Ray Tracing: Everything you need to know about this technology

If you enjoy games and are curious to know how they work, you have certainly heard of Ray Tracing. This technology is a lighting technique that brings a realistic look to virtual environments. A quality graphics card can use the Ray Tracing to make the user feel as if they were inside the game. O Ray tracing tries to display the light in the same way as in the real world.

Understand how the Ray Tracing works helps your gaming platform (whether it's a PC or a specific console) to run games at the highest quality level. In this article we will get to know a little more about what it is and how this technique is used in the world of computer graphics and electronic games.

virtual light

Computer graphics may seem like a complicated subject to explain, but believe me, the Ray Tracing it's simpler than it looks. As we mentioned earlier, the technology tries to simulate the way light works in the real world. Instead of creating pre-programmed light for scenes in games, the Ray Tracing traces the path of the simulated light. Or rather, millions of simulated lights, or photons. It is as if, in a painting, the artist draws each ray of light from the scene or landscape to create the closest simulation effect to reality.

Light bounces off objects as it moves and interacts with their properties. For example, if it reflects off a bright green surface, its color may change. This is essentially how light works in real life. A particle of light starts at a point of origin and travels along the path until it interacts with an object, when its path is determined by the object's properties. For example, a dense, black object can absorb light or a mirror can fully reflect it.

The similarity of Ray tracing with real life makes this an extremely realistic 3D rendering technique, making even low-detail games like Minecraft look almost photorealistic under certain conditions. However, there is only one problem: the behavior of light is difficult to simulate. Even new generation consoles like the Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 will have their hardware pushed to the limit to ensure maximum performance with the technology of the Ray Tracing.

Recreating the way light actually works in the world is complicated and resource-intensive, requiring a lot of computing power. Most games that use Ray Tracing use a combination of traditional lighting techniques (called rasterization), and reserve the use of Ray Tracing true only for specific surfaces such as puddles and metals. A great example of this is Battlefield V. You can see the reflection of troops in the water, terrain on planes, and even the reflection of explosions in the paint of a car. The vast majority of modern 3D graphics engines can display quality reflections, but not the level of detail seen in Battlefield V.

The light simulated by Ray Tracing can create much more realistic shadows in dark or brightly lit scenes. For this reason, achieving this same result without the use of technology is extraordinarily difficult. Developers can only “fake it” through the controlled and careful use of previously created light sources. This takes a lot of time and effort, and even then, the result is not always satisfactory.

Some games make full use of the Ray Tracing in its global illumination, applying the technique to the entire scene. However, this is the most computationally expensive approach and needs a modern and powerful graphics card to perform properly. A game that does this is Metro Exodus, even if imperfectly. In the game we can see how light reacts with weapons, surfaces and even tree branches, in a simulation that approaches reality.

For this reason, using the technique of Ray Tracing partially in shadows or reflective surfaces is such a popular alternative. The new technology of DLSS (Deep Learning Super Sampling, “Deep Learning Super Sampling”, in English) of the NVIDIA tries to fill the “holes” that exist in games that use few rays of light for lighting, creating a scene almost entirely made by Ray Tracing. The technique uses sampling of light rays (and the way they behave on surfaces) and, through a little math, generates new rays and reflections in real time at no extra cost to the graphics card.

The hardware behind ray tracing

To handle these implementations, the generation of graphics cards RTX da NVIDIA introduced hardware created specifically for the Ray tracing. The new graphics card architecture uses the RT Colors company to handle the technique in real time. These new cores have much greater processing power than seen in the previous generation, the GTX.

These cores are not strictly necessary for the application of the Ray Tracing, since the effects of the technique can be performed on the graphics cards of the GTX 10 and 16, although they are much less capable than the boards RTX top notch with RT cores. One of the main focuses of the plate line RTX of NVIDIA is precisely in the improvement of the technique of Ray Tracing, with a performance far superior to the series GTX previous.

Because they are not optimized for this purpose, even the most powerful graphics cards GTXLike 1080 Ti, struggle with games with Ray Tracing with resolution above 1080p. already the RTX 2080 Ti, the world's most powerful graphics card with 68 RT cores, is capable of running Battlefield V at 80fps in Full HD. If the player intends to increase the resolution to 4K, however, the frame rate will be reduced. For this reason, RTX cards need to run games at lower framerates to ensure satisfactory performance using ray tracing.

But don't worry, there is a "light" at the end of this tunnel of problems. the method of Ray Tracing da NVIDIA is not the only option available to simulate lighting in virtual environments. There are also post-processing effects. “path tracing” that offer comparable visuals without having the same computational cost. However, the latter still need some adjustments to be used on a large scale by graphics cards.

However, if you're into amazing visuals that get closer and closer to reality, you'll still want a powerful graphics card to do. Ray Tracing, no matter the implementation. The good news? The more popular this technique becomes and the more developers come up with ways to improve it, the wider the range of hardware at more affordable consumer prices.

Put the power of ray tracing into your PC with NVIDIA RTX cards

A NVIDIA has on the market a line of GPUs that support the technology RTX , to bring more realism to your games. The first option we recommend is the GALAX GeForce RTX 2060 Super, a great value card for those starting out in the world of ray tracing. With 8 GB of GDDR6 memory, this model requires a computer with Windows 10, at least 8 GB of RAM and 1,5 GB of storage, a motherboard with a PCIe x16 slot, two free bays in the case and a power supply that has at least 550 W of power, with an 8-pin supplementary power connector. you find the GALAX GeForce RTX 2060 Super from BRL 3.817 in Amazon.

Another recommendation is to Gigabyte GeForce RTX 2070 Super Windforce OC, whose processor is 26% faster than the RTX 2060, with the same 8GB of GDDR6 memory. A differential of this board is the Windforce system, which consists of 3 fans rotating in opposite directions, interspersed. Thus, the flow of hot air is spread to both sides of the board, improving heat dissipation inside the case.

To use this GPU, you need a PC with Windows 10, a minimum of 8 GB of RAM and 1,5 GB of free storage, a motherboard with an available PCIe x16 slot, two free bays in the case and a power supply with at least 650W, with an 8-pin and a 6-pin supplementary power connector. THE Gigabyte GeForce RTX 2070 Super Windforce OC can be found from BRL 4.702 in Amazon.

And if you're looking for maximum performance and realism, we recommend GALAX GeForce RTX 2080 Super WTF, with 8GB of DDR6 RAM. Its use requires the Windows 10 operating system, a minimum of 8 GB of RAM and 1,5 GB of storage, a motherboard with a PCIe x16 slot, two free slots in the case and a power supply with at least 650W, with a power connector. complementary 8-pin and another 6-pin. THE GALAX GeForce RTX 2080 Super WTF can be found at from BRL 6.633 in Amazon.

And you, are you ready for the beauty of ray tracing in games? Which title do you most want to see working with technology? write to our comments!

Source: Trusted Reviews