Here be dragons

Hic sunt dracones.

This repository contains multiple implementations of the same 3D scene, using different APIs and frameworks on various platforms. The goal is to provide a comparison between multiple rendering methods. This is inherently biased due to the variety of algorithms used and available CPU/GPU configurations, but can hopefully still provide interesting insights on 3D rendering. You can check a video of all current versions runnning here (Youtube)

The following versions are currently available:

• OpenGL
• WebGL
• Vulkan
• Metal
• SceneKit
• Unity
• Blender Cycles
• Ptah (a custom real-time renderer, see the Github page)
• Nintendo DS
• Nintendo Game Boy Advance
• PlayStation 2
• PICO-8
• Vectrex
• Glide

The following versions are (tentatively) planned:

• DirectX (11 or 12), OpenGL ES
• other console hardwares
• another raytracing approach

In the directory of each version, one can find the source code, the corresponding resources (as each method has its own format/quality constraints), along with a readme describing the method and a few examples.

Resources

The scene is composed of four main elements:

• a plane representing the ground, with a pavement texture.
• a dragon (the Stanford dragon).
• a monkey head ('Suzanne') rotating around its vertical axis.
• a skybox surrounding the scene, textured with a cloudy sky.

Additionally, the sun is simulated by using a directional light, and the camera should be able to rotate around the scene. The initial 3D models and textures are contained in the opengl/resources directory.

Other implementations

Here you can find implementations using some of the above APIs combined with other programming languages, submitted by awesome people!

• An OpenGL + Python version, by cprogrammer1994: herebedragons-python. (see #11)
• A Vulkan version, by vazgriz: vk_dragons.