Thread: The latest version DirectX 10.1

No discussion on the future of graphics can ever be complete without discussing the MicrosoftAPI for graphics developers: Direct X. The latest version DirectX 10.1 comes with a host of changes over the revolutionary DirectX 10, released in parallel with Vista. One of the main improvements is the improved access to shader resources. In particular, better control when reading back samples from multi-sample antialiasing. Along with this, the ability to create customized downsampling filters is also available.

New formats for render targets which support blending mean that render targets can now be blended independently of one another. Direct3D 10.1 has improvements in shadow filtering capabilities within the API but we shall have to wait and see how well developers can use this in their future apps. core processors. So, it will allow for higher performance in multi-core systems. The number of calls to the API when drawing and rendering reflections and refractions (two commonly used features in modern game titles) have been reduced in Direct3D 10. I, which should make for some nice performance boosts. Finally,another oft-used feature, cube mapping, now comes with the ability to use an indexable array for handling cube maps.



One of the major additions that would impact image quality in DirectX I O.J is the introduction of32-bit floating-point filtering. Currently, 16-bit filtering is used in both DirectX 9 and 10. This would impact the quality of High Dynamic Range rendering in particular. On top of this, the overall precision throughout the render¬ing pipeline will also be increased. These increases in precision could make for an interesting challenge for the graphics inde¬pendent hardware vendors (l HV s\ for they would need to spend major resources in upgrading their equipment to match these new requirements.

Looking at improvements on the image quality front, DirectX J 0.1 introduces full application control over anti-aliasing. This allows applications to control the usage of both multi-sample and super-sample anti-aliasing, as well as give them the ability to choose sample patterns to best suit the rendering scenario in a particular scene or title. These changes in DirectX 10.1 give the application control over the pixel coverage mask, which is used to help to quickly approximate sampling for an area of pixels. This in particular should prove to be a boon when anti-aliasing particles, vegetation,scenes with motion blur and the like. All of this additional control handed to the application could allow for anti-aliasing to be used much more effectively controlled by game developers.