3D Graphics Rendering

Technology and Historical Overview

Overview
 Introduction to 3D Computer Graphics
 OpenGL
 SGI vs Linux
 3D Animation
 Terrain Modeler: Project Status
Introduction to 3d Computer
Graphics
 3D computer graphics is the science,
study, and method of projecting a
mathematical representation of 3D
objects onto a 2D image using visual
tricks such as perspective and
shading to simulate the eye's
perception of those objects.
3D Graphics and Physics
 3D graphic software is largely based
on simulating physical interactions.

 Generally:
 Space relations.
 Light interactions.

 In particular cases:
 Material properties.
 Object Movement.
Goals of 3D computers graphics
 Practical goal:
Visualization - to generate images
(usually of recognizable subjects)
that are useful in some way.

 Ideal goal:
Photorealism - to produce images
indistinguishable from
photographs.
Components of a 3D Graphic
System
 3D Modeling:
 A way to describe the 3D world or
scene, which is composed of
mathematical representations of 3D
objects called models.

 3D Rendering:
 A mechanism responsible for producing
a 2D image from 3D models.
3D Modeling
 Simple 3D objects can be modeled using
mathematical equations operating in the 3-
dimensional Cartesian coordinate system.
 Example:

the equation x2 + y2 + z2 = r2
is a model of a perfect
sphere with radius r.
Modeling considerations
 Pure mathematical equations to represent
3D objects requires a great deal of
computing power
 Impractical for real-time applications such
as games or interactive simulations.
Alternatives: Polygon Models
 Modeling objects by sampling only certain
points on the object, retaining no data
about the curvature in between
 More efficient, but less detailed.
Alternatives: Texture Mapping
 Technique used to add
surface color detail
without increasing the
complexity of a model.

 An image is mapped to
the surface of a model.
From 3D models to 2D images
 A 3D world or scene is composed of
collection of 3d models
 Three different coordinates systems
(or spaces) are defined for different
model related operations:
 Object Space
 World Space
 Screen Space
Object Space
 The coordinate system in which a
specific 3D object is defined.

 Each object usually have its own

object space with the origin at the
object's center

 The object center is the point about

which the object is moved and
rotated.
World Space
 World space is the coordinate system
of the 3D world to be rendered.

 The position and orientation of all the

models are defined relative to the
center of the world space.

 The position and orientation of the

virtual camera is also defined relative
to the world space.
Screen Space
 2D space that represents the
boundaries of the image to be
produced.

 Many optimization techniques are

performed on screen space.
Mathematics of 3D graphics
 3D operations like translation,
rotation and scaling are performed
using matrices and lineal algebra.

 Each operation is performed by

multiplying the 3D vertices by a
specific transformation matrix.
3D Rendering
 The process of taking the mathematical
model of the world and producing the
output image.
 The core of the rendering process involves
projecting the 3D models onto a 2D image
plane.
Types of Rendering Algorithms
 Two general approaches:

 Pixel-oriented rendering:
 Ray tracers

 Polygon-oriented rendering:
 Scan-line renderers
Ray tracers
 Operates by tracing
theoretical light
rays as they
intersect objects in
the scene and the
projection plane.
Ray tracer limitations
 Processor intensive. A full ray tracer is
impractical for real-time applications.
 Does not take into account inter-
reflections of diffuse light, resulting in
hard shadows.
Radiosity
 Technique that models the inter-
reflections of diffuse light between
surfaces of the world or environment.
 Produces more photorealistic
illumination and shadows.
Scan-line renderers
 Operate on an object-by-object basis,
directly drawing each polygon to the
screen.
 Requires all objects – including those
modeled with continuous curvature – to
be tessellated into polygons.
 Polygons are eventually tessellated into
pixels.
Illumination for scan-line
renderers
 Lighting and shading is calculated
using the normal vector.
 The color is linearly interpolated
across the polygon surface.
Common shading techniques
scan-line renderer
 Flat shading

 Gouraud Shading

 Phong Shading
Flat Shading
 The color of the polygon is calculated
at the center of the polygon by using
the normal vector.
 The complete polygon surface is
uniformly lighted.
Gouraud Shading
 A normal vector is calculated at each
vertex.
 Color is calculated for each vertex
and interpolated across the polygon
Phong Shading
 The normal vectors are interpolated
across the surface of the polygon
 The color of each point within the
polygon is calculated from its
corresponding normal vector
Polygon shading techniques
compared
Viewing frustum
 Segment of the 3D world to be
rendered
 Objects outside the viewing volume
are ignored.
Hidden surface determination
 Not all objects inside the viewing frustum
are always visible from the point of view of
the camera.

 Not all polygons of a particular object are

visible from the point of view of the
camera.

 Common Techniques
 Painters Algorithm
 Z-Buffering
Painter’s Algorithm
 Polygon-oriented.
 All the polygons are sorted by their
depth and then displayed in this
order.
Z-Buffering
 Pixel-oriented.
 When multiple objects
overlap (from the point of
view of the camera) on a
particular pixel, only the
value of the pixel closest
to the camera is used.
 Implemented by saving
the depth value of each
displayed pixel in a
buffer, and comparing the
depth of each new
overlapping pixel against
the value in the buffer.
Perspective Projection
 Projects the 3D world to a 2D image
The Open Graphics Language
OpenGL – The Open Graphics
Language
 De facto Application Programming
Interface (API) for cross-platform
development of 3D graphics
applications.
 Implementations available for all
major Operating Systems and
hardware platforms.
 Support for hardware accelerated 3D
rendering.
 Scalable, high-level, easy to use, well
documented.
History of OpenGL
 Originally released by SGI in the early
90s.
 Descendant of IRIX GL.
 Previous 3D graphics APIs were
generally platform dependant.
 Born out of market pressure for a
cross-platform 3D API during the late
80s.
OpenGL - Code Example
 How to define a triangle:

glBegin (GL_TRIANGLES);
glVertex (0,0,0);
glVertex (1,1,0);
glVertex (2,0,0);
glEnd ();
Development with OpenGL
 OpenGL API designed only for
drawing images.

 Auxiliary visual toolkits are required

for developing OpenGL applications
for modern windowed desktop
environments.

 Potential options:
 GLUT, SDL, GTK+
Potential Auxiliary Toolkits
 GLUT: Specifically designed for
developing OpenGL demo
applications.
 SDL (Simple DirectMedia Layer):
Library for multimedia and game
development.
 GTK+: General purpose toolkit for
creating graphical user interfaces with
OpenGL extensions available.
SGI vs Linux

VS
SGI vs Linux
 Linux is quickly becoming the
preferred OS for OpenGL and 3D
computer graphics development.

 Today Linux dominates one of SGI’s

most controlled market: Movie Special
Effects.

 Why?
SGI and Hollywood
 Special effects production pipeline
involves:

 The graphic workstation – Used by the

artists to create the models and textures
used in the visual effects sequence.

 The render-farm – A computer cluster

dedicated for rendering the images or
animations that form the visual effect
sequence.
SGI’s Market dominance
 SGI dominated the market of 3D graphics
solutions during the 80s and 90s.

 SGI hardware provided excellent

performance for rendering calculations
combined with a fast video subsystem.

 The computer special effects market was

locked-in to SGI’s hardware.

 Most of the 3D rendering software was

developed for IRIX (SGI’s UNIX OS).
SGI economics disadvantages
 SGI’s workstations are expensive.

 Historically FX houses purchased

large amount of SGIs, which were
amortized over several movies
(usually 5 years).
The rise of Lintel (Linux+Intel)
Causes:
 The development of Linux (an open
source UNIX clone for the PC) during the
90s.

 The continuous performance increase of

the Intel CPUs.

 The development of consumer-level 3D

acceleration hardware for the PC driven
by the growing video game market.
Why the switch to Lintel?
 Lintel platform provides a higher
cost/performance ratio.

 Linux is a POSIX complaint UNIX

clone, porting the software from IRIX
is trivial.

 Linux is open-source and runs in

multiple-architectures which greatly
limits the possibility of vendor lock-in.
Lintel economic benefits

 Using Lintel, a large portion of the

hardware costs can be recouped with
every movie.

 Buying a new render-farm for each

new movie is economically viable.
Not just for the render-farm
 Initially Linux was used for render-
farm.

 Now it is used for the graphic

workstation as well.

 It is even displacing Apple computers

as the standard platform for
video/film editing and compositing.
Results?
 Movies created using Lintel:
 Titanic
 Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
 The Harry Potter Movies
 The Lord of the Rings Trilogy
 Shrek and Shrek 2
 Practically every movie involving special-
effects made after the year 2000
Lintel on other 3D graphics
areas.
 The Lintel cost/performance also
benefits the academic/scientific
applications of 3D computer graphics.

 Heavily used in automotive and

aeronautics industries for solid
modeling and simulations.
3D Animation
Luxo Jr.
 The first film produced by Pixar in
1986.
 It demonstrates the use of ray tracing
to simulate the shifting light and
shadow given by the animated lamps
as well as simple surface textures.
 It was the first CGI film to be
nominated for an Academy Award.
Future Improvements
 Full windowed application.
 Support for screen captures.
 Support for Land-marking (3D
bookmarks)
 Support for animation scripting and
recording.
 Support for simultaneous rendering of
multiple terrains.
Future Improvements (Cont.)
 Restructure code to accommodate
three module abstraction layers:
 IO Layer – Modules for reading and
writing terrain files of different formats.
 Sampling Layer – Modules implementing
different LOD algorithms with user-
selected sampling value.
 Rendering Layer – Modules for rendering
the terrain using different OpenGL
primitives, rendering attributes and
vendor-optimized code paths.
Long-term
 Porting the project to Jogl: Java OpenGL

 http://java.sun.com/products/jfc/tsc/articles/jcanyon/
References:
 Wikipidia – The Free Encyclopedia
 http://www.wikipedia.org/
 OpenGL - The Industry Standard for High
Performance Graphics
 http://www.opengl.org/
 Google Image Search
 http://images.google.com
 Overview of 3D Interactive Graphics
 http://www.siggraph.org/project-grants/com97/com97-
tut.html
 Linux Journal - Industry of Change: Linux Storms
Hollywood
 http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/5472
 JCanyon - Grand Canyon Demo
 http://java.sun.com/products/jfc/tsc/articles/jcanyon/