IP Library › Granted Patent US 12,639,793
Granted Patent B2
US 12,639,793 · App. 17/681,319 · Granted May 26, 2026

System, devices and/or processes for dynamic temporal anti-aliasing technique selection

Inventors: Liam James O'Neil (Bedale, GB); Joshua James Sowerby (Twickenham, GB); Matthew James Wash (Stapleford, GB); Yanxiang Wang (Manchester, GB)
Assignee: Arm Limited
G06T5/70G06T1/60G06T5/20
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Quick Facts
Patent No.
US 12,639,793
App. No.
17/681,319
Granted
May 26, 2026
Kind
B2
Abstract

Example methods, apparatuses, and/or articles of manufacture are disclosed that may be implemented, in whole or in part, techniques to select between and/or among multiple available alternative approaches to perform a temporal anti-aliasing operation in processing an image.

Claims (44)

1 . A method comprising:

computing, by one or more processors, for each of a plurality of patches of contiguous pixels into which a previous image frame is partitioned, at least one attribute of the patch of contiguous pixels in the previous image frame;

computing, by the one or more processors, for each of the plurality of patches of contiguous pixels into which the previous image frame is partitioned, at least one attribute of a patch of contiguous pixels in a rendered image corresponding to the patch of contiguous pixels in the previous image frame; and

applying, by the one or more processors, a temporal antialiasing operation for application to image signal intensity values to represent a selected patch of contiguous pixels in a current image frame among a plurality of patches of contiguous pixels into which the current image frame is partitioned, the temporal antialiasing operation being selected for application to the image signal intensity values from among a plurality of temporal antialiasing operations individually selectable for each of the plurality of patches of contiguous pixels into which the current image frame is partitioned based, at least in part, on a comparison of the computed at least one attribute of the patch of contiguous pixels in the previous image frame and the computed at least one attribute of the patch of contiguous pixels in the rendered image, the comparison indicating a degree of aliasing present in the patch of contiguous pixels in a reproduced image, wherein:

different temporal antialiasing operations are selected for application to image signal intensity values of different patches of contiguous pixels into which the current image frame is partitioned based, at least in part, on the comparison indicating the degree of aliasing present in the patch of contiguous pixels in the reproduced image.

2 . The method of claim 1 , and further comprising:

determining a metric based, at least in part, on the comparison; and

selecting the one of the plurality of temporal antialiasing operations individually selectable for each of the plurality of patches of contiguous pixels into which the current image frame is partitioned based, at least in part, on the metric.

3 . The method of claim 2 , wherein the plurality of temporal antialiasing operations comprise at least a first temporal antialiasing operation and a second temporal antialiasing operation, and further comprising selecting the first temporal antialiasing operation responsive to the metric indicating greater than a threshold level of similarity.

4 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the second temporal antialiasing operation being more computationally intensive than the first temporal antialiasing operation.

5 . The method of claim 2 , and further comprising computing the metric based, at least in part, on a difference between a frame depth of the rendered image and a frame depth of a warped previous image frame.

6 . The method of claim 2 , and further comprising computing the metric based, at least in part, on a magnitude of a displacement vector indicative of a displacement between a position in the previous image frame and a corresponding position in the rendered image.

7 . The method of claim 2 , and further comprising computing the metric based, at least in part, on a comparison of a computed surface normal in the rendered image and a computed surface normal in the previous image frame.

8 . The method of claim 2 , and further comprising computing the metric based, at least in part, on a comparison of a computed shadow map in the rendered image and a computed shadow map in the previous image frame.

9 . The method of claim 2 , and further comprising:

retrieving the at least one attribute of the rendered image from a frame buffer location associated with the rendered image; and

retrieving the at least one attribute of the previous image frame from a frame buffer location associated with the previous image frame.

10 . The method of claim 9 , wherein the frame buffer location associated with the rendered image and the frame buffer location associated with the previous image frame are located in a geometry buffer.

11 . An electronic device comprising:

circuitry to, for each of a plurality of patches of contiguous pixels into which a previous image frame is partitioned, compute at least one attribute of the patch of contiguous pixels in the previous image frame;

circuitry to compute, for each of the plurality of patches into which the previous image frame is partitioned, at least one attribute of a patch of contiguous pixels in a rendered image corresponding to the patch of contiguous pixels in the previous image frame; and

circuitry to execute a temporal antialiasing operation for application to image signal intensity values to represent a selected patch of contiguous pixels in a current image frame among a plurality of patches of contiguous pixels into which the current image frame is partitioned, the temporal antialiasing operation to be selected for application to the image signal intensity values from among a plurality of temporal antialiasing operations individually selectable for each of the plurality of patches of contiguous pixels into which the current image frame is partitioned to be based, at least in part, on a comparison of the at least one computed attribute of the patch of contiguous pixels in the previous image frame and the at least one computed attribute of the patch of contiguous pixels in the rendered image, the comparison indicating a degree of aliasing present in the patch of contiguous pixels in a reproduced image, wherein:

different temporal antialiasing operations are selected for application to image signal intensity values of different patches of contiguous pixels into which the current image frame is partitioned based, at least in part, on the indicating of the degree of aliasing present in the patch of contiguous pixels in the reproduced image.

12 . An apparatus comprising:

one or more storage devices; and

one or more processors coupled to the one or more storage devices to:

compute, for each of a plurality of patches of contiguous pixels into which a previous image frame is partitioned, at least one attribute of the patch in the previous image frame based, at least in part, on image signal intensity values of the patch of contiguous pixels in the previous image frame;

compute, for each of the plurality of patches into which the previous image frame is partitioned, at least one attribute of a patch of a rendered image corresponding to the patch of contiguous pixels in the previous image frame; and

apply a temporal antialiasing operation to image signal intensity values to represent a selected patch of contiguous pixels among a plurality of patches into which a current image frame is partitioned, the temporal antialiasing operation to be selected for application to the image signal intensity values to represent the selected patch of contiguous pixels among the plurality of patches in the current image frame from among a plurality of temporal antialiasing operations individually selectable for each of the plurality of patches of contiguous pixels into which the current image frame is partitioned based, at least in part, on a comparison of the at least one computed attribute of the patch of contiguous pixels in the previous image frame and the at least one computed attribute of the patch of contiguous pixels in the rendered image, the comparison indicating a degree of aliasing present in the patch of contiguous pixels in a reproduced image, wherein:

different temporal antialiasing operations are selected for application to image signal intensity values of different patches of contiguous pixels into which the current image frame is partitioned based, at least in part, on the comparison indicating the degree of aliasing present in the patch of contiguous pixels in the reproduced image.

13 . The apparatus claim 12 , wherein the one or more processors are further to:

obtain a metric based, at least in part, on the comparison; and

select the one of the plurality of temporal antialiasing operations individually selectable for each of the plurality of patches of contiguous pixels into which the current image frame is partitioned based, at least in part, on the metric.

14 . The apparatus of claim 13 , wherein the plurality of temporal antialiasing operations individually selectable for each of the plurality of contiguous pixels into which the current image frame is partitioned comprises at least a first temporal antialiasing operation and a second temporal antialiasing operation, and wherein the one or more processors are further to select the first temporal antialiasing operation responsive to an indication by the metric of a similarity greater than a threshold level of similarity.

15 . The apparatus of claim 14 , wherein the second temporal antialiasing operation being more computationally intensive than the first temporal antialiasing operation.

16 . The apparatus of claim 13 , and wherein the one or more processors are to compute the metric based, at least in part, on a difference between a frame depth of the rendered image and a frame depth of a previous warped image frame.

17 . The apparatus of claim 13 , and wherein the one or more processors are further to compute the metric based, at least in part, on a magnitude of a displacement vector indicative of a displacement between a position in the previous image frame and a corresponding position in the rendered image.

18 . The apparatus of claim 13 , wherein the one or more processors are further comprising computing the metric based, at least in part, on a comparison of a computed surface normal in the rendered image and a computed surface normal in the previous image frame.

19 . The apparatus of claim 13 , and wherein the one or more processors are further to compute the metric based, at least in part, on a comparison of a computed shadow map in the rendered image and a computed shadow map in the previous image frame.

20 . The apparatus of claim 13 , and wherein the one or more processors are further to:

retrieve the at least one computed attribute of the rendered image from a frame buffer location formed in the one or more storage devices associated with the rendered image; and

retrieve the at least one computed attribute of the previous image frame from a frame buffer location formed in the one or more storage devices associated with the previous image frame.

21 . The apparatus of claim 13 , wherein the one or more processors are further to:

apply the selected one of the temporal antialiasing operations individually selectable for each of the plurality of patches of contiguous pixels into which the current image frame is partitioned to accept or reject the image signal intensity values to represent the selected patch of contiguous pixels in the current image frame.

Assignments (3)
ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNOR'S INTEREST Recorded Jul 6, 2022
From: APICAL LIMITED
To: ARM LIMITED
Reel/Frame 060591/0717 →
ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNOR'S INTEREST Recorded Feb 25, 2022
From: O'NEIL, LIAM JAMES; SOWERBY, JOSHUA JAMES; WASH, MATTHEW JAMES
To: ARM LIMITED
Reel/Frame 059106/0705 →
ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNOR'S INTEREST Recorded Feb 25, 2022
From: WANG, YANXIANG
To: APICAL LIMITED
Reel/Frame 059106/0800 →
Continuity (1)
Related Publication 20230274394A1 · Aug 31, 2023
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