Patent ID: 7969438

Claim:
A computer enabled method of animation, comprising the acts of: providing an image depicting at least one object; storing in a computer readable memory a plurality of depth values of each pixel of the image from a position of a light source, thereby forming a multilayer depth map; storing in the computer memory an opacity or translucency value along with each of the plurality of depth values of each pixel in the multilayer depth map, thereby forming a multilayer translucent shadow map; tracing a projected light ray against multilayer translucent shadow map; performing an intersection test of each traced light ray to define at least one shadow in the image, as cast by the light ray; wherein for each pixel there is provided a list of the layers of the multilayer depth map, each layer having a depth of the first samples in the layer, an accumulated opacity of all the samples in the layer, and a count of samples in the layer; wherein the intersection test includes computing in a processor an accumulated visibility along each of the traced light rays using the multilayer translucent shadow map.