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Computer Graphics:  2011-2012

Information

Lecturer	Stephen Cameron
Degrees	Part A Options — Computer Science Schedule B1 — Computer Science Schedule B1 — Mathematics and Computer Science
Term	Michaelmas Term 2011  (16 lectures)

Overview

This course is an introductory course in Computer Graphics, and covers a wide range of the field of interactive computer graphics at all levels of abstraction, and with emphasis on both theory and practise. It follows a standard textbook in the field, with additional material used to keep the course up-to-date.

Learning outcomes

Knowledge and understanding

• Understanding of the fundamentals of the modern computer graphics pipeline
• The mathematics of affine transformations in three dimensions
• Manipulation of lighting effects 
• Application of mathematics to graphics systems

Practical skills

• Ability to program low-level scan-conversion of simple shapes
• Working knowledge of a modern 3D graphics library via the practical assignments 
• Ability to produce usable graphics user-interfaces
• Ability to write programs from a practical specification and produce realistic graphics output
• GPU programming

Synopsis

The following are major topics that will be covered. (Numbers in brackets give an approximation to the number of lecture hours spent on the topic.)

• Fundamentals of graphics hardware and software (3).
• Essential algorithms: line generation, solid area display, transformations, clipping, projection (5).
• Abstraction, and simple examples of libraries of graphics functions (2).
• Modelling of 3-dimensional solids, and display of parametric curves (2).
• Rendering techniques and colour and lighting models (3).
• Input devices, interactive techniques, and the human-machine interface (1).

There is practical work to supplement the lecture material; the course does assume previous experience of practical programming in a high-level procedural language, and simple knowledge of matrices and vectors. The practicals themselves will be in Java, or using Java-like syntax (GPU).

Syllabus

The following are major topics that will be covered. (Numbers in brackets give an approximation to the number of lecture hours spent on the topic.)

• Fundamentals of graphics hardware and software (3).
• Essential algorithms: line generation, solid area display, transformations, clipping, projection (5).
• Abstraction, and simple examples of libraries of graphics functions (2).
• Modelling of 3-dimensional solids, and display of parametric curves (2).
• Rendering techniques and colour and lighting models (3).
• Input devices, interactive techniques, and the human-machine interface (1).

There is practical work to supplement the lecture material; the course does assume previous experience of practical programming in a high-level procedural language, and simple knowledge of matrices and vectors. The practicals themselves will be in Java, or using Java-like syntax (GPU).

Reading list

The new main course text is

• Interactive Computer Graphics: A Top-Down Approach with Shader-Based OpenGL by Shreiner and Angel, Pearson Education ISBN 9780273752264, 61 GBP (41 GBP Amazon)

Supplemental Reading

There are many text books on computer graphics.  Two you are likely to find in College libraries are

• "Introduction to Computer Graphics" by J D Foley, A Van Dam, S K Feiner, J F Hughes and R L Phillips, Addison-Wesley, ISBN 0201609215
• "Computer Graphics: Principles and Practice" by Foley, Van Dam, Feiner, & Hughes, Addison-Wesley ISBN 0201848406

Another recent book is

• "Computer Graphics with OpenGL" by Hearn, Baker and Carithers, ISBN 978-0132484572