How CGI Works

This video was about how computer programs and math dudes were able to come across the various obstacles of creating realistic lighting and rendering through computers. Math and science are deeply connected to this video as all of the problems that needed to be solved such as shadows, reflections and refractions needed to be solved by using math equations that can be put into a language that computers can understand. So basically coding.
The first method used was Rasterization. This technique involved using projections to shoot through a grid system (being pixels) to detect where shapes were and to delete empty space to produce and object. This is different from Ray casting as that involves sending light through the pixel holes and looking for intersections. Rasterization was good at figuring out shapes but wasn't that greatest at actual lighting.
 This is were Ray Casting came in as it was able to find what objects were in front of the camera and which one were behind. The three major problems with these methods though were creating shadows, reflections and refractions. This was solved when ray casting evolved into Recursive Ray Tracing. This sent out different projections when collisions where made and depending on if it again made a collisions would decide how to shade the pixels based on lighting. The problem after these methods were in effect was figuring out Indirect vs Direct illumination.
 While Indirect is decent at creating the general lighting it does not account for the other sources of lighting, because in the real world light bounces everything. While rather direct lighting accounts for all the other various sorts of lights. This creating an issue that wasn't overcomed until an equation was made by James Kaiyja to combat this. This equation basically had to figure out which lighting factors would be affected by what. While this equation didn't handle transmission and sub surface scattering that well, it was still a start of a better representation of physics which is still be improved on today.
 There are also two laws that were hypothesized because of these advancements in computers. One was Moore's Law being that the number of transistors in a dense integrated circuit has doubled in about every 2 years. This meaning that rendering sees a sizable improvement give or take in this time frame. Then there is also Blinn's Law being as tech advances rendering time stays constant. While this might seem obviously false at first what it really means is that the better our tech becomes, the more we push the limit of what it can do, further and further.
 These two laws relate heavily to the topic as advancements are being made constantly in the CGI field and the people at the helm are never going to stop pushing it's potential.
CGI is a massive tool that isn't slowing down at any point soon. But even though it's amazing what it can do, I wouldn't say it's that different from any other art form. When it started it was very foreign territory and it took talented people to push it to the main stream. And it's still being pushed to this day to reach it's full potential. And I think any art form is like that being that there is a constant flow of new people trying to figure out mathematically and scientifically what can be done to improve it.