Ray tracing hardware and method

A ray tracing system for calculating ray tracing within a computer generated scene comprising:

• one or more integrated circuits configured with:
• a memory interface configured to perform read/write operations with at least one memory;
• a ray generation module configured to generate ray data representing rays;
• an acceleration structure generation module configured to process scene geometry stored in a memory, accessible by the memory interface, to generate an acceleration structure;
• at least one intersection tester module comprising:
• at least one bounding volume intersection tester module configured to compare ray data, representing a ray, with bounding volumes for bounding volume intersections;
• and
• at least one primitive intersection module configured to, responsive to an intersection between a ray and a bounding volumes, compare ray data with one or more primitives primitive intersections.

A method for calculating ray tracing data for use in a computer generated scene comprising:

• receiving and storing in memory geometry data representing elements in a computer generated scene;
• receiving and storing in memory ray parameters;
• processing the ray parameters with a ray generation module to generate ray data;
• processing the geometry data with an acceleration structure generation module to generate an acceleration structure;
• processing the ray data and the acceleration structure with one or more intersection tester modules to calculate primary intersections between ray data and elements of the acceleration structure;
• using the intersections, calculating secondary ray data;
• sorting and batching the secondary rays and providing the secondary rays to at least one of the intersection tester modules to calculate secondary intersections between secondary ray data and elements of the acceleration structure;
• outputting and storing pixel data in memory, the pixel data representing pixel values which can be used to represent the scene on a display.