research-article

Embree: a kernel framework for efficient CPU ray tracing

Authors:

Carsten Benthin,

Gregory S. Johnson,

Manfred ErnstAuthors Info & Claims

ACM Transactions on Graphics (TOG), Volume 33, Issue 4

Article No.: 143, Pages 1 - 8

https://doi.org/10.1145/2601097.2601199

Published: 27 July 2014 Publication History

Abstract

We describe Embree, an open source ray tracing framework for x86 CPUs. Embree is explicitly designed to achieve high performance in professional rendering environments in which complex geometry and incoherent ray distributions are common. Embree consists of a set of low-level kernels that maximize utilization of modern CPU architectures, and an API which enables these kernels to be used in existing renderers with minimal programmer effort. In this paper, we describe the design goals and software architecture of Embree, and show that for secondary rays in particular, the performance of Embree is competitive with (and often higher than) existing state-of-the-art methods on CPUs and GPUs.

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Cited By

Mock AMagnusson MHertzberg J(2025)RadaRays: Real-Time Simulation of Rotating FMCW Radar for Mobile Robotics via Hardware-Accelerated Ray TracingIEEE Robotics and Automation Letters10.1109/LRA.2025.353168910:3(2470-2477)Online publication date: Mar-2025
https://doi.org/10.1109/LRA.2025.3531689
Walker RBarker MMazarico ESun XNeumann GSmith DHead JZuber M(2024)Near-infrared Photometry of the Moon’s Surface with Passive Radiometry from the Lunar Orbiter Laser Altimeter (LOLA)The Planetary Science Journal10.3847/PSJ/ad44675:5(122)Online publication date: 28-May-2024
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Chaity Mvan Aardt J(2024)Exploring the Limits of Species Identification via a Convolutional Neural Network in a Complex Forest Scene through Simulated Imaging SpectroscopyRemote Sensing10.3390/rs1603049816:3(498)Online publication date: 28-Jan-2024
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Index Terms

Embree: a kernel framework for efficient CPU ray tracing
1. Computing methodologies
  1. Computer graphics
    1. Rendering
      1. Ray tracing

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Published In

cover image ACM Transactions on Graphics

ACM Transactions on Graphics Volume 33, Issue 4

July 2014

1366 pages

ISSN:0730-0301

EISSN:1557-7368

DOI:10.1145/2601097

Issue’s Table of Contents

Copyright © 2014 ACM.

Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

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Association for Computing Machinery

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Publication History

Published: 27 July 2014

Published in TOG Volume 33, Issue 4

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Cited By

Mock AMagnusson MHertzberg J(2025)RadaRays: Real-Time Simulation of Rotating FMCW Radar for Mobile Robotics via Hardware-Accelerated Ray TracingIEEE Robotics and Automation Letters10.1109/LRA.2025.353168910:3(2470-2477)Online publication date: Mar-2025
https://doi.org/10.1109/LRA.2025.3531689
Walker RBarker MMazarico ESun XNeumann GSmith DHead JZuber M(2024)Near-infrared Photometry of the Moon’s Surface with Passive Radiometry from the Lunar Orbiter Laser Altimeter (LOLA)The Planetary Science Journal10.3847/PSJ/ad44675:5(122)Online publication date: 28-May-2024
https://doi.org/10.3847/PSJ/ad4467
Chaity Mvan Aardt J(2024)Exploring the Limits of Species Identification via a Convolutional Neural Network in a Complex Forest Scene through Simulated Imaging SpectroscopyRemote Sensing10.3390/rs1603049816:3(498)Online publication date: 28-Jan-2024
https://doi.org/10.3390/rs16030498
Vasile CUlmămei ABîră C(2024)Image Processing Hardware Acceleration—A Review of Operations Involved and Current Hardware ApproachesJournal of Imaging10.3390/jimaging1012029810:12(298)Online publication date: 21-Nov-2024
https://doi.org/10.3390/jimaging10120298
Yilmaz SRomano PChierici LKnudsen EShriwise P(2024)CAD and constructive solid geometry modeling of the Molten Salt Reactor Experiment with OpenMCFrontiers in Nuclear Engineering10.3389/fnuen.2024.13854783Online publication date: 9-May-2024
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Xu KCavalier ABringier BRibardière MMeneveaux D(2024)Virtually measuring layered material appearanceJournal of the Optical Society of America A10.1364/JOSAA.51460441:5(959)Online publication date: 25-Apr-2024
https://doi.org/10.1364/JOSAA.514604
Zhou YHuang TRamamoorthi RSen PYan L(2024)Appearance-Preserving Scene Aggregation for Level-of-Detail RenderingACM Transactions on Graphics10.1145/370834344:1(1-23)Online publication date: 19-Dec-2024
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Chen HMiller BGkioulekas I(2024)3D Reconstruction with Fast Dipole SumsACM Transactions on Graphics10.1145/368791443:6(1-19)Online publication date: 19-Nov-2024
https://doi.org/10.1145/3687914
Barczak JBenthin CMcAllister D(2024)DGF: A Dense, Hardware-Friendly Geometry Format for Lossily Compressing Meshlets with Arbitrary TopologiesProceedings of the ACM on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques10.1145/36753837:3(1-17)Online publication date: 9-Aug-2024
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Meister DKulkarni PVasishta AHarada T(2024)HIPRT: A Ray Tracing Framework in HIPProceedings of the ACM on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques10.1145/36753787:3(1-18)Online publication date: 9-Aug-2024
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