Realtime (super fast) Ambient Occulsion.

[Katachi]

They most probably use a (less accurate) approximation of the real AO algorithm. But it looks good :)

[lllab]

they say its some shaderlanguage- i guess directx or ogl like...
it is calculated by the graphiccard.

and it also has realtime shadows- also a feature that OGL is able to. i am sure we will see similar things in v10. formz has realtime shadows in viewport since a year, its nothing absolutly new.

cheers
stefan

[LucentDreams]

yes theres been a few papers aboutt his and such going around, just as there are with real time GI, raltime Caustics etc. We are on the verge of almost all areas being capable in Realtime Engines, but the fact is none of them are truly accurate enough still, and they do add significant hits, yes a single model on a floor will work wel even at insanely high polygon rates, but try adding in a smal house with many objects and realtime shadows and AO will burn you card up fast.

Its nice to see an application already try and integrate this, but I'd say most features like that are still a good two years away from being normal in most apps. Shadows has a few ways of being handled already.

Check out a game for the PS2 called Shadow of the colossus, even though its PS2, it looks much like a next gen game, realtime AO, HDR illumination and effects, Motion Blur, Tonnes of Hair, AI IK engine, and character to character collision and interaction unlike anything seen on current gens before. Truly shows how smart shader writing and polygon handling and such is getting. While much of next gen stuff is simply relying on the new power and spoonfed cabaillities, SCEA proved you can do it all with current systems if you know what your doing.

Check out the ATI demo site, they have demos showing a crowd scene with realtime AO and shadows, its pretty insane. they also have an impressive statue with an SSS effect where as the stature is scaled, the line penetrates further into the model, very impressive stuff.

[helluvapixel]

Yes it is quite fast, the images below took less than a second. All have varying amounts of polygons. Bear in mind it isn't quite as realtime as you'd suspect:

http://www.jase.ca/content/forumpost/steampunk/sp_roadster_engine_07.jpg
http://www.jase.ca/content/forumpost/steampunk/sp_roadster_piston_01.jpg

model courtesy of glen southern:
http://www.jase.ca/content/forumpost/sdm/gs_hex2_sammael.jpg

[helluvapixel]

*** stupid dupe post ***

[Per-Anders]

it's all impressive stuff, but as kai say's it's been going around for a while now.

graphics card acceleration is definitely going to become more important over time for rendering. though this is sure to bring more problems (i.e. do you have the right graphics card, does it support these calls and so on), i suspect most programs will only really implement such features when they become part of the standards such as opengl, cg, sl etc plus for cross platform apps this becomes an even greater problem. ati, nvidia, microsoft and the others will have to stop playing silly buggers and start seriously working together on a single standard, otherwise they'll scupper the possibilities.

[LucentDreams]

yep, the main reason many 3d apps still is not because its not an appealing way to work, but because they also support mac which doenst have direct X, and also has issues with HLSL so no CG either, limits you to ogl2.0 only, which especially in shader land can be very limiting as its often a more difficult language to do things in.

[lllab]

but it would be nice to have in viewport- i dont mean for rendering.

i love the realtime shadows, they also work on more complex houses- see formz. it helps visualizing the space and the relation between oblects in space.

its defenitly not a replacemnet for rendering.

cheers
stefan

[jddog]

but it would be nice to have in viewport- i dont mean for rendering.
i love the realtime shadows, they also work on more complex houses- see formz. it helps visualizing the space and the relation between oblects in space.
Yep I'm agree with what you tell here...
Julien

[RorrKonn]

TrueSpace 7 has a realtime renered engine.
u need a killer 3D card to run it.
I have a GeForse 2 card so can't play with it yet.

http://www.opengl.org (http://www.opengl.org)
http://www.sgi.com (http://www.sgi.com)

RorrKonn
http://www.atomic-3d.com (http://www.atomic-3d.com)
TS 6, LW 7, C4D 9, zBrush 2.

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