Texture Element

What Does Texture Element Mean?

A texture element (texel) is the basic unit of texture space that is used in computer graphics. An array of texels make up a texture, lust like a picture is made up of an array of pixels. But there is a difference between texel and pixel when talking about 3-D graphics and most parts of a 3-D rendition.

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A texture element is also known as a texture pixel.

Techopedia Explains Texture Element

The graphical processing unit in a computer graphic application is used to perform texture mapping: assigning a texel to each and every type of texture. Two techniques are used for texture mapping: clamping and wrapping. Clamping confines the texel according to the given texture type by bringing it to the closest boundary if it is greater than the texture size. On the other hand, wrapping moves the texel as the texture size increases in order to keep them at the same ratio. Clamping does not allow the texel to be repeated and keeps it in one spot, whereas wrapping causes repetition.

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Margaret Rouse is an award-winning technical writer and teacher known for her ability to explain complex technical subjects to a non-technical, business audience. Over the past twenty years her explanations have appeared on TechTarget websites and she's been cited as an authority in articles by the New York Times, Time Magazine, USA Today, ZDNet, PC Magazine and Discovery Magazine.Margaret's idea of a fun day is helping IT and business professionals learn to speak each other’s highly specialized languages. If you have a suggestion for a new definition or how to improve a technical explanation, please email Margaret or contact her…