Apparatus and method for hierarchical beam tracing and packet compression in a ray tracing system

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10204441-B2
Application number	US-201715482704-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 7, 2017
Priority date	Apr 7, 2017
Publication date	Feb 12, 2019
Grant date	Feb 12, 2019

Abstract

An apparatus and method for compressing ray tracing data prior to transmission between nodes. For example, one embodiment of an apparatus comprises: a first node comprising a first ray tracing engine, the first node communicatively coupled to a second node comprising a second ray tracing engine; first compression circuitry coupled to the first ray tracing engine, the first compression circuitry to perform compression on ray tracing data of the first ray tracing engine to produce a first compressed stream of ray tracing data; and interface circuitry to transmit the first compressed stream of ray tracing data from the first node to the second node.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A graphics processing apparatus comprising:
a first node comprising a first ray tracing engine, the first node communicatively coupled to a second node comprising a second ray tracing engine;
first compression circuitry coupled to the first ray tracing engine, the first compression circuitry to perform compression on ray tracing data of the first ray tracing engine to produce a first compressed stream of ray tracing data, wherein the first compression circuitry comprises a lossy compression component to perform lossy compression of a first portion of the ray tracing data, and the first compression circuitry further comprises a lossless compression component to perform lossless compression of a second portion of the ray tracing data, and wherein the lossless compression comprises data and/or commands which, upon execution by the second ray tracing engine on the second node, allows the second ray tracing engine to reconstruct the ray tracing data; and
interface circuitry to transmit the first compressed stream of ray tracing data from the first node to the second node.

2. The graphics processing apparatus as in claim 1 further comprising:
first decompression circuitry coupled to the first ray tracing engine, the first decompression circuitry to perform decompression of a second compressed stream of ray tracing data received from the second node.

3. The graphics processing apparatus as in claim 2 wherein the second node comprises second compression circuitry to generate the second compressed stream of ray tracing data and second decompression circuitry to decompress the first compressed stream of ray tracing data received from the first node.

4. The graphics processing apparatus as in claim 1 wherein the lossy compression comprises converting 32-bit floating point coordinate values to 8-bit integer coordinate values.

5. The graphics processing apparatus as in claim 1 wherein the lossless compression further comprises grouping values and creating implicit rays using applicable metadata.

6. The graphics processing apparatus as in claim 1 wherein the lossless compression further comprises sharing origins among multiple rays.

7. The graphics processing apparatus as in claim 1 wherein the lossless compression further comprises sending implicit rays.

8. A method comprising:
communicatively coupling a first node comprising a first ray tracing engine to a second node comprising a second ray tracing engine;
performing compression of ray tracing data of the first ray tracing engine using first compression circuitry on the first node to produce a first compressed stream of ray tracing data, wherein performing compression of the ray tracing data includes performing lossy compression of a first portion of the ray tracing data, and performing lossless compression of a second portion of the ray tracing data, and wherein the lossless compression comprises data and/or commands which, upon execution by the second ray tracing engine on the second node, allows the second ray tracing engine to reconstruct the ray tracing data; and
transmitting the first compressed stream of ray tracing data from the first node to the second node.

9. The method as in claim 8 further comprising:
performing decompression of a second compressed stream of ray tracing data received from the second node using first decompression circuitry on the first node.

10. The method as in claim 9 wherein the second node comprises second compression circuitry to generate the second compressed stream of ray tracing data and second decompression circuitry to decompress the first compressed stream of ray tracing data received from the first node.

11. The method as in claim 8 wherein the lossy compression comprises converting 32-bit floating point coordinate values to 8-bit integer coordinate values.

12. The method as in claim 8 wherein the lossless compression further comprises grouping values and creating implicit rays using applicable metadata.

13. The method as in claim 8 wherein the lossless compression further comprises sharing origins among multiple rays.

14. The method as in claim 8 wherein the lossless compression further comprises sending implicit rays.

15. A non-transitory machine-readable medium having program code stored thereon which, when executed by a machine, causes the machine to perform the operations of:
communicatively coupling a first node comprising a first ray tracing engine to a second node comprising a second ray tracing engine;
performing compression of ray tracing data of the first ray tracing engine using first compression circuitry on the first node to produce a first compressed stream of ray tracing data, wherein performing compression of the ray tracing data includes performing lossy compression of a first portion of the ray tracing data, and performing lossless compression of a second portion of the ray tracing data, and wherein the lossless compression comprises data and/or commands which, upon execution by the second ray tracing engine on the second node, allows the second ray tracing engine to reconstruct the ray tracing data; and
transmitting the first compressed stream of ray tracing data from the first node to the second node.

16. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 15 further comprising:
performing decompression of a second compressed stream of ray tracing data received from the second node using first decompression circuitry on the first node.

17. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 16 wherein the second node comprises second compression circuitry to generate the second compressed stream of ray tracing data and second decompression circuitry to decompress the first compressed stream of ray tracing data received from the first node.

18. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 15 wherein the lossy compression comprises converting 32-bit floating point coordinate values to 8-bit integer coordinate values.

19. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 15 wherein the lossless compression further comprises grouping values and creating implicit rays using applicable metadata.

20. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 15 wherein the lossless compression further comprises sharing origins among multiple rays.

21. The non-transitory machine-readable medium as in claim 15 wherein the lossless compression further comprises sending implicit rays.

Assignees

• Wald Ingo
• Liktor Gabor
• Benthin Carsten
• Brownlee Carson
• Guenther Johannes
• Amstutz Jefferson D
• Intel Corp

Inventors

• Wald Ingo
• Liktor Gabor
• Benthin Carsten
• Brownlee Carson
• Guenther Johannes
• Amstutz Jefferson D

Classifications

• G06T9/00

  Image coding (bandwidth or redundancy reduction for static pictures H04N1/41; coding or decoding of static colour picture signals H04N1/64; methods or arrangements for coding, decoding, compressing or decompressing digital video signals H04N19/00) · CPC title

• G06T15/06 Primary

  Ray-tracing · CPC title

• G06T15/80

  Shading · CPC title

• G06T15/005

  General purpose rendering architectures · CPC title

• G06T17/10

  Constructive solid geometry [CSG] using solid primitives, e.g. cylinders, cubes · CPC title