Light Prepass Cascaded Shadow Mapping

Updates, updates, updates (actually, it's only an update. Singular). The image you see above is Light Prepass rendering with Cascaded Shadow Mapping. Each of the color changes in the image above represents the splits of the CSSM based on distance from the camera.

I first implemented the Nvidia's CSSM implementation (which I intentionally didn't post the results here because how I implemented it was too embarassing to show). I can't seem to stabilize that implementation. Then I tried Wolfgang Engel's [ShaderX5] CSSM, which I then simplify based from Michael Valiant's [ShaderX6]. Although, I didn't fully implementated exactly as he did. Primarily on MEC (minimal enclosing circle) part. I instead used a transformed-axis bounding box on each frustum split. With bounding box, I don't have to recompute the split even if I rotate or translate the camera. Depth can also be constant, depends on the requirements. But what I did is the just using the radius of the BB plus the length of the difference between center of BB and original light position. The center of the BB is the untransformed axis. I call it Camera-Frustum-Split Bound Depth. It's a just my fancy way of saying, 'getting enough' precision from an orthographic shadow kinda' thing. In simple terms, imagine a light tripod attached on top of a helmet beaming in a certain direction downward with a special gimbal ignoring panning, yawing and rolling of the head (rolling heads... o_O). The distance of the light from the eyes are constant. Though I think this is only applicable to outdoor sun type scene.

For the shadow view matrix, I preserved the light direction in the BB(transformed) space so whenever I turn or move the camera the depth and shadow view angle are constant.

I still have to work on the filtering and fading-into-the-next shadow split. The initial part I've done which is the transition of cascades are based from pixel depth(view space) distance vs the far distance of each split. My plan is to gradually fade in between splits. I choose this way because it make sense, atleast for me, that transitions are based from a field of view of the eye. I read somewhere, I can't remember where, that this also avoids shadow split transition popping.

Btw, I store the splits in per channel rather than a spliting a single channel texture. I don't know how this will affect my rendering or if this is better or worse, but good enough... for now.