of image synthesis
Andrew Glassner, "Principles of digital image synthesis", Morgan Kaufmann, 1995
Free PDF version of this book.

Course Objective

This course covers algorithms for computer graphics rendering of photorealistic images. We will cover the ray tracing algorithm, shading models, acceleration structures, and global illumination algorithms. There will be a number of assignments focusing on implementing a ray tracer capable of rendering realistic images of fairly complex scenes.

Contents

The ray tracing algorithm, camera models, geometry intersection, geometry tessellation, acceleration structures, shading models, texturing, bump mapping, sampling and filtering, and advanced topics such as Monte Carlo ray tracing.

Grading

This is class is for 4 units.

Assignments

The programming assignments use the Miro base code (compiles on Mac, linux, and windows with visual studio 2015, Miro for visual studio 2013. You may need these files if you compile miro on windows. You need OpenGL and GLUT to compile Miro. To download the base code, you will need to use the UCSD Proxy Server, or one of the ACS managed PCs.

Assignment 0
Assignment 1 (CSE168)
Assignment 1 (CSE274)

Assignment 2 (CSE168)
Assignment 2 (CSE274)
Assignment 3

Models for the assignments

sphere.obj
bunny.zip (contains bunny.obj)
bunny_smooth.zip (contains bunny_smooth.obj with normals)
teapot.obj
cornell_box.obj
sponza.zip (contains sponza.obj)

Useful Resources

Ray Tracing News
Ray Tracing Document (raytrace.pdf)

Schedule

Date Topic Reading Slides
Week 1
March 29 Topics Overview, Introduction to Ray Tracing
Chapter 2,5,6,7 (should be known material), Section 10.1, 10.2 slides
March 31 Introduction to Miro and How to Render spheres Section 10.3, 10.4 slides
Week 2
April 5 Intersection algorithms 2
  slides
April 7 Shading
  slides
Week 3
April 12 Assignment 1 + Texturing   slides
April 14 Procedural texturing   slides
Week 4
April 19 Acceleration Structures 1   slides
April 21 Acceleration Structures 2 BVH paper slides
Week 5
April 26 Acceleration Structures 3 Surface area heuristic slides
April 28 Monte Carlo Ray Tracing 1   slides
Week 6
May 3 Monte Carlo Ray Tracing 2 Chapter on Sampling slides
May 5 Midterm (date may change) 2010 midterm  
Week 7
May 10 Photon Mapping 1 Chapter on Global Illumination slides
May 12 Photon Mapping and Irradiance Caching slides 1 slides 2
Week 8
May 17 Progressive Photon Mapping   slides
May 19 Tone Mapping night slides slides
Week 9
May 24 Advanced Geometry   slides
May 26 Non Photorealistic Rendering   slides
Week 10
May 31 Sampling   slides
June 2 Final project presentations    

Last update: June, 2016