ss_raytracer

A raytracer built in c++

Input file specifications

This raytracer follows the specifications for the final project of CSE167x found here: https://courses.edx.org/courses/course-v1:UCSanDiegoX+CSE167x+2T2018/information/

The input file should be a sequence of lines/commands according to the following rules. The format for a command is: Command Arg1 Arg2 ... ArgN Where command is the command identifier and each parameter is given separated by a single space. Below, the commands are listed with names to understand parameters.

General commands

• Blank line The input file can have blank lines that should be ignored.
• # This is a line of comments. Ignore any line starting with a #.
• size width height: The size command must be the first command of the file, which controls the image size.
• maxdepth depth: The maximum depth (number of bounces) for a ray (default should be 5).
• output filename: The output file to which the image should be written.

Camera

• camera lookfromx lookfromy lookfromz lookatx lookaty lookatz upx upy upz fovy Specifies the camera. The world aspect ratio (distinct from the width and height that determine image aspect ratio) is always 1; a sphere at the center of a screen will look like a circle, not an ellipse, independent of the image aspect ratio.

Geometry

• sphere x y z radius Defines a sphere with a given position and radius.
• tri v1 v2 v3 Create a triangle out of the vertices involved (which have previously been specified with the vertex command). The vertices are assumed to be specified in counter-clockwise order.

Transformations

• translate x y z A translation 3-vector.
• rotate x y z angle Rotate by angle (in degrees) about the given axis.
• scale x y z Scale by the corresponding amount in each axis (a non-uniform scaling).
• pushTransform Push the current modeling transform on the stack.
• popTransform Pop the current transform from the stack. The sequence of popTransform and pushTransform can be used if desired before every primitive to reset the transformation.

Lights

• directional x y z r g b The direction to the light source, and the color.
• point x y z r g b The location of a point source and the colo.
• attenuation const linear quadratic Sets the constant, linear and quadratic attenuations (default 1,0,0).
• ambient r g b The global ambient color to be added for each object (default .2,.2,.2).

Materials

• diffuse r g b specifies the diffuse color of the surface.
• specular r g b specifies the specular color of the surface.
• shininess s specifies the shininess of the surface.
• emission r g b gives the emissive color of the surface.

Example Images

Further Work

There is a lot of potential improvements and missing features in this raytracer. Here is a list of things I am interested in working on:

1. Anti-aliasing via multi-sampling
2. Multithreading to improve performance
3. More shapes: cube/quad/cylinder/disc/plane/etc.
4. Monte Carlo integration
5. Acceleration via space partitioning (think octrees)
6. Transparency
7. Double-sided primitives

Lots more, but those are some achievable options in my current skill range.