Rasterisoitu

Rasterisoitu is the Finnish term for a rasterized image or graphic, meaning information that has been converted from vector or geometric definitions into a grid of discrete picture elements, or pixels. In common usage, rasterisoitu refers to images stored or displayed as bitmaps rather than as resolution-independent vector data.

Rasterization is the process used in most real-time computer graphics pipelines to render shapes, text and 3D surfaces. In 2D, shapes are filled by determining which pixels lie inside their boundaries. In 3D, triangles are projected onto the screen and rasterized to determine per-pixel color, shading and texturing, with depth testing to handle occlusion. The process often includes anti-aliasing to reduce jagged edges and improve visual quality.

Advantages of rasterization include speed and hardware efficiency, as it aligns well with modern graphics processing units and enables real-time rendering at varying resolutions. Limitations include a loss of scalability: rasterized images do not retain detail when enlarged beyond their original resolution, and fine geometric precision can be harder to preserve compared with vector representations. Anti-aliasing and supersampling are common techniques to mitigate jaggies, and font rendering typically involves rasterizing outlines to bitmap glyphs at each size.

In practice, many systems use rasterized images for display while still employing vector formats where scalable quality is needed. Fonts, user interfaces and textures are frequently rasterized to fit screen pixels, while vector graphics remain useful for scalable illustrations and design work. See also raster graphics, vector graphics, rasterization, anti-aliasing, and font rasterization.