Ray Tracing from the Ground Up

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1. yunnppOct 2026
   For rasterization, I would recommend: https://pikuma.com/courses/learn-3d-computer-graphics-progra...

   If the video format is not for you, I would at least follow the contents, then look up the individual pieces. The black book has a number of them: https://www.jagregory.com/abrash-black-book/

   For ray tracing, Ray Tracing from the Ground Up: https://www.amazon.in/Ray-Tracing-Ground-Kevin-Suffern/dp/15...

   Then people will jump in to say that the PBRT book (https://www.pbrt.org/) is a better or more comprehensive source, and it is true, but my opinion is that From the Ground Up is easier to get started with.

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2. grg0Sep 2025
   I agree with OP and find the literal programming in that book incredibly distracting and annoying. I prefer the theory up front and the code later. "Ray Tracing From the Ground Up" does a much better job in my opinion (although it also only covers a fraction of the topics in the PBR book.)
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3. gieldSep 2024
   If you want a deep-dive into the mathematics as well, I really liked Ray Tracing from the Ground Up by Kevin Suffern [1]. The book focuses on the theory and mathematics of ray tracing, and uses C++ to build a ray tracer. The code however is simple and explained really well so you could adapt it to the programming language of your choice.

   [1] https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/ray-tracing-from/978149...

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4. harrytodorovFeb 2020
   Well, there is the book "Ray Tracing from the Ground Up" [1], which although a bit outdated (stemming from 2007), gives in-depth discussions on many of the topics. The author discusses possible pitfalls on the way as well. There are a few chapters, which are still math-heavy (the ones discussing the principles of stochastic ray tracing, a.k.a. Monte Carlo ray tracing).

   A helpful resource for me, personally, was the educational ray tracer "Nori" [2], which came with 5 assignments covering fundamentals of a ray-tracing system (intersection acceleration, Monte Carlo sampling, basic and advanced integrators, BRDFs, even microfacet material models). Assignments gave hints on how to integrate those features in the ray tracer, plus they provided ways to validate ray-traced results. Currently, the assignments are removed from the Nori's website, but one can find them using the Wayback Machine.

   [1] "Ray Tracing from the Ground Up", by Kevin Suffern, September 2007, http://www.raytracegroundup.com/

   [2] Nori: an educational ray tracer, Dr. Wenzel Jakob, https://wjakob.github.io/nori/# (using Wayback machine to access assignments https://web.archive.org/web/20200110040505/https://wjakob.gi...)

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5. BjartrAug 2019
   Ray Tracing from the Ground Up, by Kevin Suffern

   As a college freshman I started this book with only a passing familiarity to C++ and was able to follow it to implement a raytracer that supported depth of field and global illumination, among other things.

   http://www.raytracegroundup.com/

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6. BjartrJan 2019
   I quite enjoyed Ray Tracing from the Ground Up when I was learning ray tracing for the first time.

   http://www.raytracegroundup.com/

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