Multi-kernel ray traversal for graphics processing units
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.
