Mesostructures GSoC 2008

Introduction

Mesostructures are fine details on the surface and its rendering has become a hot topic in computer graphics. It is chiefly due to the amount of realism and visual effects (like occlusion, self-shadow and correct silhouettes) achieved by it. Techniques most commonly used in games and implemented in most game engines are Normal mapping, bump mapping which are not able produce such rich visual effects. The most traditional technique proposed for rendering fine details was Displacement mapping. But due to the large number of polygons involved, this technique is very slow and no where close to real time. In recent years, this problem is being seen from a different perspective via Per-Pixel displacement mapping. This technique tries to achieve the same visual effects and realism as displacement mapping but does so in pixel domain. In recent years, lots of approaches have been proposed under per-pixel displacement mapping like Relief mapping, View dependent displacement mapping(VDM), Generalized displacement mapping(GDM), cone step mapping, sphere tracing using distance functions, pyramidal displacement mapping to name a few.