Hidden Surface Elimination on Parallel Processors

Abstract

With the wide availability of general purpose parallel computers, there is a need to reconsider hidden surface elimination (HSE) algorithms with respect to parallel implementation. This paper considers MIMD parallel implementations off our common image space HSE algorithms - recursive subdivision, scan line, painter s, and z-buffer. Their suitability for parallel implementation is investigated and their relative performance in multiprocessor systems is measured using polygonal scene descriptions of between 200 and 2500 polygons. Dependence on the size of scene description is measured and results are extrapolated to larger scene descriptions. It is shown that HSE algorithms may be efficiently parallelised. A distributed z-buffer is shown to be a fast and efficient method of solving HSE problems using parallel computers.