Non-Photorealistic Rendering

What Does Non-Photorealistic Rendering Mean?

Non-realistic photorendering (NPR) is a process by which computer engineers try to animate and represent items inspired by paintings, drawings, cartoons and other sources that do not feature photorealism. It is often used in today’s computer animation projects, where a diversity of methods creates very diverse styles of television and cinema or other video.

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Techopedia Explains Non-Photorealistic Rendering

Much of early computer graphic results focused on photorealism — they focused on animating and simulating characters and items that were very much based on real-life or photorealistic images. By contrast, non-realistic photorendering takes imaginary characters and objects, and gives them a life of their own. The rules for this are slightly different than for photorealistic rendering. For example, engineers may have built an advanced simulator for photorealistic humans, drawing on a deep knowledge of human anatomy and the movement of joints, etc. When engineers go to create a simulation for a non-realistic character or object, they are looking at a different set of range of motion instructions, different proportions, and different shapes and ways of movement. That is why non-photorealistic rendering as a new genre in computer animation has its own unique methodology and technique.

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Margaret Rouse

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…