RE: [Algorithms] Lightmap Terrain

[Charles B. <cb...@cb...>]

The more I look at real outdoor environments (eg. life) the
more I feel that it may be hopeless to simulate them realistically
on a computer screen.  The problem is the sun.  The sun is so
bright, and so strongly affects our experience outdoors, that you
can't make a realistic outdoor enviroment without a blindingly
bright sun, sharp specular reflections on water and cars, etc.
These are very bright, very high frequency effects that are very
very hard to model.  Also, back-lighting by the sun, such as the
halo around an opaque object, or the glow of the sun through a
tree's leaves (take a look at that, it's amazing, and happens
quite often).  

IMHO this is orders of magnitude more important to visual realism
than radiosity on landscapes.  Diffuse lighting looks reasonable
with just the parrallel light from the sun (properly shadowed,
of course, perhaps with a slower-than-Lambertian angle dependence)
and ambient.

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Charles Bloom    cb...@cb...    http://www.cbloom.com