Rendering Display hardware

[pat777]

Wouldn't it be hard to render display hardware? I mean, each pixel will have to be a small light source so you could end up using millions of light sources.

 

[KimB]

Nah. As usual in 3D, you'd just use tricks. The actual emitted light from display hardware is typically emitted in almost all direcitions pretty strongly, so you could just approximate it with a single colored light at the center of the screen (this approximation would only break down when very close to the screen). The color and brightness of this light would be the average color for the screen during that frame, so you'd probably want to do some pre-processing to have the average color available for all times.

 

[Mintmaster]

I think auto-mipmapping is fast enough that you don't need to pre-process (just choose the bottom 1x1 mip level). That way you could have a person playing a computer game in the dark and his body would light up fairly realistically.

Although why you want to play a computer game of someone playing a computer game is beyond me...

 

[KimB]

Although why you want to play a computer game of someone playing a computer game is beyond me...

...but seriously, imagine a DOOM3 scenario, where it's a research laboratory. I think it'd be a neat effect to have a dim room with a lit screen being the only lightsource for a game like that...

Regardless, I don't think auto mipmap generation is fast enough that you'd want to recalculate every frame, potentially for multiple displays, not when it's something that could easily be precalculated.

 

[Mintmaster]

Although why you want to play a computer game of someone playing a computer game is beyond me...

Actually, I played "Willy Beamish" a good decade or so ago, and you could make the character practice for a video game competition.

...but seriously, imagine a DOOM3 scenario, where it's a research laboratory. I think it'd be a neat effect to have a dim room with a lit screen being the only lightsource for a game like that...

Yeah, good idea. Would really add to the mood.

Regardless, I don't think auto mipmap generation is fast enough that you'd want to recalculate every frame, potentially for multiple displays, not when it's something that could easily be precalculated.

For a precalculated display sequence, sure. With the bandwidth of today's cards, though, auto mipmap generation is plenty fast. Developers occasionally do that even in today's games for dynamic cube-map reflections without horrible texture aliasing.