Leveraging control surface fast clears to optimize 3d operations

A graphics processor system comprising:

• a memory to store a multisample surface, a source control surface for the multisample surface, a non-multisample surface, and a destination control surface for the non-multisample surface;
• and
• a hardware graphics rendering pipeline configured to perform multisample anti-aliasing, the hardware graphics rendering pipeline including pixel processing logic to:
• dispatch a multisample resolve draw to a shader unit of the hardware graphics rendering pipeline to generate color data for the non-multisample surface, the shader unit to execute a pixel shader program to generate a resolved color value from one or more sample locations of a pixel of a multisample surface, wherein the pixel shader program is to cause the shader unit to:
• read the source control surface for a pixel of the multisample surface to determine a clear status for the pixel of the multisample surface;
• and
• dispatch a new write command to write a clear status to the destination control surface for a pixel of the non-multisample surface based on the clear status for the pixel of the multisample surface.

A method to resolve color data from a multisample surface to a non-multisample surface in a memory associated with a hardware graphics rendering pipeline, the method comprising:

• dispatching a multisample resolve call to a shader unit of the hardware graphics rendering pipeline, the shader unit to execute a pixel shader program to generate a first resolved color value from multiple sample locations of the multisample surface;
• determining, via metadata associated with a first pixel of the multisample surface, that the first pixel is set to a clear color value, wherein the metadata associated with the first pixel is stored in a source control surface in the memory associated with the hardware graphics rendering pipeline;
• and
• bypassing, by the shader unit, execution of the pixel shader program for the first pixel in response to determining that the first pixel is set to the clear color value.