http://blogs.agi.com/pointbreak Thoughts on GFX Thu, 23 Oct 2008 20:53:38 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en To debug lighting, it is handy to visualize per-vertex normals. Traditionally, one would create a vertex buffer with a bunch of lines representing normals and render this after rendering the mesh itself. This works but it is not nearly as simple, or as cool, as using a geometry shader. You can ... http://blogs.agi.com/pointbreak/index.php/2008/10/23/geometry-shader-for-debugging-normals/ As Deron predicted way back in January, our product has been renamed.  What you have come to know as Point Break is now called Insight3D.  Usually developers resist name changes but we're all pretty happy with it.  We hope the name change doesn't cause too much confusion for you.  In ... http://blogs.agi.com/pointbreak/index.php/2008/10/17/product-rename-to-insight3d/ Rendering objects over large distances is common for geospatial programs, and when done incorrectly, the objects may visually jitter.  Here, an object is made up of any combination of triangles, lines, and points, like a 3D model.  The problem becomes more noticeable as the viewer nears the object.  The following ... http://blogs.agi.com/pointbreak/index.php/2008/09/03/precisions-precisions/ Our new text rendering code is 5x faster (in a bad case) than our STK code - and the new code uses the same algorithm! How's that work? Well, we are using the same algorithm but the implementation is vastly different.  In this post, I'll describe the new implementation, which offloads ... http://blogs.agi.com/pointbreak/index.php/2008/08/29/rendering-text-fast/ We just returned from the annual SIGGRAPH conference, and one thing is clear: it's an exciting time to be in computer graphics. There was an overwhelming amount of things to see. The Larrabee, GPU, and OpenGL presentations were among the best in my opinion. http://blogs.agi.com/pointbreak/index.php/2008/08/18/siggraph-2008-trip-report/ Fall recruitment season is only a month away.  Good timing.  Our 3D team is working on lots of interesting problems in the fields of computer graphics and software architecture.  In fact, we have so many interesting things to do that we need your help. Specifically, we’d like to talk to students ... http://blogs.agi.com/pointbreak/index.php/2008/08/06/3d-development-internships/ The alpha version of Point Break is now complete.  For an alpha, it is packed with features, documentation, and examples.  I also expect it is more stable then most alpha software; well over 20,000 lines of unit test code have been hammering on it several times a day for months.  ... http://blogs.agi.com/pointbreak/index.php/2008/06/04/alpha-version-released/ I'll discuss using a bounding sphere for occlusion culling today. The basic idea is that large objects, occluders, are likely to occlude smaller objects in a scene.  In Point Break, an obvious occluder is the Earth, and satellites, ground stations, vehicles, et.al. are objects likely to be occluded.  Occlusion culling ... http://blogs.agi.com/pointbreak/index.php/2008/04/18/horizon-culling/ We're taking a break from Point Break to discuss how STK's Solar Panel Tool calculates its numbers.  STK's Solar Panel Tool is used to estimate the amount of power that solar panels generate at a given time.  If you are unfamiliar with the tool, search for "Solar Panel Tool" in ... http://blogs.agi.com/pointbreak/index.php/2008/04/16/shedding-light-on-the-solar-panel-tool/ Triangulation is the process of decomposing a simple polygon into a set of triangles.  Recently, a customer uncovered a bug with our triangulation algorithm.  The customer defined the boundary of a polygon that would be rendered on the earth.  Our code failed to triangulate the polygon due to a precision ... http://blogs.agi.com/pointbreak/index.php/2008/03/20/triangulation-rhymes-with-strangulation/