Mathias Schwengerer
Inverse Method for Baked Lighting
[Thesis]

Information

Abstract

In this thesis, we present a novel application of inverse rendering through the use case of estimating light source parameters from baked lighting information bundled with a 3D scene. As input, we use a scene file that contains the geometry and the baked lighting information of a scene. The extracted scene information is then used to estimate a lighting configuration. With the resulting lighting configuration, it is possible to reproduce a closely matched shading of the scene.

Because of hardware limitations, real-time rendering applications such as video games have historically provided limited realism in terms of lighting. Baked lighting was a common method used to illuminate the scene under real-time constraints. Nowadays, hardware-supported ray tracing enables dynamic lighting and global illumination in real time. Our method aims to build a physically based lighting setup that comes as close to the baked lightmaps as possible. This reconstructed lighting setup allows the relighting of the scene through advanced rendering effects such as dynamic lighting, indirect lighting, reflections, refractions, and soft shadows. This could facilitate the process of bringing classic games up to modern standards, especially when the original data is unavailable or lost.

This project relies on a differentiable rendering framework under development in the Rendering and Modeling Group (Prof. Wimmer, TU Wien). The goal of this bachelor's thesis is to evaluate and demonstrate the capabilities of an inverse rendering method built on this system. Specifically, we aim to estimate light sources from existing precalculated lightmaps used in the game Quake III Arena. For this purpose, our first step is to extract the geometry and lightmaps from a scene file, import the data into the rendering framework, and then implement a suitable optimization scheme to construct new light sources. With these new light sources, we can render the scenes using ray tracing and global illumination to achieve realistic lighting effects, including indirect lighting, accurate reflections, and soft shadows.

Additional Files and Images

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Weblinks

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BibTeX

@bachelorsthesis{Schwengerer_Mathias-2022-BGL,
  title =      "Inverse Method for Baked Lighting",
  author =     "Mathias Schwengerer",
  year =       "2023",
  abstract =   "In this thesis, we present a novel application of inverse
               rendering through the use case of estimating light source
               parameters from baked lighting information bundled with a 3D
               scene. As input, we use a scene file that contains the
               geometry and the baked lighting information of a scene. The
               extracted scene information is then used to estimate a
               lighting configuration. With the resulting lighting
               configuration, it is possible to reproduce a closely matched
               shading of the scene.  Because of hardware limitations,
               real-time rendering applications such as video games have
               historically provided limited realism in terms of lighting.
               Baked lighting was a common method used to illuminate the
               scene under real-time constraints. Nowadays,
               hardware-supported ray tracing enables dynamic lighting and
               global illumination in real time. Our method aims to build a
               physically based lighting setup that comes as close to the
               baked lightmaps as possible. This reconstructed lighting
               setup allows the relighting of the scene through advanced
               rendering effects such as dynamic lighting, indirect
               lighting, reflections, refractions, and soft shadows. This
               could facilitate the process of bringing classic games up to
               modern standards, especially when the original data is
               unavailable or lost.  This project relies on a
               differentiable rendering framework under development in the
               Rendering and Modeling Group (Prof. Wimmer, TU Wien). The
               goal of this bachelor's thesis is to evaluate and
               demonstrate the capabilities of an inverse rendering method
               built on this system. Specifically, we aim to estimate light
               sources from existing precalculated lightmaps used in the
               game Quake III Arena. For this purpose, our first step is to
               extract the geometry and lightmaps from a scene file, import
               the data into the rendering framework, and then implement a
               suitable optimization scheme to construct new light sources.
               With these new light sources, we can render the scenes using
               ray tracing and global illumination to achieve realistic
               lighting effects, including indirect lighting, accurate
               reflections, and soft shadows. ",
  month =      aug,
  address =    "Favoritenstrasse 9-11/E193-02, A-1040 Vienna, Austria",
  school =     "Research Unit of Computer Graphics, Institute of Visual
               Computing and Human-Centered Technology, Faculty of
               Informatics, TU Wien ",
  keywords =   "lighting, inverse rendering, optimization",
  URL =        "https://www.cg.tuwien.ac.at/research/publications/2023/Schwengerer_Mathias-2022-BGL/",
}