Samsung Experts Explain Ray Tracing for the Galaxy S23 Series – Samsung Latin America Newsroom

As the popularity of smartphones has increased, so has the popularity of mobile games in the mainstream gaming market. Today, more and more consumers want to experience their PC and console games with brilliant graphics on their mobile devices, raising performance expectations. gaming of smartphones.

The Galaxy S23 series, the flagship smartphone from Samsung Electronics introduced on February 1, features the best and most powerful GPU, which improves performance by 41% compared to the previous version, along with Ray Tracing, which provides realistic lighting. to mobile gaming and has caught the attention of gamers around the world.

▲ Ray Tracing technology, which creates an experience gaming immersive mobile on Galaxy S23 series, unveiled at Galaxy Unpacked 2023

Samsung Newsroom sat down with the developers of Ray Tracing, recently introduced on the Galaxy S23 series, to understand the story behind how the team improved the experience. gaming mobile. Read on to learn more about one of the biggest breakthroughs in charts. gaming for smartphones in years.

Ray Tracing: improve your experience gaming with realistic graphics

Ray Tracing is the latest rendering method that manifests graphic effects in real time by tracing rays of light. The Galaxy S23 series GPU is equipped with special-purpose hardware to accelerate these ray tracing simulations similar to a GPU of desktopshowing shadows and light reflections in mobile games in a much more realistic way.

▲ (From left) Jungwoo Kim and Joonyong Park, developers of Ray Tracing technology from Samsung Electronics’ MX Business System Platform R&D Group.

Jungwoo Kim of the Systems Platform Development Group, which managed the development of the GPU for the Galaxy S23 series, described Ray Tracing technology as “the ultimate method of graphic rendering.”

“Ray Tracing is a complex simulation that tracks how an eye’s optic nerve receives a ray of light after it is reflected, refracted, or diffracted by an object,” Kim said. “It’s very similar to how light is actually processed.”

“The previous rasterization technique is limited, resulting in awkward and inaccurate expressions,” said Joonyong Park, who managed GPU technical support and internal and external cooperation for this new product. “When it comes to the shadow effect, for example, the previous method cast an object onto a scene to create a shadow map in advance and fit it onto the object again. On the other hand, Ray Tracing simulates the actual effect of how shadows are formed, appearing accurately and realistically on the screen, so users can enjoy more natural graphics.”

Closing the gap between charts desktop and mobiles with the Galaxy S23 series

Since 2010, Samsung has focused on breaking down the barriers between console, desktop and mobile by extending the performance and reach of its graphics API (Application Programming Interface). By partnering with major industry players, Samsung has led the way in standardizing on its latest technology like the Common API. By doing so, more companies can easily apply the latest technology to more games and expand their relevant ecosystems.

“In 2016, we standardized on the next-generation graphics API called Vulkan released by the Khronos Group, and we managed to commercialize it through the Galaxy S7,” Kim said. “But we’ve been working on advanced GPU development with partners like Epic Games and Unity to optimize Android game performance since 2015, before Vulkan was integrated into Galaxy devices. The optimization code we acquired by working together was first provided to game developers, proving the success of Vulkan and development optimization. The achievement was presented at various developer conferences.”

▲ Jungwoo Kim of Samsung Electronics MX Business System Platform R&D Group

In line with the recent growing trends in cross-platform gaming, Samsung quickly applied GPU technology from desktop to your mobile GPU. “In close cooperation with AP vendors, we have honed the performance of the latest mobile GPU for flagship products,” said Park. “With the rise of consumers demanding that the graphic quality of their mobile devices match the quality of consoles, we have been preparing to offer Ray Tracing technology in mobile game developments for two years now,” he said, describing the proactive effort from your team to lead this mobile innovation.

Multiplayer collaboration driving mobile performance

The developers cooperated with the Samsung Ukraine P&D Institute (SRUKR) and various partner companies, including Epic Games, the developer of the Unreal Engine, to prepare the best graphics.

▲ The demo content for Galaxy Unpacked 2023 was created in association with Epic Games. Compared to the previous raster rendering method (right), the Ray Tracing method (left) simulates more realistic graphics.

Kim explained that the demo contents featured at Galaxy Unpacked 2023 were a joint effort. “This is an area that we have been working on in collaboration with a game developer and their processors,” Kim said. “We are still making various attempts to achieve efficient rendering. As a result, we were able to overcome the challenges by reducing the number of calculations while maintaining the same level of quality.”

▲ Demo of content developed by Samsung Electronics. Compared to the previous method of raster rendering (below), Ray Tracing technology (above) allows for more realistic graphics with Dynamic Shadow.

▲ Joonyong Park of Samsung Electronics MX Business System Platform R&D Group

Park also shared an episode from when he was working on the development of the Galaxy S7 product. “I remember developing a content demo at Epic Games headquarters in North Carolina in the United States,” Park said. “We successfully rendered a demo game featuring a chicken character using the Vulkan API for the first time. As soon as the chicken character appeared for the first time after a bug fix, everyone at Epic Games, SRUKR, and colleagues on the MX R&D team cheered. Then we all celebrated with a dinner, where we had fried chicken.” Park thanked his teammates with whom he had worked so hard to achieve this feat.

The Galaxy S23 series opens up a new paradigm for mobile gaming

So what does the future look like in which Ray Tracing technology is commercialized? “Going forward, I expect the graphic content creation and consumption pipeline to change in a way that is aligned with Ray Tracing,” Park said. “In this process, we hope that mobile devices with portability and high-performance hardware on par with consoles will contribute to the changes.”

▲ Ray Tracing technology on the Galaxy S23.

“Certainly, you can expect an eye-catching gaming experience,” said the Ray Tracing developers, addressing fans who were looking forward to the gaming performance of the new Galaxy flagship. The developers also shared their plans to use this technology widely, starting with the Galaxy S23 series.

“Ray tracing technology is now only starting to go mobile. Since Samsung has researched and prepared this technology for a long time, our company will lead the industry and expand it rapidly,” Kim said. “Our next goal is to find the optimal method to apply Ray Tracing on many mobile devices and provide a great experience. gaming to the users”.

▲ (From left) Jungwoo Kim and Joonyong Park of Samsung Electronics MX Business System Platform R&D Group pose with the Galaxy S23, which introduces Ray Tracing to mobile games.

“Ray tracing compatible mobile games are not yet available on the market, but if there is a game company that shows interest in the new mobile GPU technology, it will be more than welcome,” said Park. When asked about the future of performance gaming mobile, Park responded that they were “working very hard to apply Ray Tracing technology to more mobile games.”

The developers’ long-term vision is to present even more immersive mobile gaming experiences with realistic graphics in the future.

Watch the video below to learn more about Ray Tracing technology on the Galaxy S23 series.