Physically Based Rendering
Matt Pharr, Greg Humphreys
17 people recommended it in 9 threads, 2013–2022.
What people on Hacker News said
It uses a literate-programming style which is neat. It's about path-tracing which is similar to ray-tracing but can give an unbiased approximation to the rendering equation (which is a reasonably accurate model of "everyday" optics.)
"Physically Based Rendering" by Pharr and Humphreys is a good intro to this way of doing things.
"Physically Based Rendering" walks you through the theory behind, and the implementation of, a photo-realistic rendering system (not real-time). An extremely thorough guide to ray tracing.
Physically Based Rendering – From Theory to Implementation doesn't necessarily have the reader build a project, but it explains its reference implementation very well, and you could go ahead and write your own in parallel based on it.
Whilst not realtime rendering - Physically Based Rendering (Pharr, Jakob & Humphreys) http://www.pbrt.org/ is great for understanding what people are trying to achieve, without being distracted by very detailed optimisation etc.
Because it covers most, if not all, the maths required to do PBR right. If you are interested in graphics, this book MUST be on your shelf.
Physically Based Rendering was a great primer into linear algebra, statistics, sampling theory and whatnot.
Physically Based Rendering by Pharr and Humphreys. Excellent book on modern ray tracing that is a literate program. It's an amazing piece of work (even won an oscar!)
Physically Based Rendering is basically a complete guide to building a modern physically based rendering engine (it even won an Academy Award)
Where it comes up
- Ask HN: What are the best textbooks in your field of expertise? 2018 · 4 recommendations
- Ask HN: What are the best books on modern computer graphics? 2017 · 4 recommendations
- Ask HN: What are some books where the reader learns by building one project? 2017 · 3 recommendations
- Ask HN: Which books do you consider real gems in your field of work/study? 2022 · 1 recommendation
- Ask HN: The book that did it for you in math and/or CS? 2022 · 1 recommendation
- Ask HN: What are some books where the reader learns by building projects? 2020 · 1 recommendation
- Ask HN: What's the best programming book you've read recently? 2014 · 1 recommendation
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