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Hello, I'm the author of the Project F blog. I've almost finished a complete overhaul of this series: animation and double-buffering are coming in October. I'd

Hello, I'm the author of the Project F blog. I've almost finished a complete overhaul of this series: animation and double-buffering are coming in October. I'd be happy to field any questions you have.

anfractuosity 4y ago
Nice work :) I think implementing a VGA controller controller seems a lot nicer in Verilog/VHDL than on an MCU. The Ti chip you're using for DVI looks interesting too, not heard of that before. It looks like you're going to use the FPGAs BRAM for double buffering? I started implementing double buffering for led strips in VHDL, but need to get back to finishing the SPI controller for it.
- WillFlux 4y ago
  Thanks :) The TI TFP410 chip is on the 1BitSquared DVI Pmod board: https://docs.icebreaker-fpga.org/hardware/pmod/dvi/ https://docs.icebreaker-fpga.org/hardware/pmod/dvi/ I've also got designs that generate DVI on the FPGA with TMDS encoding (no external IC required). I've never polished or written them up, but you can see an example here: * https://github.com/projf/projf-explore/blob/main/graphics/fpga-graphics/xc7-hd/top_square.sv https://github.com/projf/projf-explore/blob/main/graphics/fp... * https://github.com/projf/projf-explore/blob/main/lib/display/tmds_encoder_dvi.sv https://github.com/projf/projf-explore/blob/main/lib/display... I'm using BRAM for framebuffers as it allows me to focus on the graphics rather than memory controllers and access. BRAM gives you dual ports and true random I/O; DRAM is much more complex.
nspattak 4y ago
Just here to say thanks for this, it looks awesome and is well in my reading list :)
kleiba 4y ago
Nice! How about a chapter on ray-tracing?
- WillFlux 4y ago
  Oh, I’ll get to that :D
sitkack 4y ago
metagripe, the font you are using is too thin, top 10% of hard to read websites. > "游ゴシック", YuGothic, "ヒラギノ角ゴ Pro", "Hiragino Kaku Gothic Pro", "メイリオ", Meiryo, sans-serif;
- WillFlux 4y ago
  If you'd link to a screenshot of what you see, that would be helpful. I have noticed the font renders thinner on Windows. I plan to look at the design over the winter: some things could definitely be improved.
  - sitkack 4y ago
    Firefox on OSX, https://i.imgur.com/G0fuP1C.png https://i.imgur.com/G0fuP1C.png BTW the article is wonderful, thank you for making it. I have an Arty board but I will be running through it in Verilator.
    - WillFlux 4y ago
      Thank you. I can't promise to get to the new design until early 2023 as I have many hardware designs I want to finish this year. Once you've got a design working in Verilator, I strongly recommend running it on an actual board if you can: nothing beats the feeling of running on hardware :)
boltzmann-brain 4y ago
do you think with a customized analog board, CRT displays could have a function similar to G-Sync? what would be involved?

anfractuosity 4y ago

Nice work :) I think implementing a VGA controller controller seems a lot nicer in Verilog/VHDL than on an MCU. The Ti chip you're using for DVI looks interesting too, not heard of that before. It looks like you're going to use the FPGAs BRAM for double buffering? I started implementing double buffering for led strips in VHDL, but need to get back to finishing the SPI controller for it.

WillFlux 4y ago
Thanks :) The TI TFP410 chip is on the 1BitSquared DVI Pmod board: https://docs.icebreaker-fpga.org/hardware/pmod/dvi/ https://docs.icebreaker-fpga.org/hardware/pmod/dvi/ I've also got designs that generate DVI on the FPGA with TMDS encoding (no external IC required). I've never polished or written them up, but you can see an example here: * https://github.com/projf/projf-explore/blob/main/graphics/fpga-graphics/xc7-hd/top_square.sv https://github.com/projf/projf-explore/blob/main/graphics/fp... * https://github.com/projf/projf-explore/blob/main/lib/display/tmds_encoder_dvi.sv https://github.com/projf/projf-explore/blob/main/lib/display... I'm using BRAM for framebuffers as it allows me to focus on the graphics rather than memory controllers and access. BRAM gives you dual ports and true random I/O; DRAM is much more complex.

nspattak 4y ago

Just here to say thanks for this, it looks awesome and is well in my reading list :)

kleiba 4y ago

Nice! How about a chapter on ray-tracing?

WillFlux 4y ago
Oh, I’ll get to that :D

sitkack 4y ago

metagripe, the font you are using is too thin, top 10% of hard to read websites. > "游ゴシック", YuGothic, "ヒラギノ角ゴ Pro", "Hiragino Kaku Gothic Pro", "メイリオ", Meiryo, sans-serif;

WillFlux 4y ago
If you'd link to a screenshot of what you see, that would be helpful. I have noticed the font renders thinner on Windows. I plan to look at the design over the winter: some things could definitely be improved.
- sitkack 4y ago
  Firefox on OSX, https://i.imgur.com/G0fuP1C.png https://i.imgur.com/G0fuP1C.png BTW the article is wonderful, thank you for making it. I have an Arty board but I will be running through it in Verilator.
  - WillFlux 4y ago
    Thank you. I can't promise to get to the new design until early 2023 as I have many hardware designs I want to finish this year. Once you've got a design working in Verilator, I strongly recommend running it on an actual board if you can: nothing beats the feeling of running on hardware :)

boltzmann-brain 4y ago

do you think with a customized analog board, CRT displays could have a function similar to G-Sync? what would be involved?