A description of a simple Ray Tracer (1995) [pdf]

maths.tcd.ie

29 points·laex··8 comments

Everybody should try implementing a ray tracer at least once in their programming career. The math is well-documented, and the wow factor is pretty great.

It also is a rabbit-hole of optimizations and modularity; you can always add on yet-another-cool-thing, and so never become bored. :)

I fully agree, I had written one and eventually ended up using it in a parallel programming class to modify it into a parallel program. It was a lot of fun and the wow factor was definitely there. Since then I've ported it to java when I learned the language. Added features now and then over the years when I wanted to try something new.

The Ray Tracer, as well as the Operating System, is the common feat of the unemployed programmer. What would be neat is if these skills could be transferred into the real world.

How handy is this? I need to get a simple Ray Tracer working by the end of the month for a course. :)

Thanks! heh.

I highly recommend Ray Tracing from Ground Up by Kevin Suffern. The book assumes no prior knowledge.

http://www.raytracegroundup.com/

I took the raytracing course taught by Kevin at UTS. It was great.

Thank you! This is really great stuff.

Totally unrelated, I noticed I got downvoted. I hope it didn't seem like I'm going to cheat or anything. I was just looking for good reference material.

I also found the description of the '00 ICFP contest a really good and short reference (take a look at chapter 3).

http://www.cs.cornell.edu/icfp/task.htm

simple.

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