Real time rendering of atmospheric scattering and volumetric shadows

Abstract

Real time rendering of atmospheric light scattering is one of the most difficult lighting effect to achieve in\ncomputer graphics. This paper presents a new real time method which renders these effects including volumetric\nshadows, which provides a great performance improvement over previous methods. Using an analytical\nexpression of the light transport equation we are able to render directly the contribution of the participating\nmedium on any surface. The rendering of shadow planes, sorted with a spatial coherence technique, and in the\nsame philosophy than the shadow volume algorithm will add the volumetric shadows. Realistic images can be\nproduced in real time for usual graphic scenes and at a high level framerate for complex scenes, allowing\nanimation of lights, objects or even participating media. The method proposed in this paper use neither\nprecomputation depending on light positions, nor texture memory.