Book Description
Until recently, application developers have had no choice but to use the graphics hardware as built by hardware developers. The programming interfaces (APIs) simply exposed the underlying capabilities of the hardware. If the hardware didn't do something quite the way an application wanted it done, there was no alternative but to accept what the hardware could do. More recently, graphics hardware has become more flexible. Developers have been eager to exploit this flexibility. Within the last year or so, it's become clear that the right answer for OpenGL is to expose the new functionality in the form of a high-level programming language - the new OpenGL Shading Language, developed by 3Dlavis, Inc., is the answer. This book is the official guide to this new language. It is both a tutorial and a reference, and is filled with many practical examples that will help developers learn the language as well as create shaders to suit their own needs. The author is at the very center of this technology, serving on the OpenGL ARB and leading the team at 3Dlabs responsible for defining and implementing the next iteration of OpenGL. This is the one book all graphics developers will need in order to learn about this important new advance in graphics programming.
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Back Cover Copy
"The author has done an excellent job at setting the stage for shader development, what the purpose is, how to do it, and how it all fits together."
—Jeffery GalinovskyStrategic Software Program Manager, Intel Corporation
The OpenGL® Shading Language, a high-level procedural shading language for OpenGL®, is the most important new development in graphics programming to emerge in years. OpenGL is the leading cross-platform 3D-graphics API, and the OpenGL Shading Language allows developers to take total control over the most important stages of the graphics-processing pipeline.
OpenGL® Shading Language is the experienced application programmer's guide to writing shaders. Part reference, part tutorial, this book thoroughly explains the shift from fixed-functionality graphics hardware to the new era of programmable graphics hardware and the additions to the OpenGL API that support this programmability. With OpenGL and shaders written in the OpenGL Shading Language, applications can perform better, achieving stunning graphics effects by utilizing the capabilities of both the visual processing unit and the central processing unit.
In this book, you will find a detailed introduction to the OpenGL Shading Language and the new OpenGL function calls that support it. The text begins by describing the syntax and semantics of this high-level programming language. Once this foundation has been established, the book explores the creation and manipulation of shaders using new OpenGL function calls.
OpenGL® Shading Language features extensive examples of shaders and their underlying algorithms, including
- Procedural texturing
- Noise
- Particle systems
- Hatching
- Analytic antialiasing
- Image processing
The color plate section illustrates the power and sophistication of the OpenGL Shading Language. The API Function Reference at the end of the book is an excellent quick reference to the API entry points that support the OpenGL Shading Language. An enhanced online index allows readers to quickly and easily search the entire text for specific topics.
--Ce texte fait référence à l’édition
Broché
.