LightGraph is an efficient way of estimating multiple scattering in discrete high resolution heterogeneous participating media. The approach is based on stochastically generated graphs that estimate how light propagates through the volume using shortest path finding.

This new method tries to provide a way of achieving high quality photorealistic multiple scattering effect at a fraction of the computational cost of commonly used techniques in visual effects. The goal is not to be physically accurate nor it is to run in real-time, but to be a fast and reliable solution to allow quick turnarounds from a practical standpoint. The project is built on top of OpenVDB using their ray tracer implementation as a base. This work was done over the course of a semester in the context of IFT-6042 at the University of Montréal.

Details regarding this program can be found in the technical paper:

The full C/C++ implementation is available on GitHub: