A Survey of Ocean Simulation and Rendering Techniques in Computer Graphics

This paper presents a survey of ocean simulation and rendering methods in computer graphics. To model and animate the ocean's surface, these methods mainly rely on two main approaches: on the one hand, those which approximate ocean dynamics with parametric, spectral or hybrid models and use empirical laws from oceanographic research. We will see that this type of methods essentially allows the simulation of ocean scenes in the deep water domain, without breaking waves. On the other hand, physically-based methods use Navier-Stokes Equations (NSE) to represent breaking waves and more generally ocean surface near the shore. We also describe ocean rendering methods in computer graphics, with a special interest in the simulation of phenomena such as foam and spray, and light's interaction with the ocean surface

Dynamics of light propagation in spatiotemporal dielectric structures

Propagation, transmission and reflection properties of linearly polarized plane waves and arbitrarily short electromagnetic pulses in one-dimensional dispersionless dielectric media possessing an arbitrary space-time dependence of the refractive index are studied by using a two-component, highly symmetric version of Maxwell's equations. The use of any slow varying amplitude approximation is avoided. Transfer matrices of sharp nonstationary interfaces are calculated explicitly, together with the amplitudes of all secondary waves produced in the scattering. Time-varying multilayer structures and spatiotemporal lenses in various configurations are investigated analytically and numerically in a unified approach. Several new effects are reported, such as pulse compression, broadening and spectral manipulation of pulses by a spatiotemporal lens, and the closure of the forbidden frequency gaps with the subsequent opening of wavenumber bandgaps in a generalized Bragg reflector

A Qualitative and Quantitative Evaluation of 8 Clear Sky Models

We provide a qualitative and quantitative evaluation of 8 clear sky models used in Computer Graphics. We compare the models with each other as well as with measurements and with a reference model from the physics community. After a short summary of the physics of the problem, we present the measurements and the reference model, and how we "invert" it to get the model parameters. We then give an overview of each CG model, and detail its scope, its algorithmic complexity, and its results using the same parameters as in the reference model. We also compare the models with a perceptual study. Our quantitative results confirm that the less simplifications and approximations are used to solve the physical equations, the more accurate are the results. We conclude with a discussion of the advantages and drawbacks of each model, and how to further improve their accuracy

The Iray Light Transport Simulation and Rendering System

While ray tracing has become increasingly common and path tracing is well understood by now, a major challenge lies in crafting an easy-to-use and efficient system implementing these technologies. Following a purely physically-based paradigm while still allowing for artistic workflows, the Iray light transport simulation and rendering system allows for rendering complex scenes by the push of a button and thus makes accurate light transport simulation widely available. In this document we discuss the challenges and implementation choices that follow from our primary design decisions, demonstrating that such a rendering system can be made a practical, scalable, and efficient real-world application that has been adopted by various companies across many fields and is in use by many industry professionals today