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Apart from web textures one other application for using algorithmic textures in bandwidth critical applications occurs to the author.
This application shares with internet systems the property that the textures are required on embedded systems, physically separate from the main engine which is responsible for serving out the data.
It is also an application where perception of textures surfaces is of great importance. More so, indeed than it is to browsers of the web.
The application being referred to is of course virtual reality.
Not all VR applications are bandwidth-critical: in some cases the participant in the virtual world can be connected to a fat pipe directly into a nearby super-computer.
However, some VR systems will be forced by their nature into situations where the world they are in contact with has to come down a bandwidth limited channel.
The most obvious example of this at the moment is when VRML pages are viewed over the internet.
Other VR systems are destined to play the role of cognitive/sense/action enhancing tools, and will be required to be totally portable. These will probably have more limited communications with the rest of the world than the existing bandwidth situation of VRML, and will be required to synthesize their own worlds locally. Algorithmic textures in most cases provide the best possible, compression technique for textural data, and allow such things as animated textures, allowing clouds to really boil and water to really ripple, with little overhead in terms of storage.
However, due to plummeting costs, storage is not as bandwidth critical as information that has to go down tubes and pipes. Any semi-portable device which synthesises its virtual world from information provided remotely may be usefully enhanced by the use of algorithmic texture generation technology.
VR applications from a perceptual point of view are more important to have displayed using surface textures than web textures. This is because of the important role which textural information plays in providing depth cues. In virtual worlds, in order to provide the best simulation, giving a good sense of depth is an important aim.
One disadvantage of using such techniques is that, due to resolution difficulties, some textures in motion can generate artefacts which generate perceptions of rapid motion for the viewer. In principle, such effects can be minimised in the short term by careful choice of texture, and with increasing resolution, the problems will diminish.
Lastly, the author has an interest in ARM Ltd processors. These are renowned for their computing-power to power-consumption and cost ratios. In the same way that there is currently immense interest in using these processors in low cost internet terminals, exactly the same considerations should be responsible for driving manufacturers with an interest in consumer VR towards these chips.
Many of ARMs competitors in the field have excellent power consumption and cost features, but with the advent of ARM's collaboration with Digital, it seems to offer high end performance currently unmatched by and other chip.
ARM also appear to be taking the high end graphics market seriously as evidenced by the emergence of their acclaimed DSP Piccolo architecture, amongst other developments.