Patent Document ID: 7978204
Application ID: 11412406
Patent Status: 1

Claim One:
1. A method, including steps of at a controlling device, assigning a set of objects to be rendered; distributing those objects to a set of rendering devices; at each rendering device, (1) computing an image in response to an assigned object, the computing of the image including intercepting a plurality of first blending operations and converting the first blending operations to a plurality of second blending operations, and the image including a set of pixels, each pixel having an α-value, (2) computing multiple overlapping images, (3) using a graphics processor to blend those images; wherein each rendering device spoofs, utilizing the plurality of second blending operations, the α-value of each pixel of a rendering plane associated with the assigned object with a pixel feature other than opacity, whereby the graphics processor delivers an α-value correctly representing a valid transparency value while still delivering correct color values, for each pixel of the rendering plane associated with the assigned object; whereby the images produced by each rendering device include transparency information sufficient to combine those images using transparency blending; wherein each of the rendering devices includes an associated general-purpose processor and the graphics processor separate from the associated general-purpose processor.