Shadows Casting shadows is relatively easy in ray tracing. Once we have found a surface point S, then for each light source, we shoot another ray whose origin V' is just the surface point S, and whose direction W' is the direction toward that light source Li. We want to make sure that the ray misses the object we are starting from, so we move the origin V' of our new ray slightly off the surface. Our "shadow ray" will therefore be: [ V' , W' ] = [ S + ε , Li ] If this shadow ray encounters any other object, then the surface is in shadow at this pixel, and we do not add in the diffuse and specular components of surface reflectance. To the right above is an example of the surface not being in shadow. Just below that is an example of a surface being in shadow, because its light path is blocked by another object. Implementation hint: As you loop through the light sources inside shadeSphere(), form a shadow ray at each iteration of the loop. Test that ray against every sphere in the scene to see whether there is a hit. If the ray has hit any sphere in scene, then don't add in diffuse or specular components from that light source.

Reflection Another great thing about ray tracing is that we can continue to follow the path of a light ray backward from the camera, to model the behavior of mirror reflection. Adapting the technique that we used to calculate the reflection direction R for the Phong reflectance model, but replacing L in that equation by -W (the direction back along the incoming ray): W' = 2 (N • (-W)) N - (-W) we can compute a new ray that starts at surface point S, and goes into that reflected direction. As shown in the figure on the right, we want to offset the origin of this ray a bit out of the surface, so that the ray does not accidentally encounter the object itself. Whatever color is computed by this ray, we mix it into the result of the Phong reflectance algorithm. The result is the appearance of a shaded surface with a mirror finish.

Refraction In the real world many materials, such as oil, water, plastic, glass and diamond, are transparent. A transparent material has an index of refraction which measures how much light slows down as it enters that medium. For example, the index of refraction of water is about 1.333, of glass is about 1.5. The index of refraction of diamond, the substance with the highest known index of refraction, is 2.42. As in the diagram to the right, you can add refraction to your ray tracing by following Snell's law: n1 / n2 = sin(θ2) / sin(θ1) to determine how much the ray should bend as it enters or exits a transparent object. Note that you will need to change your ray tracing model to incorporate refraction. In addition to your initial incoming ray, and any shadow or reflection rays, you also need to add a refraction ray, which starts just inside the surface, and continues inward. Note that if you have ray traced to a sphere, and are now computing where the refracting ray will exit that sphere, you will want to compute the second root of the quadratic equation. Then, after this refracting ray has exited out the back of the transparent sphere, you will want to compute how much it refracts on its way out, and then shoot a ray from there into the scene behind the sphere. In general, you use the results of refraction by mixing the color it returns together with whatever surface color you have computed due to pure reflection or blinn/phong reflectance.

At the end of class we saw a video:

Carlitopolis by Neito, 2005