Randomness
- Physically Based Rendering: From Theory to Implementation
Comprehensive reference on physically based rendering techniques
- Lecture 18: Monte Carlo Rendering (CMU 15-462/662)
An introduction to Monte Carlo ray tracing
- Beyond White Noise for Real-Time Rendering
A good introduction on the use of different types of noise for random number generation, focusing on applications in real time rendering
- Lecture 19: Variance Reduction (CMU 15-462/662)
An overview various variance reduction techniques for Monte Carlo rendering, covering bidirectional path tracing, Metropolis-Hastings algorithm, MIS, stratified Sampling, low-discrepancy sampling, blue noise, photon mapping, and finite element radiosity
- The rendering equation
The classic Kajiya rendering equation paper introduced the "rendering equation" and the path tracing algorithm
- Flavors of Sampling in Ray Tracing
An overview of different sampling strategies used in ray tracing.
- Robust Monte Carlo Methods for Light Transport Simulation
the Academy Award-winning Ph.D. thesis by Eric Veach. It starts from bidirectional light transport algorithms and introduces multiple importance sampling and Metropolis light transport
- Edge-Avoiding À-Trous Wavelet Transform for fast Global Illumination Filtering (2010)
Classic paper introducing a fast and simple filter for ray tracing denoising.
- Using Blue Noise For Raytraced Soft Shadows
Article from the "blue noise guy" talking about how to apply blue noise to raytraced soft shadows
- What is direct lighting (next event estimation) in a ray tracer?
An explanation of direct lighting and next event estimation in ray tracers
- Hash Functions for GPU Rendering (2020)
This paper analyze the hash functions to make recommendations on which hash functions offer the best quality/speed trade-off for the range of needs, from high-performance/low-quality to high-quality/low-performance. It also present a new class of hash tuned for multidimensional input and output that performs well at the high-quality end of this spectrum.
