Lighting Management in Virtual Worlds

• US 20140342823A1
• Filed: 05/14/2013
• Published: 11/20/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 05/14/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Roblox Corp.
• Original Assignee: Roblox Corp.
• Inventors: Baszucki, David, Kozlov, Semen, Kapulkin, Arseny
• Granted Patent: US 9,245,376 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 463/31
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/355 Performing operations on behalf of clients with restricted processing capabilities, e.g. servers transform changing game scene into an encoded video stream for transmitting to a mobile phone or a thin client
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/52 involving aspects of the displayed game scene
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 13/80 Special adaptations for executing a specific game genre or game mode
• CPC Class Codes: A63F 2300/66 for rendering three dimensional images
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 15/08 Volume rendering
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 15/50 Lighting effects
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2370/022 Centralised management of display operation, e.g. in a server instead of locally
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/63 Control signaling related to video distribution between client, server and network components; Network processes for video distribution between server and clients or between remote clients, e.g. transmitting basic layer and enhancement layers over different transmission paths, setting up a peer-to-peer communication via Internet between remote STB's; Communication protocols; Addressing real-time session protocols H04L65/1101; distributed application using peer-to-peer [P2P] networks H04L67/104

Abstract

A system has a server with a processor, a storage medium and coded instructions executable on the processor causing the server to display a video game to a player operating a computer, the video game comprising a virtual world having objects with surfaces, movable in the space of the virtual world by the player, and one or more light sources, create and manage a voxel grid associated with the player, compute an occupancy value for individual ones of the cells of the grid, compute an illumination value for cells of the grid by consideration of position and direction of the light sources, the occupancy value of the cell, and illumination values of immediately adjacent cells in the voxel grid, and determine brightness for pixels in display of surfaces of objects in frames of the video game based on the illumination values of cells proximate to the surfaces of the objects.

Claims

1. A system comprising:

a network-connected computerized server having a processor and a non-transitory physical storage medium; and

coded instructions executable on the processor, the coded instructions when executed causing the server to;

display a video game in an interactive interface to a player operating a computerized appliance connected to the server on the network, the video game comprising a virtual world of defined spatial dimensions having objects with defined dimensions and surfaces, one or more of the objects movable in the defined space of the virtual world by the player through one or more input mechanisms of the computerized appliance, and one or more light sources defined by position and direction in the virtual world;

create and manage a voxel grid associated with the player, the voxel grid comprising a plurality of cells in a three-dimensional array occupying the a portion of the space of the virtual world;

compute an occupancy value for individual ones of the cells of the voxel grid, the occupancy value depending at least in part on a portion of a cell occluded in the direction of a light source by at least a portion of one or more of the defined objects;

compute an illumination value for individual ones of the cells of the voxel grid by consideration of one or more of the position and direction of the one or more defined light sources, the occupancy value of the cell for which an illumination value is to be determined, and illumination values of immediately adjacent cells in the voxel grid; and

determine brightness for pixels in display of surfaces of objects in frames of the video game based at least in part on the determined illumination values of cells proximate to the surfaces of the objects in the virtual world.

2. The system of claim 1 further comprising:

normalizing illumination values to a value between zero and one inclusive.

3. The system of claim 1 further comprising:

selecting the immediately adjacent cells in the voxel grid for using illumination values to influence the illumination value of an object cell.depending on direction of a light source.

4. The system of claim 1 further comprising:

diminishing illumination value of a cell by the occupancy value determined for the cell.

5. The system of claim 1 further comprising:

creating and managing a second voxel grid associated with a second player of the video game.

6. The system of claim 1 further comprising:

redetermining illumination values for individual ones of the cells in the voxel grid in response to the player causing an object in the virtual world to be moved by a specific dimension in a direction.

7. The system of claim 6 further comprising:

dividing the voxel grid into individual regions and redetermining illumination values of for individual ones of the cells in the voxel grid only in one of the individual regions in response to the player causing an object to be moved.

8. The system of claim 6 further comprising:

moving the voxel grid in the virtual world in the direction and by the dimension that the object is moved by the player,

9. The system of claim 1 further comprising:

selecting a cell in the voxel grid to use for illumination value for a portion of a surface by considering a normal to the surface pointing to an adjacent cell.

10. A method comprising:

displaying by a network-connected computerized server having a processor and a non-transitory physical storage medium and coded instructions executable on the processor, a video game in an interactive interface to a player operating a computerized appliance connected to the server on the network, the video game comprising a virtual world of defined spatial dimensions having objects with defined dimensions and surfaces, one or more of the objects movable in the defined space of the virtual world by the player through one or more input mechanisms of the computerized appliance, and one or more light sources defined by position and direction in the virtual world;

creating and managing a voxel grid associated with the player, the voxel grid comprising a plurality of cells in a three-dimensional array occupying the a portion of the space of the virtual world;

computing an occupancy value for individual ones of the cells of the voxel grid, the occupancy value depending at least in part on a portion of a cell occluded in the direction of a light source by at least a portion of one or more of the defined objects;

computing an illumination value for individual ones of the cells of the voxel grid by consideration of one or more of the position and direction of the one or more defined light sources, the occupancy value of the cell for which an illumination value is to be determined, and illumination values of immediately adjacent cells in the voxel grid; and

determining brightness for pixels in display of surfaces of objects in frames of the video game based at least in part on the determined illumination values of cells proximate to the surfaces of the objects in the virtual world.

11. The method of claim 10 further comprising:

normalizing illumination values to a value between zero and one inclusive.

12. The method of claim 10 further comprising:

selecting the immediately adjacent cells in the voxel grid for using illumination values to influence the illumination value of an object cell.depending on direction of a light source.

13. The method of claim 10 further comprising:

diminishing illumination value of a cell by the occupancy value determined for the cell.

14. The method of claim 10 further comprising:

creating and managing a second voxel grid associated with a second player of the video game.

15. The method of claim 10 further comprising:

redetermining illumination values for individual ones of the cells in the voxel grid in response to the player causing an object in the virtual world to be moved by a specific dimension in a direction.

16. The method of claim 15 further comprising:

dividing the voxel grid into individual regions and redetermining illumination values of for individual ones of the cells in the voxel grid only in one of the individual regions in response to the player causing an object to be moved.

17. The method of claim 15 further comprising:

moving the voxel grid in the virtual world in the direction and by the dimension that the object is moved by the player,

18. The method of claim 10 further comprising:

selecting a cell in the voxel grid to use for illumination value for a portion of a surface by considering a normal to the surface pointing to an adjacent cell.