3D Graphics for Consumer Applications: How Realistic Does it Have to Be?

The design of graphics IC's for the consumer market has performance limitations imposed by the need to maintain low cost, and must be driven by consideration of the potential applications. The likely requirements for a consumer aimed real time 3D graphics system are stated in terms of performance and rendering techniques, and a research prototype of a 3D display processor is presented. The processor performs polygon drawing with smooth shading, Z buffer, and texture mapping into standard memory components. Limitations of the system and necessary image quality improvements are discussed.