Editing ATI TruForm (section)

== Overview ==
Before the adoption of pixel shader-enhanced bump mapping methods such as [[normal mapping|normal]] and [[parallax mapping]] that simulate higher mesh detail, curved 3D shapes in games were created with large numbers of triangles. The more triangles are used, the more detailed and thus less polygonal the surface appears. TruForm creates a curved surface using the existing triangles, and [[Tessellation (computer graphics)|tessellates]] this surface to make a new, more detailed polygonal model. It is designed to increase visual quality, without significantly impacting frame rates, by utilizing hardware processing of geometry.

TruForm was not significantly accepted by game developers because it ideally required the models to be designed with TruForm in mind. To enable the feature without causing visual problems, such as ballooned-up weapons, the models had to have flags identifying which areas were to be tessellated. The lack of industry-wide support of the technique from the competition caused developers to ignore the technology.

In later version of Catalyst drivers, the TruForm feature is removed.

Beginning with Radeon [[Radeon R520|X1000 series]], TruForm was no longer advertised as a hardware feature.  However, Radeon 9500 and higher (as well as hardware supporting Shader Model 3.0) include Render to [[Vertex Buffer]] feature, which can be used for tessellation applications.[https://web.archive.org/web/20070927173130/http://www.behardware.com/articles/616-2/ati-s-demos-without-vertex-texturing.html] In the case of Radeon X1000 series, it supports binding up to 5 R2VB buffers
simultaneously. Tessellation as dedicated hardware has returned in Xenos and [[Radeon R600]] GPUs.