Course Description

Advances in real-time graphics research and the ever-increasing power of mainstream GPUs and consoles continue to generate an explosion of innovative algorithms suitable for fast, interactive rendering of complex and engaging virtual worlds. Every year, the latest video games employ a vast variety of sophisticated algorithms to produce ground-breaking 3D rendering that pushes the visual boundaries and interactive experience of rich environments.

 

The first part of the course includes speakers from the makers of several innovative game companies, such as Bungie, Intel, and Avalanche, as well as game-oriented research from Chalmers University of Technology. Topics covered in the first part include practical methods of real game-rendering pipelines and shipping game engines, order-independent transparency and novel GPU-friendly data structures, programmable blending, and clustered shading for lighting complex scenes in real-time.

 

The second part of the course includes speakers from the state-of-the-art games, such as Crytek, CD Project RED, and Studio Gobo. Topics covered in the second part of the course include practical methods of real game-rendering pipelines and shipping game engines, real-time radiosity solution targeted toward games, efficient rendering of ocean water, character pipeline, and novel methods for antialiasing, and variety of other graphics gems from shipping engines. We will complete the day with a panel amongst all of the speakers for parts I and II focused on practical game production pipelines and challenges for cross-generation development.

 

This is the course to attend if you are in the game development industry or want to learn the latest and greatest techniques in real-time rendering domain!

 

 

Syllabus

Advances in Real-Time Rendering in Games: Part I

TUESDAY, JULY 23, 2013 - 9:00AM TO 12:15PM | Anaheim Convention Center, Ballroom AB

Advances in Real-Time Rendering in Games: Part II

TUESDAY, JULY 23, 2013 - 2:00PM TO 5:15PM | Anaheim Convention Center, Ballroom AB

 

 

Advances in Real-Time Rendering in Games: Part I

TUESDAY, JULY 23, 2013 - 9:00AM TO 12:15PM | Anaheim Convention Center, Ballroom AB

 

09:00 am

Natalya Tatarchuk (Bungie)

Welcome!

 

09:10 am

Natalya Tatarchuk (Bungie)

MYTHIC SCIENCE FICTION IN REAL-TIME: DESTINY RENDERING ENGINE

 

10:10 am

Marco Salvi (Intel)

PIXEL SYNCHRONIZATION: SOLVING OLD GRAPHICS PROBLEMS WITH NEW DATA STRUCTURES

 

11:00 am

Emil Persson (Avalanche), Ola Olsson (Chalmers University of Technology)

PRACTICAL CLUSTERED DEFERRED AND FORWARD SHADING

 

12:00pm

GENERAL Q&A

 

Advances in Real-Time Rendering in Games: Part II

TUESDAY, JULY 23, 2013 - 2:00PM TO 5:15PM | Anaheim Convention Center, Ballroom AB

 

 

02:00 pm

Natalya Tatarchuk (Bungie)

Welcome Back!

 

02:05 pm
Balazs Torok, Krzysztof Krzy (CD Projekt RED)

THE REDENGINE 3 CHARACTER PIPELINE

 

03:05 pm

Huw Bowles (Studio Gobo)

OCEANS ON A SHOESTRING: SHAPE REPRESENTATION, MESHING AND SHADING

 

03:50 pm

Tiago Sousa (Crytek)

GRAPHICS GEMS FROM CRYENGINE 3

 

4:50 pm

Natalya Tatarchuk, Marco Salvi, Emil Persson, Ola Olsson, Balazs Torok, Krzysztof Krzy, Huw Bowles, Tiago Sousa

GAME DEVELOPER ROUND TABLE: PRACTICAL RENDERING PIPELINES FOR GAME ENGINES AND CHALLENGES FOR CROSS-GENERATION DEVELOPMENT

 

05:15 pm

Natalya Tatarchuk

CLOSING REMARKS

 

 

 

MYTHIC SCIENCE FICTION IN REAL-TIME: DESTINY RENDERING ENGINE

 

Abstract: In this talk, the author will present the driving concepts and design principles for the upcoming AAA title 'Destiny', describe the new engine developed to bring this game to life focusing on several key technologies that have helped shape the visuals for the game. Following that, the author will then turn towards research needs that the game titles are facing going forward, with focus on relevant technologies and practical pipelines.

Presenters:

Natalya Tatarchuk

Authors:

Natalya Tatarchuk, Chris Tchou, Joe Venzon

Affiliation:

Bungie

Bios:

Natalya Tatarchuk is an Engineering Architect currently working on state-of-the art next-gen rendering engine and game graphics for the upcoming Bungie game 'Destiny'. Previously she was a graphics software architect and a project lead in the Game Computing Application Group at AMD Graphics Products Group (Office of the CTO) where she pushed parallel computing boundaries investigating innovative real-time graphics techniques. Additionally, she had been the lead of ATI’s demo team creating the innovative interactive renderings and the lead for the tools group at ATI Research. She has published papers and articles in various computer graphics conferences and technical book series, and has presented her work at graphics and game developer conferences worldwide.

 

Materials:
(Updated August 11th, 2013)

PowerPoint Slides (525 MB)

PDF Slides (15 MB)

 

 

 

 

PIXEL SYNCHRONIZATION: SOLVING OLD GRAPHICS PROBLEMS WITH NEW DATA STRUCTURES

Abstract: In this session, we will introduce a new synchronization primitive for pixel shaders that enables a whole new way of attacking graphics problems on the GPU. The new method is easy to use, requires a fixed amount of memory and provides stable and consistent performance.


Several applications will be detailed and demonstrated in real-time, including programmable blending, single pass depth peeling, order-independent transparency and deep shadow maps.

 

Presenter:

Marco Salvi (Intel)

 

Bios:

Marco Salvi is a Research Lead focusing on new graphics hardware & software algorithms and architectures at Intel. Prior to joining Intel Marco was responsible for architecting advanced graphics engines, performing low-level optimizations and developing new rendering techniques for PC and console games. Marco has a M.S. in Physics from the University of Bologna (2001).

 

Materials:
(Updated August 11th, 2013)

Slides (PDF, 1.3 MB)

 

PRACTICAL CLUSTERED DEFERRED AND FORWARD SHADING

Abstract: Efficient and flexible lighting remain a challenge in modern game engines. Clustered Shading [Olsson et. al. 2012] is a new lighting technique that offers compelling advantages of previous methods such as Tiled Deferred and Forward+. It scales better with complex scenes, while also offering more flexibility and fewer hassles. It is a unified lighting solution that works well with transparency, MSAA, custom material and lighting models, without requiring extra passes or even necessarily a pre-z pass.


This session will introduce the latest academic research on this technique, as well as the adapted version of the technique that is currently in production at Avalanche Studios. Key differences between the implementations and their implications will be discussed.

Presenters:

Emil Persson (Avalanche),  Ola Olsson (Chalmers University of Technology)

Bios:

Emil Persson is the Head of Research at Avalanche Studios, where he is conducting forward-looking research, with the aim to be relevant and practical for game development, as well as setting the future direction for the Avalanche Engine. Previously, Emil was an ISV Engineer in the Developer Relations team at ATI/AMD. He assisted tier-1 game developers with the latest rendering techniques, identifying performance problems and applying optimizations. He also made major contributions to SDK samples and technical documentation.


Ola Olsson is currently a PhD student at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg, Sweden. He's a member of the Computer Graphics group, and spends most of his time these days forcing pixels into boxes of various shapes and sizes. His primary research focus is algorithms for managing and shading thousands of lights in real time, resulting in several influential publications on Tiled and, later, Clustered Shading. Before becoming a PhD student, Ola was a games programmer for around 10 years with roles ranging from game-play programmer on 'Ty the Tasmanian Tiger', to lead rendering programmer on 'Race Pro'.

 

Materials:
(Updated August 11th, 2013)

Part I: Introduction to Clustered Shading (PowerPoint Slides, 26 MB)

Part II: Practical Implementation at Avalanche (PowerPoint Slides, 9 MB)

 

 

THE REDENGINE 3 CHARACTER PIPELINE

Abstract: In The Witcher 2 we were using a DirectX 9 based deferred renderer to support a massive world filled with exciting characters and fearsome monsters. These elements are key to a mature story driven RPG. This pipeline had a lot of restrictions, some of them caused by the hardware of the target platforms some of them just results of time constraints.

 

Now we are making the third iteration of our engine, we learned a lot from the development process of the previous ones and we have a lot of new ideas. Additionally to this we released our editor to the public and we got lots of feedback from the community. Assembling all this information we set out to create a new character pipeline for rendering and animating humans, animals and monsters in our games.

 

In our talk we first give an overview of the character pipeline used in the production of The Witcher 2 detailing the problems and the solutions that we used. We talk about the shaders that we used, the budgets that we set for our artists, the specialties of the lighting of characters especially in cutscenes and finally the animations and mimics that make those characters really believable.

 

We briefly talk about the differences between the PC and Xbox 360 in terms of our characters both from the rendering and the animation point of view, the challenges of making this really complex system run on a much more constrained platform. In the main part of the talk we present our new system that utilizes DX11 and Forward+ rendering to achieve much better results. We talk specifically about hair simulation and rendering, skin shading with a completely revised mimics animation system. We share details about how the animations get from our motion capture studio into the game and how we create the animations for monsters and animals. Furthermore we talk about the difficulties of creating a consistent lighting and environment system with so many features created specifically for characters.


At the end of the talk we provide some ideas for further development of these features.

 

Presenters:

Balázs Török (CD Projekt RED ), Krzysztof Krzyscin (CD Projekt RED)

Bio:

Balázs Török, Lead Engine Programmer. Over 5 years of experience in the games industry. Started as a junior in Eidos Hungary, on the Battlestations: Pacific project where he quickly proved himself to be valuable member of the team. Then went to Digital Reality where he became a senior while building a data driven multithreaded render engine that supported SkyDrift and Bang Bang Racing. He started working in CD Projekt RED after the Witcher 2 PC release, as an Xbox 360 specialist, and took his part from the Witcher 1 MAC version also. Right now works as lead of the newly formed engine team where he defines the future of the engine that was used to make one of the best looking games of the current generation.


Krzysztof Krzyscin, Lead Technical Artist. Krzysztof started his development adventure with small indie games, worked also on the first Witcher and on a few unannounced Star Wars universe games. He works at CD Projekt RED since 2009, started as Environmental Artist, and right now he is in charge of all technical matters covering all projects. Krzysztof specializes in new tools, R&D, optimizations and simulations.

 

Materials:
(Updated August 11th, 2013)

PowerPoint Slides (26 MB)

 

 

OCEANS ON A SHOESTRING: SHAPE REPRESENTATION, MESHING AND SHADING

Abstract: This talk will cover the current state of the art and introduce new techniques for ocean rendering. It will start by comparing some different shape representations. A number of simple improvements to existing representations will be presented, and then a new procedural representation will be described that allows efficient height queries. Next, techniques for meshing will be discussed, and a new 'Pinned Grid' meshing technique will be described that significantly reduces aliasing. Finally, our experiences with surface shading will be described and our final shipping ocean shader will be presented.

 

Presenter:

Huw Bowles (Studio Gobo)

Bio:

Huw Bowles is a graphics developer and researcher at Studio Gobo, a boutique developer in Brighton/UK. He has previously worked for Disney Research and did applied real-time rendering research at Black Rock Studio/Disney Interactive Studios.

 

Materials:

(Updated August 11th, 2013)

PowerPoint Slides (248 MB)

 

 

GRAPHICS GEMS FROM CRYENGINE 3

Abstract: This lecture will cover rendering topics related to Crytek’s latest engine iteration, the technology which powers titles such as Ryse, Warface, and Crysis 3. Among covered topics, the speaker will present SMAA 1TX: an update featuring a robust and simple temporal antialising component; performant and physically-plausible camera related post-processing techniques such as motion blur and depth of field will also be covered.

Presenter:

Tiago Sousa (Crytek)

Bio:

Tiago Sousa is Crytek's R&D Principal Graphics Engineer, where he has worked for over a decade on all engine versions, shipped game titles such as Far Cry, Crysis 1 (PC + Consoles), Crysis 2, and Crysis 3. He has also given a helping hand to ongoing projects such as Warface, Ryse, and other undisclosed projects. You can follow him on twitter @Crytek_Tiago

 

Materials:

(Updated August 11th, 2013)

PowerPoint Slides (32 MB)

 

 

 

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