A Question about Pixel Shaders

[motagaly]

Dear All

I read many times about Pixel and vertex shaders nad how it will be fully programmable approach to the developers ..

My Q is ..

Does Pixel shaders and Vertex Shaders eliminate the Textures Att All .. i mean that there will be noo need for textures as every pixel is rendered indep. ??

If i have some mis-understanding .. please correct me knowlage ..

ThanX for Your Support Great Men

Bye

[[[ Motagaly Online ]]]
-=[ Fly with ur Fantasy ]=-

 

[entium]

Well it could be done without textures but the results will look kinda cheesy. lol

Pixel shaders are used for enchancing at the pixel level. Things like Dot 3 texture maps (normal maps) are used at the pixel level to add a fake bump effect. These types of calcualtions are done at either every single frame or when an object moves depending on how the pixel shader is constructed.

Pixel shaders are using for real time reflection and refraction. Pretty much any type of advanced effect a programmer wants to add at the texture level and reducing the work load of CPU is done through a pixel shader.

Glow effects are now done though shaders.

Vertex shadare are used to effect 3d meshes at the vertex level. Real time displacment. Polygon breaking. Cloth similuation.

They don't eliminate the textures (well if done right sometimes we can reduce the number of textures that have to be used)

Shaders improve upon what is capable and improve speed by reducing work load from the CPU. With out them Doom 3, Far Cry, and Half Life 2 will look like Unreal 2 (well actaully much worse).