Multi-kernel ray traversal for graphics processing units

Thomas Schiffer*, Dieter W. Fellner

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference paperpeer-review

Abstract

Ray tracing is a very popular family of algorithms that are used to compute images with high visual quality. One of its core challenges is designing an efficient mapping of ray traversal computations to massively parallel hardware architectures like modern algorithms graphics processing units (GPUs). In this paper we investigate the performance of state-of-the-art ray traversal algorithms on GPUs and discuss their potentials and limitations. Based on this analysis, a novel ray traversal scheme called batch tracing is proposed. It subdivides the task into multiple kernels, each of which is designed for efficient parallel execution. Our algorithm achieves comparable performance to current approaches and represents a promising direction for future research.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationCommunications in Computer and Information Science
PublisherSpringer Verlag
Pages78-93
Number of pages16
Volume550
ISBN (Print)9783319251165
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2015
Event9th International Joint Conference on Computer Vision, Imaging and Computer Graphics Theory and Applications: VISIGRAPP 2014/VISAPP 2014 - Lissabon, Portugal
Duration: 5 Jan 20148 Jan 2014

Publication series

NameCommunications in Computer and Information Science
Volume550
ISSN (Print)18650929

Conference

Conference9th International Joint Conference on Computer Vision, Imaging and Computer Graphics Theory and Applications
Country/TerritoryPortugal
CityLissabon
Period5/01/148/01/14
Other5th International Special Session of the expert network HCI-KDD at the 9th International Conference on Computer Vision, Imaging and Computer Graphics Theory and Applications, HCI-KDD Group

Keywords

  • Graphics processing units
  • Parallelism
  • Ray tracing
  • SIMT

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • General Computer Science

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