Real-Time Shader Programming

Part II

Pixel Shader Reference

QUICK OVERVIEW

Just as vertex shaders operate on a single vertex, pixel shaders operate on a single pixel. Pixel shaders’ instructions break down into two categories: those that work on the color and alpha blending and those that work on texture addressing. Generally you can perform a color and/or alpha blending operation or a texture addressing operation with a single pixel shader instruction.

While vertex shaders are straight forward, pixel shaders are a bit more idiosyncratic since they more closely mimic the underlying hardware, and the hardware is evolving. Pixel shader versions 1.0 though 1.3 tend to show the influence of hardware manufactured by NVIDIA, while version 1.4 exposes the way the ATI hardware ...