A VLSI System Architecture for High-Speed Radiative Transfer 3D Image Synthesis

Abstract

In this paper we present a VLSI system architecture for high-speed synthesis of 3D images composed of diffusely reflective surfaces. The system consists of two loosely coupled sub-systems. The first sub-system computes the form-factor matrix F. The form-factor computation is based on the hemi-cube approximation technique, where the patch-to-hemi-cube projections are computed by an efficient ray-tracing algorithm. The second sub-system, a multiprocessor Gauss-Seidel iterative system solver, solves the sparse system of radiosity equations (I-AF)b=e. The described system is suitable for VLSI implementation. Pipelined CORDIC processors are used in the first sub-system, and pipelined multiplier/accumulator processors are used in the second sub-system.