GPU Gems: Programming Techniques, Tips and Tricks for Real-Time Graphics

Chapter 3. Skin in the “Dawn” Demo

Curtis Beeson NVIDIA

Kevin Bjorke NVIDIA

Introduction

“Dawn” is a demonstration that was created by NVIDIA to introduce the GeForce FX product line and illustrate how programmable shading could be used to create a realistic human character, as shown in Figure 3-1. The vertex shaders (described in Chapter 4, “Animation in the ‘Dawn’ Demo”) deform a high-resolution mesh through indexed skinning and blend shapes, and they provide setup for the lighting model used in the fragment shaders. The skin and wing fragment shaders produce both range and detail that could not have been achieved before the introduction of programmable graphics hardware.^[1]

Figure 3-1. Dawn

This chapter discusses how programmable graphics hardware ...