path tracing using the ar350 processor
The AR350 is a ray tracing processor developed by Advanced Rendering Technologies. By using AR350 processors arrays, the PURE and RenderDrive products achieve high performances in Ray Tracing based rendering. In this paper we present an extension of their capabilities to global illumination computation by implementing Path Tracing based methods. Because the core program of these rendering appliances is not modifiable but driven by a Render-Man compliant interface, we achieve this goal by writing dedicated shaders. We obtain better indirect illumination than with the use of standard shaders and keep high performances by the exclusive use of the AR350 processors array for all intersection tests.
path tracing ar350 global illumination hardware implementation renderman