- Perlin noise
Perlin noise is a procedural texture primitive, used by visual effects artists to increase the appearance of realism in
computer graphics . This is a type ofGradient noise . The function has apseudo-random appearance, yet all of its visual details are the same size (see image). This property allows it to be readily controllable; multiple scaled copies of Perlin noise can be inserted into mathematical expressions to create a great variety of procedural textures. Synthetic texture using Perlin noise is often used in CGI to make computer-generated objects appear more natural, by imitating the controlled random appearance of textures of nature.It resulted from the work of
Ken Perlin , who developed it while working atMathematical Applications Group, Inc. . In 1997 he won anAcademy Award for Technical Achievement from theAcademy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for this contribution to the1982 movie "Tron" [Kerman, Phillip. "Macromedia Flash 8 @work: Projects and Techniques to Get the Job Done." Sams Publishing. 2006.] .Perlin noise is implemented as a function of either (x,y,z) or (x,y,z,time) which uses interpolation between a set of pre-calculated
gradient vector s to construct a value that varies pseudo-randomly over space and/or time.Ken Perlin improved the implementation in 2002, suppressing somevisual artifact s (see the external links).Perlin noise is widely used in
computer graphics for effects like fire, smoke, and clouds. It is also frequently used to generate textures when memory is extremely limited, such as in demos, and is increasingly finding use onGraphics Processing Unit s forreal-time graphics incomputer game s.ee also
*
Value noise
*Fractal landscape
*Simplex noise
*Simulation noise
*Wavelet noise References
External links
* [http://www.noisemachine.com/talk1/ Making Noise] Ken Perlin talk on noise.
* [http://mrl.nyu.edu/~perlin/ Ken Perlin's homepage]
* [http://www.mrl.nyu.edu/~perlin/doc/oscar.html Ken Perlin's Academy Award page]
* [http://mrl.nyu.edu/~perlin/noise/ Ken Perlin's improved noise (2002) java source code]
* [http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~mzucker/code/perlin-noise-math-faq.html Matt Zucker's Perlin noise math FAQ]
* [http://therandomuniverse.blogspot.com The Random Universe] - Using Perlin Noise to mimic celestial structures.
* [http://www.sepcot.com/blog/2006/08-2006-PDN-PerlinNoise2d.shtml Using Perlin Noise to Generate 2-Dimensional Clouds in Paint.NET] - A very good tutorial
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