Bisqwit
2 HN recommenders · recommended in 3 months, 2019–2021
15:00 · 905K views · May 24, 2011
Bisqwit writes a raytracer from scratch in C++ for DOS, rendering in the 16-color VGA palette at 640x480. The video also covers color quantization and ordered dithering.
HN fans praise Bisqwit as a favorite programming YouTuber and this video as an excellent look at dithering.
3 comments from Hacker News
Bisqwit's discussion of dithering is outstanding . He presents a very impressive algorithm for arbitrary-palette dithering that is animation safe . > This paper introduces a patent-free positional (ordered) dithering algorithm that is applicable for arbitrary palettes. Such dithering algorithm can be used to change truecolor animations into paletted ones, while maximally avoiding unintended jitter arising from dithering. He demonstrates it "live coding" style in this[1] video where he writes a demo in 256 colors of a "starfield" animation with color blending and Gaussian blur style bloom. The first animation at 6:33 using traditional ordered dithering has the usual annoying artifacts. The animation at 13:00 using an optimal palette and his "gamma-aware Knoll-Yliluom positional dithering" changed my understanding of what was possible with a 256 color palette. The animation even looks decent[2] dithered all the way down to a 16 color palette! If that wasn't crazy enough, he also "live codes" a raytracer[3] in DOS that "renders in 16-color VGA palette at 640x480 resolution." [1] [LINK] [2] [LINK] [3] this video
Agreed. My favourite programming YouTuber by a long stretch. If anyone is unfamiliar with him and wants to watch some of the "classics" I'd recommend these: His "cracking videogame passwords" series: [LINK] Creating a Doom-style 3D engine in C: [LINK] Creating a Rogue-like game in C++11: [LINK] Creating a PIC16 emulator and NES music player: [LINK] Creating a NES emulator: [LINK] Creating a DOS VGA raytracer: this video
Wow that's really cool. I liked the structure you added to the Martian landscape. It was funny to wake up and see this on HN, as I was watching something DOS and 3D-related on Bisqwit's channel last night. this video