Educational Software for Ray Tracing

Ray tracing is a set of algorithms for rendering scenes. It is known for producing high-quality images-and taking equally impressive amounts of time to do it in. However, since the early 1990s, computer graphics professionals have taken a new look at this rendering technology. Ever-improving microprocessors and algorithms may soon make ray tracing the rendering algorithm of choice for interactive computer graphics. Many movies already rely on this physical light simulation for special effects.

We developed the RayViz software to help undergraduate students of computer graphics gain a deeper understanding of the ray tracing algorithm via visualization. RayViz allows students to interactive explore the rays generated to color a pixel in an image.

RayViz v1.0 was Team TinArm's final project for the undergraduate computer science program at Grove City College. It has been released under the LGPL v2.1 as free software.

If you have any questions/comments/feature requests about the RayViz software, please do not hesitate to email Kevin Bensema at kbensema@ucdavis.edu, or post in the sourceforge forums for the project.