Coffee, Code & Shaders: Real-Time Rendering Conversations

Today, we're going to talk about this presentation given by Tzu-Mao Li at Pacific Graphics 2025 . In it, he discusses the relevance of classical graphics programming in the face of the generative AI boom. Through several use cases, he shows how traditional methods offer the predictability, control, and scalability that are essential for artists. He also proposes a future where AI acts as a too...

Today, we will talk about an educational video presented by Markitekta , which analyzes the evolution of computer lighting. It covers everything from 1990s rasterization with Toy Story to how Lumen works in Unreal Engine 5 . The video explains fundamental concepts like ray-tracing, path-tracing, and the Monte Carlo approximation. Finally, it shows how these innovations enable the calculation of gl...

Today, we are going to talk about this paper that will be presented at SIGGRAPH ASIA 2026 , where the authors—Jacob Munkberg, Jon Hasselgren, Petrik Clarberg, Magnus Andersson, and Tomas Akenine-Möller—present a technique that decouples shading from screen pixels, saving computational resources and reducing noise when applying Monte Carlo Ray Tracing. Read full paper: https://fileadmin.cs.lth.se/g...

Today, we are going to talk about the presentation given by Shlomi Steinberg and Matt Pharr at EUROGRAPHICS 2026 . In it, they explain how the wave nature of light and its propagation and diffraction of electromagnetic fields are crucial for simulating many phenomena; however, wave simulation is more complex than classic ray-based models. Therefore, in this presentation, they introduce a bilinear...

Today, we will talk about a presentation by Tom Hammersley , Principal Engineer at EA Codemasters , during the Game Developers Conference 2025 . In this talk, he details how they implemented path tracing for F1 25 in less than a year using their in-house Ego engine, unifying various lighting systems into a single algorithm. He also shares some practical solutions for managing thousands of simultan...

This time we will talk about the presentation given by Colin Barré-Brisebois from SEED , the R&D division of Electronic Arts , during the Graphics Programming Conference 2025 . In this talk, he shares his reflections on the department's 10 years of existence, covering both the strategic aspect of balancing high-risk projects with practical applications, and the collaborative culture needed...

Today we are going to talk about this presentation given by Ruslan Kutdosov , Senior Rendering Programmer at Saber Interactive , on behalf of his colleague Kirill Alekseenko (Render Tech Lead) during the Graphics Programming Conference 2025 . In it, they share their experience integrating upscaling techniques such as FSR, DLSS, and XeSS into the current iteration of their engine used for Warhammer...

Today, we will talk about this presentation given by Lucas Miguel Antunes da Silva , Graphics Programmer at Davsh Graphics Programming , during Vulkanized 2026 . He discusses the development of Factions , a voxel-based VR game for Meta Quest 2 and 3 , explaining how they overcame the bandwidth and memory limitations of mobile processors using occlusion and geometry culling techniques directly on t...

Today we will talk about the presentation given by Dennis Gustafson and Gabe Rundlet from Tuxedo Labs during the Graphics Programming Conference 2025 . In it, they explain how the engine's initial design overcame OpenGL's limitations for simulating lighting in fully destructible environments using Shadow Volumes and 3D Bitmaps, as well as their subsequent transition to Vulkan and the use o...

On this occasion, we will discuss the presentation given by Sergey Sharybin , Blender 's Head of Development, during the 2025 Graphics Programming Conference . In it, he speaks about the unified architecture of their path tracer, Cycles, which is capable of running on various CPU and GPU platforms through a micro-kernel structure and a shader virtual machine to improve interactivity for the ar...

Today we will discuss this paper published in  The Journal of Computer Graphics Techniques  by Chase Mayer and Ulf Assarsson . In it, instead of using the traditional Ray Marching method, the authors propose using Newton's Method to locate screen-space intersections. This allows pixels to converge in two to six iterations, drastically reducing the computational load compared to current standar...

On this occasion, we will be discussing the presentation given by Hitoshi Mishima , a Render Engineer at Capcom , during REAC 2025 . In it, he details how they adapted the RE Engine pipeline to integrate Meshlets, enabling the optimization of games with massive, dense environments like Dragon's Dogma and Monster Hunter Wilds . He also covers the use of Visibility Buffers and two-phase occlusio...

Today, we are going to discuss the paper published by NVIDIA's Pascal Gautron, which introduces a technique called  'Hashed Raytraced Ambient Occlusion' (HRTAO) . Unlike traditional screen-space methods, this technique utilizes  multi-resolution spatial hashing  that adapts the level of detail based on camera distance for scene lighting, effectively eliminating visual noise. Read full...

Today, we’re talking about the presentation given by Devansh Maheshwari , a graphics programmer at Supergiant Games , during the 2024 Graphics Programming Conference . In it, he shares the team's achievements and challenges while developing and refining their rendering technology, and how building their own pipeline allowed them to reach their goal of creating unforgettable gaming experiences....

This time, we will discuss the presentation given by Mikkel Gjoel and Mikkel Svendsen from Playdead during the Game Developers Conference 2016 . In it, they talk about the rendering strategies used to create the visual atmosphere of  INSIDE —from the use of blue noise and temporal anti-aliasing for its minimalist aesthetic, to the efficient handling of volumetric fog, water reflections, and shadow...

On this occasion, we will discuss the presentation given by Jalal El Mansouri , Technical Architect at Ubisoft Montreal , during the Game Developers Conference 2016. In it, he talks about how they implemented the material management system for Rainbow Six Siege by grouping draw calls into efficient batches and using unified buffers to optimize the processing of procedural destruction. Watch full p...

Today, we’ll be discussing a talk given by Timo Heinapurola from the game studio Supercell at the Game Developers Conference 2023 . In it, he explains the process of replacing the rendering engine in their biggest hits, like Clash of Clans and Brawl Stars . He covers how they created a more efficient, modern cross-platform abstraction layer for APIs like Metal and Vulkan, and how they used automat...

On this occasion, we will discuss the presentation given by Wannes Vanderstappen , Senior Graphics Programmer at Larian Studios , during the Graphics Programming Conference 2025 . He talks about the transition of their graphics engine from their previous game, Divinity: Original Sin 2 , to their most recent title, Baldur's Gate 3 , featuring a high-fidelity cinematic aesthetic. Watch full pres...

On this occasion, we are going to analyze this paper presented at Pacific Graphics 2025 , which introduces an iterative and efficient method for updating lightmaps. It avoids recalculating the entire lighting from scratch by processing only the residual changes generated when inserting or removing objects using a light transport operator. Read full paper: https://momentsingraphics.de/Media/PG2025/...

Today, we will discuss the paper presented by Christoph Peters at SIGGRAPH ASIA 2025 . In this work, he aims to improve volume rendering fidelity by adapting the jackknife estimation technique, which employs an elegant extension of complex number arithmetic to neutralize bias in light transport through media such as clouds or smoke. Read full paper: https://momentsingraphics.de/Media/SiggraphAsia2...

Today, we’re going to discuss the presentation given at SIGGRAPH 2025 by Thiago Souza , Rendering Technical Director at id Software . He talked about the Global Illumination system developed for their new engine, idTech 8 (used in games like Doom and Indiana Jones ). The system replaces slow, static baking with real-time ray tracing using Cascaded Radiance Volumes, allowing for immediate changes i...

Today we're talking about a 2006 paper that leverages Spherical Harmonics to simplify object visibility and create real-time soft shadows in dynamic settings. By modeling objects as clusters of spheres, it easily handles deformable characters and maintains fluid GPU performance, utilizing spherical harmonic exponentiation for the visibility reconstruction. Read full paper here: https://www.cs....

After all the holiday chaos, we’re finally back; and this time, we'll be talking about the presentation given by  Jasmin Patry , Lead Render Engineer at Sucker Punch Productions, during SIGGRAPH 2021 regarding dynamic indirect lighting, atmospheric volumetric lighting, and tonemapping in the game  Ghost of Tsushima .Whatch full presentation here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GOee6lcEbWg Ori...

To close out the year, before the December festivities begin, we will discuss this paper—a collaboration between Adobe and NVIDIA—which presents a new method for the real-time rendering of glints found in complex materials such as car paint or brushed surfaces. The proposed technique is based on a modification of the microfacet model (such as GGX and Beckmann) and utilizes Russian roulette-based i...

On this occasion, we will discuss this presentation given by Ari Silvennoinen , Fellow Software Engineer at Activision , during the Advances in Real-Time Rendering at SIGGRAPH 2021 , which focuses on the large-scale global illumination system used in games like Call of Duty and Warzone , focusing on aspects such as an adaptive and warped irradiance volume approach to represent lighting in large ma...