forge-hdr-tone-mapping

HDR tone mapping in SDL GPU requires a two-pass pipeline: render your scene to a floating-point HDR target like R16G16B16A16_FLOAT, then apply a tone-map shader to the swapchain. This preserves bright detail and outputs a display-referred image.

Reinhard and ACES are both filmic tone-mapping operators supported for HDR processing. ACES generally provides a more cinematic curve with better color rolloff in highlights, while Reinhard offers simpler global tonemapping with adjustable exposure control.

Yes, a floating-point HDR render target such as R16G16B16A16_FLOAT is required. You render the scene to this HDR target first, then tone-map it to the swapchain to preserve detail in bright areas before display.

Bright detail loss happens when rendering directly to a low dynamic range swapchain. Implementing a two-pass HDR tone mapping pipeline with an intermediate floating-point target and exposure control preserves highlights before converting to the final display image.

Yes, exposure control is adjustable when applying either Reinhard or ACES filmic tone-map shaders. This allows you to tune the HDR to display-referred conversion process during the tone-mapping pass to the swapchain.