SRV
SRV (Shader Resource View) is a mechanism in graphics APIs such as Direct3D 12 that allows shaders to access GPU resources like textures and buffers. It provides a unified interface for reading data from various sources, including 2D and 3D textures, structured and unstructured buffers.
Key Features of SRV
- Flexible Data Access – Enables shaders to read information from textures and buffers with different formats.
- Support for Various Resource Types – Works with textures, structured buffers, and even certain forms of GPU memory.
- Optimized Memory Management – Ensures efficient utilization of GPU resources.
Using SRV in Direct3D 12
In Direct3D 12, SRV is created and bound to a descriptor, which is then used in shaders. Example of creating an SRV for a texture:
D3D12_SHADER_RESOURCE_VIEW_DESC srvDesc = {};
srvDesc.Shader4ComponentMapping = D3D12_DEFAULT_SHADER_4_COMPONENT_MAPPING;
srvDesc.Format = textureFormat;
srvDesc.ViewDimension = D3D12_SRV_DIMENSION_TEXTURE2D;
srvDesc.Texture2D.MipLevels = 1;
device->CreateShaderResourceView(texture, &srvDesc, srvHandle);
Where is SRV Used?
- Texturing – Used to pass textures to shaders, enabling advanced lighting and material effects.
- Post-Processing – Applied in image filtering, blurring effects, depth processing, and other tasks.
- Physics Simulations – Helps process height maps, particle density, and other simulation parameters.
- Data-Driven Rendering – Used in techniques such as voxelization and screen-space effects.
Conclusion
SRV (Shader Resource View) is a crucial component in modern graphics APIs, allowing shaders to efficiently read data from various GPU resources. Due to its flexibility and performance, SRV is widely used in texturing, post-processing, and computational tasks, playing a key role in computer graphics visualization.