Shader Enhancements

BRL-CAD's shader system is custom developed for the librt raytracer. Shaders are currently coded in C and explicitly added to the active shader list. A question of interest is whether we can utilize work being done for other open source raytracing shader systems to improve the flexibility of BRL-CAD's shader system and take advantage of shaders developed for other systems.

A proposal should outline what changes are proposed to BRL-CAD's current shaders. Initial stages would involve either writing the shader bridge in liboptical or designing a new approach (remember though, all existing shader functionality in the current system must be preserved, even if it is re-implemented in some fashion. Be careful about biting off more than you can achieve in a summer.)

References

This task will require a fair bit of background research in order to put together a compelling proposal - interested students should study BRL-CAD's shader system to determine how it works, and then look at other open source, license compatible systems to see what they may offer. Candidates include:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shading_language
• Sony's Open Shader Language (OSL): http://opensource.imageworks.com/?p=osl
• Pixie: http://www.renderpixie.com/
• Yafaray: http://www.yafaray.org/

OSL is of particular interest because it is developed specifically for raytracing systems.

Code of relevance:

• src/liboptical
• include/optical.h

Documentation of relevance:

• Introduction to MGED
  • Do lessons 1-7 minimum
• Principles of Effective Modeling
  • Read Appendix B
• BRL-CAD's optical shaders
  • Provides a broad survey from a developer's perspective

Requirements

• Familiarity with C/C++