“Imagination was a major contributor to the Vulkan API, and was among the first to demonstrate it on mobile platforms. Now that the specification is released, we feel that it is important to get it into the hands of developers as soon as possible,” said Graham Deacon, senior director of PowerVR Business Operations at Imagination. “With this new SDK, they have a powerful tool for game and application development on PowerVR based platforms, which include some of the world’s most popular smartphones, tablets, OTT set-top boxes and other consumer products.”
The PowerVR Framework features a Vulkan backend. This lightweight abstraction layer is claimed to provide utility functions that enable control of Vulkan while reducing the amount of code required to render a scene. It features functions for tasks such as object creation and asset uploading, simplified object lifetime management, and cross-platform setup.
Together with the PowerVR Graphics SDK, Imagination says it offers a complete set of advanced tools for graphics developers. The latest release includes several new features and enhancements. PVRShaderEditor now supports the ability to choose different compilers per shader, and PVRGeoPOD supports 3DSMax 2016 SP2. PVRTrace now includes a full ‘Call Hierarchy’ which is claimed to show all a call’s dependencies at a point in time, and also enables viewing of buffer object data. Finally, PVRTune includes new counters for ‘ISP pixel load’ and ‘Overdraw.’
