Activity Suggestions
The example render cache application which you can download and run from
the button on the main page, is an excellent vehicle
for exploring and understanding the render cache. To help you get started
with this, we have compile a list of short suggested activities that highlight
particular aspects of the render cache. This list is open-ended and
we encourage you to discover others. Once you have mastered the basics,
you can also download the source to the sample application and ray tracer
and try modifing them to enable further experiments.
I'll first quickly mention three controls that are especially useful for
exploring how the render cache works:
- The Display pull-down box lets you see the output from various
stages in the render cache's processing of each frame.
- The "Freeze Points" allows you to temporarily stop the updating of
the cache of shaded points, so that you can view them from other viewpoints
and at various stages in their processing.
- The "Clear First" option clears the image to black between each frame
so that any pixels that the render cache was unable to estimate show up as
black (otherwise they keep their color from the previous frame).
Basic Render Cache Components
Extended Render Cache Components