Computer Graphics II - Resources

Lecture Notes, Etc.

• My slides. Course password required for access.

• RenderMan files. Password required for access.

Textbooks

• Ray Tracing from the Ground Up (Suffern) home page

• Physically Based Rendering (Pharr and Humphreys) home page

Other General Resources

• The Algorithmic Beauty of Plants (downloadable PDF version), Prusinkiewicz and Lindenmayer, Springer-Verlag, 1990.

Rendering and Ray Tracing Tools

RenderMan

• High quality rendering interface specification created by Pixar

• Commercial RenderMan Implementations
  • prman - Pixar's Implementation of the RenderMan Interface
    • Available on the machines in ICL5 and ICL6
    • Useful web sites:
      • Pixar's RenderMan Interface Specification
      • The RenderMan Repository (www.renderman.org)
      • Pixar's RenderMan University (lots of example images, "How To" documents, etc.)
    • References:
      • Steve Upstil, The RenderMan Companion: A Programmer's Guide to Realistic Computer Graphics, Addison-Wesley, 1990
      • Anthony A. Apocodaca and Larry Gritz, Advanced RenderMan: Creating CGI for Motion Pictures, Morgan Kaufman, 2000
      • Rudy Cortes and Saty Raghavachary, The RenderMan Shading Language Guide, Thomson, 2008
      • Ian Stephenson, Essential RenderMan fast, Springer 2003
  • 3delight
    • The 3delight home page
  
  
• Open Source RenderMan Implementations
  • AQSIS
    • The AQSIS home page
    • The AQSIS Wiki
  • Pixie
    • The Pixie home page
    • The Pixie Wiki
  • jrMan
    • Not as far along as the others - several features not yet implemented
    • The jrMan home page

Radiance

• Physically based, highly accurate ray-tracing software system for UNIX computers
• Licensed at no cost to users for non-commercial use
• Web site: http://radsite.lbl.gov/radiance/
• References:
  • Greg Ward Larson and Rob A. Shakespeare, Rendering with Radiance The Art and Science of Lighting Visualization, Morgan Kaufman, 1998

Persistance of Vision (POV)

• A high-quality, free raytracer tool for creating 3D graphics
• Available in official versions for many systems
• Web site: http://www.povray.org/
• References:
  • Alexander Enzmann, Lutz Kretzschmar, Chris Young, Ray Tracing Worlds with Pov-Ray, The Waite Group, 1994

Rayshade

• Extensible system for creating ray-traced images
• Written in C, yacc, and lex; runs on many different platforms
• Web site: http://graphics.stanford.edu/~cek/rayshade/rayshade.html
• Repository: ftp://graphics.stanford.edu/pub/rayshade/
• References:
  • Craig E. Kolb, Rayshade User's Guide and Reference Manual, January 1992; HTML version, PostScript version

3D APIs

OpenGL

• Cross-platform standard for 3D rendering and 3D hardware acceleration.
• Runtime library ships with all Windows, MacOS, Linux and Unix systems.
• Web site: http://www.opengl.org/
• References:
  • Donald Hearn, M. Pauline Baker, and Warren R. Carithers, Computer Graphics With OpenGL, 4th Edition, Prentice-Hall, 2011
  • F.S. Hill, Jr, Computer Graphics Using OpenGL, 2nd Edition, Prentice-Hall, 2001
  • OpenGL Architecture Board:
    • OpenGL Programming Guide: The Official Guide to Learning OpenGL, Version 2, 5th edition, Addison-Wesley, 2006
  • Richard Wright, Nicholas Haemel, Graham M. Sellers, and Benjamin Lipchak, OpenGL SuperBible, 5th edition, Addison-Wesley, 2011
  • Edward Angel, Interactive Computer Graphics: A Top-Down Approach Using Shader-Based OpenGL, 6th Edition, Addison-Wesley, 2012
  • Edward Angel, OpenGL: A Primer, 3rd Edition, Addison-Wesley, 2008
• Other documentation:
  • Creating Real Time 3D Graphics With OpenGL(O'Reilly)
  • OpenGL Rendering and Drawing(O'Reilly)
  • Preparing to Build an OpenGL Application(O'Reilly)
  • CS320 @ Goucher College

Java3D

• Official 3D API for Java
• Web site: http://java3d.java.net/
• References:
  • Henry Sowizral, Kevin Rushford, and Michael Deering, The Java 3D API Specification, Addison-Wesley, 1998
  • Daniel Selman, Java 3D Programming, Addsion-Wesley, 2001
• JavaWorld Articles:
  • Tutorial: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
  • Java3D Translation and Rotation
  • Surfaces and Illumination in Java3D
  • Rendering Fractal Landscapes in Java3D

Direct3D

• Microsoft Windows 3D API
• DirectX Developer Center web site: DirectX
• References
  • Ernest Pazera, Andre Lamothe (Editor), Andre Lomothe (Editor), Isometric Game Programming with DirectX 7.0 w/CD, Prima Tech
  • Peter Walsh, The Zen of Direct3D Game Programming, Prima Tech

Real Time Shading Languages

Cg

• Real Time Shading Language created by nVidia.
• Proposed as the standard shading language for OpenGL 2.0.
• Works with both OpenGL and DirectX
• Web site: http://developer.nvidia.com/
• References
  • Randima Fernando and Mark Kilgard, The Cg Tutorial: The Definitive Guide to Programmable Real-Time Graphics, Addison-Wesley, 2003.

Web-Based Scene Description Languages

VMRL97

• Virtual Reality Modeling Language
• Web sites:
  • http://www.web3d.org/
• References:
  • Rick Carey, Gavin Bell, The Annotated VRML 2.0 Reference Manual, Addison-Wesley, 1997

X3D

• XML Version of VRML
• Web site: http://www.web3d.org/x3d/

Animation, Modeling, Interactive

Maya®

• Integrated 3D modeling, animation, effects, and rendering tool
• Available free for non-commercial use as the Maya® Personal Learning Edition
• Web site: http://www.autodesk.com/maya
• References:
  • Darius Derakhshani, Introducing Maya® 7: 3D for Beginners, Wiley, 2005
  • Marc-Andre Guindon, Learning Maya® 7: Foundation, Sybex, 2005
  • John Kundert-Gibbs, Dariush Derakhshani, Eric Kunzendorf, Boaz Livny, Mick Larkins, Mastering Maya® 7, Wiley, 2005

Blender

• Open source 3D modeling, animation, rendering, post-production, interactive creation & playback
• Available under the GPL for "all major operating systems"
• Web site: http://www.blender.org/

3ds Max®

• Animation, modeling, skinning tools
• Commercial (list price $3675, as of 2012/11/19); 30-day free trial available
• Web site: http://www.autodesk.com/3dsmax/

AC3D^TM

• 3D modeling tool
• Available for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux
• Commercial (personal license $89.95, as of 2012/11/19); 14-day free trial available
• Web site: http://www.inivis.com/

Miscellaneous 3D Graphics Links

• Ultimate 3D Links
• Mayang's 3D textures site
• Image*After's textures and images
• GRSites free background textures library
• Planit3D's free textures