Rendering by tracing geometric rays to surfaces, selecting visible intersections and evaluating illumination. Primary rays determine camera visibility, while shadow rays test visibility of light sources; recursive variants trace reflected and transmitted continuations.
A Monte Carlo method for estimating light transport through random paths of successive surface interactions. A sampled continuation contributes its scattering response and cosine divided by its sampling probability density function. Next-event estimation makes direct source connections explicit, including connections to ideal point lights.
Explicit light-source sampling at a surface interaction: connect to a sampled source and use a shadow ray to test visibility. It avoids relying solely on a randomly continued path to hit an emitter; this is essential for ordinary continuous direction sampling with ideal point lights.
A visibility ray or finite segment from a surface toward a light source. An opaque blocker before the source removes that source's direct illumination at the surface. Intersections beyond a finite light source must not count.
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