creative labs teaches Carmack a thing or two about shadows?

K

kyleb

Veteran
"Working together with id Software, an industry icon, provides Creative with an exciting opportunity to enhance one of the hottest game engines around... We are also pleased with the agreement relating to Creative's patented shadowing technique and id's cutting-edge 3D graphics DOOM 3 engine."
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http://bluesnews.com/cgi-bin/board.pl?action=viewthread&threadid=50329


im guessing it's some 3dlabs tech, but does anyone have any more info on this?
 
Oh my God. That sounds very much like Creative was threatening to sue id software over their shadowing algorithm. That's just so very wrong in so many ways. But it does seem like it was all worked out....
 
Definately sounds like it. Carmack has never seemed so hot about EAX and can't blame him. Sounds like Creative was just trying to get them to add EAX.

Interesting how Creative is putting it in and not id Software ;)
 
Cryect said:
Interesting how Creative is putting it in and not id Software ;)
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Kinda like how they didn't add EAX to UT via official patch but rather through a separate install.
 
Considering that Carmack has always been against software patents, this must make him pretty pissed off... Creative should not try to mess with him, id might strike back with their next engine...
 
The technique known as 'Carmacks reverse' was in fact developed and patented before it was known as Carmacks reverse. Carmack seems to re-discovered it but thats the problem with software patents, you still owe something to someone without even knowing it

If your using reverse stencil shadows in anything then yes, there are legal issues you should talk to a lawyer about.
 
Anyone recals what sound cards were used when first rolling demos were showed from Doom3? ;) ;)



Just a another reason for a problems between iD and Creative.
 
991060 said:
Since when shadow volume is patented?

Do I need to pay money if using it in my demo? :p
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No, not shadow volumes per se. The Creative patent is to do with the idea of testing for being in shadow from "far to near" (aka ZFail rather than ZPass) which then avoids having to deal with the problem with holes when the shadow volume goes through the front clipping plane.
 
MikeC said:
Would you be referring to this e-mail about shadow volumes that Carmack send to NVIDIA's Mark Kilgard back in 2000?
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From that email
There are cases where real, honest volume clipping must take place....
..
Anything that requires finding convex hulls in realtime is starting to
sound like a Bad Idea.

I sweated over this for a while, with the code getting grosser and grosser,
but then I had an idea for a different direction.
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Ironically, there is a really elegant solution to this clipping/capping problem... but it is also patented.
 
Nappe1 said:
Anyone recals what sound cards were used when first rolling demos were showed from Doom3? ;) ;)



Just a another reason for a problems between iD and Creative.
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Philips Acoustic Edge was used at Quakecon 2002.
 
Ironically, there is a really elegant solution to this clipping/capping problem... but it is also patented.
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Sounds interesting; would you mind elaborating or digging up a link? (I've not had much luck with patent searching in the past.)
 
SteveHill said:
Ironically, there is a really elegant solution to this clipping/capping problem... but it is also patented.
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Sounds interesting; would you mind elaborating or digging up a link? (I've not had much luck with patent searching in the past.)
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It was used in the Elan T&L chip that was part of Naomi2 arcade system. The basic idea is that as the clipping is actually being done against the front clip plane, the generated edges are used to construct the cap.
 
Simon F said:
It was used in the Elan T&L chip that was part of Naomi2 arcade system. The basic idea is that as the clipping is actually being done against the front clip plane, the generated edges are used to construct the cap.
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Ah, neat :). Cheers.
 
Well, if you ask me, his little writeup that has been posted at nVidia's site for ages would be reason alone for that patent to be thrown out. Too bad it so damned hard to get a patent thrown out....
 
fighting a software patent law suit is a bitch though, end results are the same, methodolgy is the same but the math behind is different then the patent can go through, thats my understanding. So I guess software patents aren't that effective.
 
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