Revectorization‐Based Soft Shadow Mapping

In this paper, we present revectorization‐based soft shadow mapping, an algorithm that enables the rendering of visually plausible anti‐aliased soft shadows in real time. In revectorization‐based shadow mapping, shadow silhouettes are anti‐aliased and filtered on the basis of a discontinuity space. By replacing the filtering step of the theoretical framework of the percentage‐closer soft shadow algorithm by a revectorization‐based filtering algorithm, we are able to provide anti‐aliasing mainly for near contact shadows or small penumbra sizes generated from low‐resolution shadow maps. Moreover, we present a screen‐space variant of our technique that generates visually plausible soft shadows with an overhead of only ∼23% in processing time, when compared to the fastest soft shadow algorithms proposed in the literature, but that introduces shadow overestimation artefacts in the final rendering. In this paper, we present revectorization‐based soft shadow mapping, an algorithm that enables the rendering of visually plausible anti‐aliased soft shadows in real time. In revectorization‐based shadow mapping, shadow silhouettes are anti‐aliased and filtered on the basis of a discontinuity space. By replacing the filtering step of the theoretical framework of the percentage‐closer soft shadow algorithm by a revectorization‐based filtering algorithm, we are able to provide anti‐aliasing mainly for near contact shadows or small penumbra sizes generated from low‐resolution shadow maps. Moreover, we present a screen‐space variant of our technique that generates visually plausible soft shadows with an overhead of only ∼23% in processing time, when compared to the fastest soft shadow algorithms proposed in the literature, but that introduces shadow overestimation artefacts in the final rendering.