Hacker News: martiano

New comment by martiano in "Show HN: I wrote a C++ ray tracer from scratch without AI"

martiano — Tue, 16 Jun 2026 09:23:35 +0000

I have used it when applying to some jobs but no success so far. I think this project was useful because it allowed me to go deeper than I ever had in code. I had very though issues that required me to ask in forums etc. I had a bug with ray-triangle intersection that took me 3 months to find the cause. So it was good training and it's a great project to have on my portfolio. I'm sure it can help me if I apply for something related to computer graphics and maybe gaming.

New comment by martiano in "Show HN: I wrote a C++ ray tracer from scratch without AI"

martiano — Tue, 16 Jun 2026 09:21:24 +0000

Implemented this and the other improvements suggested on the thread. Performance up by 20%! Thanks for the feedback. https://github.com/themartiano/luz/pull/3

New comment by martiano in "Show HN: I wrote a C++ ray tracer from scratch without AI"

martiano — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 16:58:02 +0000

I just launched the project, so can't say it helped me professionally yet. Almost all of the time invested in this was pre-AI. I agree it's harder to justify those deep dives but still worth it if you do it alongside AI IMO.

New comment by martiano in "Show HN: I wrote a C++ ray tracer from scratch without AI"

martiano — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 14:20:53 +0000

Not really, but it would be fun. I really like Rust as well

New comment by martiano in "Show HN: I wrote a C++ ray tracer from scratch without AI"

martiano — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 14:20:15 +0000

Wow, pretty good. Why web?

New comment by martiano in "Show HN: I wrote a C++ ray tracer from scratch without AI"

martiano — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 14:09:29 +0000

Thanks! I get your point about AI, but I think it's fair to say it's almost 100% AI free. I worked on it for ~15 months, vs 1 week now with AI. Previous results were quite similar

New comment by martiano in "Show HN: I wrote a C++ ray tracer from scratch without AI"

martiano — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 14:02:47 +0000

I get your point. I consider it fair with the disclaimer because the "manual" version was very similar to current but missing some love

New comment by martiano in "Show HN: I wrote a C++ ray tracer from scratch without AI"

martiano — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 13:57:31 +0000

The greatest resource I've found on the internet is the Ray Tracing in One Weekend series. (https://raytracing.github.io/) You can start there and go pretty far. Also you can mix random papers you'll find and eventually just testing and experimenting yourself.

New comment by martiano in "Show HN: I wrote a C++ ray tracer from scratch without AI"

martiano — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 09:34:31 +0000

Hey HN,

5 years ago I was 17 and learning to code C/C++ in a coding bootcamp (42). One of the projects was a simple C ray tracer. I really enjoyed working on the project and always loved computer graphics, so I decided to create my own path tracer from scratch, in C++, without using any third-party libraries.

I ended up working on it consistently for over a year, then sporadically when CG excitement hit me again. Recently I polished it and completed some unfinished features and decided to make it public, finally. It's a C++20 Path Tracer with a CPU renderer. It is able to render good-looking images with reasonable performance and sample count.

Btw this was initially coded without AI, but I've used it for the recent clean up and features. This project is a personal favorite of mine, and it can improve a lot, so I'd love to hear your feedback.

Show HN: I wrote a C++ ray tracer from scratch without AI

martiano — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 09:34:10 +0000

Article URL: https://github.com/themartiano/luz

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48538833

Points: 155

# Comments: 64