MetalRaytracer

An offline raytracer built on Metal frameworks.

This project was built on MacOS 11.0 Big Sur. Earlier versions of MacOS are not supported.

Previous Work

This project is my CSE 168's course project on a new platform. Details regarding my class project can be found here: CSE 168 Final Project

Input File Format Documentation

Rendering Specification

• size x y Provides the size of the output image.
• maxDepth depth Provides depth for the raytracer.
• output outputName Provides output name for the raytracer.
• camera lookfromx lookfromy lookfromz lookatx lookaty lookatz upx upy upz fov Provides information regarding camera's position and orientation.
• lightsamples number The number of samples we generate per quadlight.
• nee on/off Turns on/off of next event estimation. The default is on, making this a path tracer.

Geometries

• sphere x y z radius defines a sphere with given position and radius.
• vertex x y z provides a vertex.
• tri v1 v2 v3 defines a triangle with given vertices. Vertices are specified using vertex command.

Transformations

• translate x y z translate the current transformation matrix with given distance.
• rotate x y z angle rotate by an angle (degree) about the given axis.
• scale x y z scale with the given amount.
• pushTransform push the current transformation matrix on to a stack.
• popTransform pop a transformation matrix off the stack.

Materials

• diffuse r g b specifies diffuse color.
• specular r g b specifies specular color.
• emission r g b specifies emission color.
• shininess s specifies the shininess of the surface.
• ambient r g b specifies the ambient color. Not recommended.
• roughness r specifies the roughness of the surface. Applies to GGX Microfacet enabled surfaces.

Lights

• directional x y z r g b specifies a directional light with given direction and color.
• point x y z r g b specifies a point light with given position and color.
• quadlight a ab ac rgb Each argument is a 3-d vector.