“A software test-bed for the development of 3-D raster graphics systems” by Whitted and Weimer

We describe a set of utility routines for 3-D shaded display which allow us to create raster scan display systems for various experimental and production applications. The principal feature of this system is a flexible scan conversion processor that can simultaneously manage several different object types. Communications between the scan conversion routine and processes which follow it in the display pipeline can be routed through a structure called a “span buffer” which retains some of the high resolution, three dimensional data of the object description and at the same time has the characteristics of a run length encoded image.

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