Introduction to Computer Graphics Cathode Ray Terminal (CRT) Flat Panel (LCD Or Plasm A): Thinner, Lighter, Less Power, Crisper Ming- Hwa Wang, Ph.D
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Introduction to Computer Graphics cathode ray terminal (CRT) flat panel (LCD or plasm a): thinner, lighter, less power, crisper Ming- Hwa Wang, Ph.D. display COEN 148/290 Computer Graphics head m ounted display: with optics to feel like large screens, Department of Computer Engineering separate displays for eyes to see 3D, can sense your head Santa Clara University position/ orientation and with position-sensitive input device to make virtual reality possible Mandatory Basics raster scan: the dot that can be lit up is rapidly swept across the an im age is a two-dim ensional array of picture elem ent (pixel); the monitor face in a pattern resolution of an im age refers to how closely packed the pixels are when size: measured in screen diagonal length displayed aspect ration: ratio of width / height continuous im ages (real im ages) vs. discrete im ages (com puter graphics triads: 3 colors are arranged in a group, and triads are arranged in a on raster display) hexagonal pattern so that each triad has six neighbors there is no such thing as a sm ooth curve in a com puter im age, the dot pitch: the smallest detail a monitor can possibly show or resolve, illusion is achieved m ostly by using large quantities of pixels the distance from any one of a triad to each of the six neighbors (sometime with anti-aliasing) scan rate or refresh rate: horizontal scan rate is the rate at which color space: individual scan lines are drawn (15-100 KHz), and the vertical scan red, green, blue (RGB) color space - internal representation rate indicates how often the entire image is refreshed (60-70 Hz) color palette using color lookup table (LUT): 256 levels per RGB interlacing (alternating even field and odd field): refreshes only com ponent requires 8 bits or a byte, LUT converts a color every other scan line each vertical pass, and requires only half as number (color index value or pseudo color) into its RGB color m any scan lines to be drawn, reduce hardware cost but flicker quite hue, intensity (or value, or lightness), saturation (HSV or HLS) color noticeably system - human representation hard copy output computer graphics: the process of converting a mathematic or geometric printer description of an object (the m odel) into a two-dimensional projection (a inkjet: 300-700 DPI (dot per inch), slow, inexpensive, quality ok visualization) that simulate the appearance of a real object laser printer: faster, better quality, more expensive lim itations: com puter graphics can't do depth of field and m otion wax transfer: quality even better, slower, more expensive blur as cam eras can, and cam eras do not have near and far clipping dye sublimation: ultimate image quality, and very expensive plans as computer graphics have photograph: film recorder a de facto approach: starting with a very detailed geom etric display controller (video card or graphic card) description, applying a series of transform ations, im itating reality by the video random access m em ory (VRAM) bitm aps is the heart of making the object look solid and real (rendering) any display controller, it is where the pixels are kept, and the not sufficient for anim ation, need synthesis m ethods and bitm aps divides the rem aining display controller into the drawing modeling methods “front end” and the video “back end” the m ain elem ents of a graphics system : application program drawing front end: off-load processor by receiving drawing process with interaction fram e store video controller raster com m ands from the processor, and the pixels are “drawn” by display writing the new values into the bitm aps, m ost display controllers photo-realism : m ake a graphics im age of an object or scene also allow the processor to directly read/ write the pixels in the indistinguishable from a TV image or photograph bitmaps com puter graphics is not an exact science, involve m uch video back end: interprets the pixel values into their colors and sim plification in the original m athem atical m odel so that it can be creates the video signals that drive the monitor implemented as a computer graphics algorithm types: persistence of vision: human's eyes continue to perceive light for a short 2D display controller or graphics user interface (GUI) engine tim e after the light has gone away (also the phosphor persistence for 2½ D display controller: allowing the color to vary across the CRT) object being drawn using bilinear interpolation, dithering, and Z buffering Hardware Basics: interactive output technologies Full 3D display controller: do transform ation, lighting, and other monitor advanced effects type: Graphic Primitives potential function: builds surfaces by m odeling lots of little blobs graphics primitives: can be draw directly into bitmaps together, the blobs are spheres when far apart, and they bleed point primitives are the smallest thing we can draw (pixels) into each other when close together vector primitives constructive solid geometry (CSG): objects are created by combining line: artifact – diagonal lines are 29% fewer pixels than sim ple 3D solids (spheres, boxes, cones, and cylinders) using only 3 horizontal or vertical lines Boolean operations: OR (or union), AND (or intersection), NOT (for polyline: m ore efficient than an equivalent list of independent minus), and XOR lines space subdivision: divide space into voxels (or volum e elem ents); polygon primitives the num ber of voxels goes up with the cube of resolution, but not convex polygons: m ost graphics system s draw sim ple convex subdivide all the space at the sam e resolution; it is hom ogenous, polygons directory i.e., you don’t need detailed inform ation in any region of space that o triangles: always convex and simple contains the same thing throughout concave polygons: easier to decompose into triangles octrees: always broken in the m iddle along each of the 3 m aj or triangle strip or Tstrip: only 1 point is needed to specify each axes, and all voxels are always rectangular solids for storing 3D new triangle, often used to draw curve surfaces volumetric data o if each triangle is drawn individually, the shared corner m ay o quadtrees are 2D variations of octrees compute 6 times, mesh and strip avoid/reduce this overhead binary space partition (BSP) trees: if a block of space isn’t quad mesh homogenous, it’s broken into two blocks, this process continues complex shapes can be drawn by lots of simple primitives until either they are homogenous or a resolution limit is reached; in regular BSP trees, all blocks are rectangular solids; blocks can Modeling be cut in two by any arbitrary plane, which require less m odeling: the process of describing an object or scene so that we can subdivision, but m ore difficult to describe and the resulting eventually draw it (and makes it easy to draw) blocks are more difficult to manipulate m ost real objects are opaque and we can only see their surface, procedure m odels: described by a m ethod, or procedure, for surfaces are often easier to describe than volum es, m ost 3D producing prim itives when necessary instead of the prim itives rendering hardware can draw only surfaces themselves, and it is more compact than an explicit list of primitives; model types when the required level of detail isn’t know when the m odel is explicit surface m odel: an outright list of all surface elem ents, or created, the procedure can be perform ed after as necessary to patches, that make up a surface achieve the desired level of detail polygons: the predom inant m ethod for m odeling surface using fractals: functions that have infinite detail, e.g., Mandelbrot set tessellation, need find appropriate tessellation level and make function them smooth graftals: objects that are “grown” according to a strict recipe curved patches: m odel sm all regions of our curved surface with particle system s: the object is drawn as the tracks of large patches of the convenient m athem atical functions, can get a num bers of individual particles; each particle has a start location closer fit to the intended surface with fewer patches, m ore and a trajectory com pact and accurate, but need to decom pose into polygons for modeling issues rendering on hardware level of detail: trade-off between realistic pictures and com puting o biquadratic or bicubic patches resources/storages spline patches: a curved patch where the m athem atical function suitability: model choices is governed by a set of control points, the patch takes on a smooth shape based on the position of these control points Lighting o nonuniform rational b-spline (NURBS), B-spline, beta spline, a scene includes the objects and all the other stuff the com puter needs to etc. actually make a picture im plicit surface: described by a m athem atical function that can light: our brains get m any subtle shape cues from how the brightness of answer whether any point you ask about is to one side, or the other an object varies across its surface; shape perception works because light side, or on a surface; sim pler but need eventually surface points will doesn’t com e from all direction equally (otherwise, whiteout or have to found so that the surface can be drawn disorienting effect m ake features difficult to distinguish, e.g., in cloudy isosurfaces: 3D contour slow) directional light: specified with only a direction to the light and an Z-buffer rendering: only the unoccluded surfaces are drawn by intensity, which apply everywhere in the scene, e.g., sunlight m aintaining an additional value (the Z-value) in each bitm ap pixel point light: light intensity