Patent Document ID: 10062199
Application ID: 15194207
Patent Status: 1

Claim One:
1. A method for rendering a three-dimensional (3D) scene, the method being performed by a computer system and comprising: receiving computer graphics data defining a 3D scene, the 3D scene including one or more objects; providing a virtual camera at a particular position for capturing a first frame in the 3D scene; performing an initial ray path tracing to identify intersections between a plurality of rays from the virtual camera and each of the one or more objects in the 3D scene, wherein the initial ray path tracing is performed using a plurality of pixels of the virtual camera and one or more light sources; and based on the initial ray path tracing, performing an object analysis for the first frame of the 3D scene, the object analysis comprises: determining whether a first object is visible from the virtual camera at the particular position; and in response to determining that the first object is not visible from the virtual camera at the particular position: counting a first number of indirect ray path intersections between the plurality of rays and the first object; comparing the first number with a first threshold; and based on the first number being less than the first threshold: determining that the first object is to be excluded from a future rendering process using the computer graphics data defining the 3D scene; and identifying the first object as being excluded from the future rendering process.