In today's student feature, part of Gamasutra's education coverage, we present a honors thesis by Gary Sheppard, presented to the University of Sheffield and titled: 'Real-Time Rendering Of Fur'. Sheppard's introduction to his thesis explains: "A vast number of creatures in the animal kingdom exhibit some kind of fur. This paper presents a complete 'shells and fins' method for modelling this fur in real-time for use in interactive systems. A wide range of properties are researched, evaluated and adapted for use in the project. Original methods are presented for hair type interpolation and fur dynamics. Here, the concept of hair domination is introduced as a method to decrease hair quantities in a fur patch, and the wind vector animation approach is adapted for use on fur. A review is then made against other methods of fur rendering to develop concept for further work." You can now read the full synopsis and download the full 76 page PDF for this honors thesis (no registration required.)