Physically based rendering

A diamond plate texture rendered close-up using physically based rendering principles. Microfacet abrasions cover the material, giving it a rough, realistic look even though the material is a metal. Specular highlights are high and realistically modeled at the appropriate edge of the tread using a normal map.

Physically based rendering (PBR) is a computer graphics approach that seeks to render images in a way that models the lights and surfaces with optics in the real world. It is often referred to as "Physically Based Lighting" or "Physically Based Shading". Many PBR pipelines aim to achieve photorealism. Feasible and quick approximations of the bidirectional reflectance distribution function and rendering equation are of mathematical importance in this field. Photogrammetry may be used to help discover and encode accurate optical properties of materials. PBR principles may be implemented in real-time applications using Shaders or offline applications using ray tracing or path tracing.