A Ray Tracing Engine for Enhancing Realism in Virtual Reality Systems

One of the keys to the potential widespread adoption of Virtual Reality (VR) technology is the development of greater levels of image realism. Electronic Design, a small business in New York State, proposes to investigate a new approach for dramatically advancing VR realism through the development of a high speed graphics engine based on optical ray tracing. An innovative architecture eliminates recursion overhead and provides constant rendering time per polygon, overcoming the major computational hurdles to real-time deployment of ray tracing. The capabilities of the ray tracing engine are not limited to visual image rendering, but can also be used to simulate the behavior of infrared sensors, radar systems, sonar, and radio communications systems. During Phase 1, Electronic Design will prove the feasibility of the proposed ray tracing engine via a software prototype that will benchmark the throughput that can be achieved in first generation hardware. The long term goal is to commercialize a low cost product that plugs into computer workstations and is used to enhance VR or other graphics applications. The proposed approach has been reviewed and endorsed by recognized experts in the VR community with backgrounds in both military and commercial applications.