Point-Based Global Illumination Directional Importance Mapping

Point-based global illumination (PBGI) is a popular technique used in film production to render complex scenes. It thrives by efficiently handling soft lighting effects caused by diffuse and glossy indirect illumination. Furthermore, it elegantly incorporates direct illumination from distant image-based environment-maps. However, PBGI’s efficiency degrades rapidly as the high dynamic-range (HDR) nature of the illumination increases or/and as the glossy reflections become sharper. In this talk, we introduce an improved PBGI cut picking algorithm, which uses directional importance mapping. We show that this technique drastically improves quality and render time when solving these difficult illumination effects.