Computer graphics is a sub-field of computer science which studies methods for digitally synthesizing and manipulating visual content. Although the term often refers to the study of three-dimensional computer graphics, it also encompasses two-dimensional graphics and image processing. The individuals who serve as professional designers for computers graphics are known as "Graphics Programmers", who often are computer programmers with skills in computer graphics design.

Overview

Computer graphics studies the aesthetic manipulation of visual and geometric information using computational techniques. It focuses on the ''mathematical'' and ''computational'' foundations of image generation and processing rather than purely

aesthetic Aesthetics, or esthetics, is a branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of beauty and taste, as well as the philosophy of art (its own area of philosophy that comes out of aesthetics). It examines aesthetic values, often expressed t ...

issues. Computer graphics is often differentiated from the field of visualization, although the two fields have many similarities. Connected studies include: *

Applied mathematics Applied mathematics is the application of mathematical methods by different fields such as physics, engineering, medicine, biology, finance, business, computer science, and industry. Thus, applied mathematics is a combination of mathemati ...

* Computational geometry *

Computational topology Algorithmic topology, or computational topology, is a subfield of topology with an overlap with areas of computer science, in particular, computational geometry and computational complexity theory. A primary concern of algorithmic topology, as it ...

Computer vision Computer vision is an interdisciplinary scientific field that deals with how computers can gain high-level understanding from digital images or videos. From the perspective of engineering, it seeks to understand and automate tasks that the human ...

* Image processing * Information visualization * Scientific visualization Applications of computer graphics include: * Print design *

Digital art Digital art refers to any artistic work or practice that uses digital technology as part of the creative or presentation process, or more specifically computational art that uses and engages with digital media. Since the 1960s, various name ...

* Special effects *

Video game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This feedba ...

s *

Visual effects Visual effects (sometimes abbreviated VFX) is the process by which imagery is created or manipulated outside the context of a live-action shot in filmmaking and video production. The integration of live-action footage and other live-action foota ...

History

There are several international conferences and journals where the most significant results in computer graphics are published. Among them are the SIGGRAPH and Eurographics conferences and the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Transactions on Graphics journal. The joint Eurographics and ACM SIGGRAPH symposium series features the major venues for the more specialized sub-fields: Symposium on Geometry Processing, Symposium on Rendering, Symposium on Computer Animation, and High Performance Graphics. As in the rest of computer science, conference publications in computer graphics are generally more significant than journal publications (and subsequently have lower acceptance rates).

Subfields

A broad classification of major subfields in computer graphics might be: #

Geometry Geometry (; ) is, with arithmetic, one of the oldest branches of mathematics. It is concerned with properties of space such as the distance, shape, size, and relative position of figures. A mathematician who works in the field of geometry is c ...

: ways to represent and process surfaces # Animation: ways to represent and manipulate motion # Rendering:

algorithm In mathematics and computer science, an algorithm () is a finite sequence of rigorous instructions, typically used to solve a class of specific problems or to perform a computation. Algorithms are used as specifications for performing ...

s to reproduce light transport # Imaging: image acquisition or image editing

Geometry

The subfield of geometry studies the representation of three-dimensional objects in a discrete digital setting. Because the appearance of an object depends largely on its exterior, boundary representations are most commonly used. Two dimensional surfaces are a good representation for most objects, though they may be non- manifold. Since surfaces are not finite, discrete digital approximations are used. Polygonal meshes (and to a lesser extent subdivision surfaces) are by far the most common representation, although point-based representations have become more popular recently (see for instance the Symposium on Point-Based Graphics). These representations are ''Lagrangian,'' meaning the spatial locations of the samples are independent. Recently, ''Eulerian'' surface descriptions (i.e., where spatial samples are fixed) such as level sets have been developed into a useful representation for deforming surfaces which undergo many topological changes (with fluids being the most notable example). Geometry subfields include: * Implicit surface modeling – an older subfield which examines the use of algebraic surfaces, constructive solid geometry, etc., for surface representation. * Digital geometry processing – surface reconstruction, simplification, fairing, mesh repair, parameterization, remeshing, mesh generation, surface compression, and surface editing all fall under this heading.
CS 598: Digital Geometry Processing (Fall 2004)
* Discrete differential geometry – a nascent field which defines geometric quantities for the discrete surfaces used in computer graphics. * Point-based graphics – a recent field which focuses on points as the fundamental representation of surfaces. * Subdivision surfaces * Out-of-core mesh processing – another recent field which focuses on mesh datasets that do not fit in main memory.

Animation

The subfield of animation studies descriptions for surfaces (and other phenomena) that move or deform over time. Historically, most work in this field has focused on parametric and data-driven models, but recently

physical simulation Dynamical simulation, in computational physics, is the simulation of systems of objects that are free to move, usually in three dimensions according to Newton's laws of dynamics, or approximations thereof. Dynamical simulation is used in compute ...

has become more popular as computers have become more powerful computationally. Animation subfields include: * Performance capture * Character animation * Physical simulation (e.g. cloth modeling, animation of

fluid dynamics In physics and engineering, fluid dynamics is a subdiscipline of fluid mechanics that describes the flow of fluids— liquids and gases. It has several subdisciplines, including ''aerodynamics'' (the study of air and other gases in motion) a ...

, etc.)

Rendering

Rendering generates images from a model. Rendering may simulate light transport to create realistic images or it may create images that have a particular artistic style in non-photorealistic rendering. The two basic operations in realistic rendering are transport (how much light passes from one place to another) and scattering (how surfaces interact with light). See

Rendering (computer graphics) Rendering or image synthesis is the process of generating a photorealistic or non-photorealistic image from a 2D or 3D model by means of a computer program. The resulting image is referred to as the render. Multiple models can be defined ...

for more information. Rendering subfields include: * Transport describes how illumination in a scene gets from one place to another. Visibility is a major component of light transport. * Scattering: Models of '' scattering'' (how light interacts with the surface ''at a given point'') and ''

shading Shading refers to the depiction of depth perception in 3D models (within the field of 3D computer graphics) or illustrations (in visual art) by varying the level of darkness. Shading tries to approximate local behavior of light on the object ...

'' (how material properties vary across the surface) are used to describe the appearance of a surface. In graphics these problems are often studied within the context of rendering since they can substantially affect the design of rendering algorithms. Descriptions of scattering are usually given in terms of a

bidirectional scattering distribution function The definition of the BSDF (bidirectional scattering distribution function) is not well standardized. The term was probably introduced in 1980 by Bartell, Dereniak, and Wolfe. Most often it is used to name the general mathematical function which de ...

(BSDF). The latter issue addresses how different types of scattering are distributed across the surface (i.e., which scattering function applies where). Descriptions of this kind are typically expressed with a program called a shader. (Note that there is some confusion since the word "shader" is sometimes used for programs that describe local ''geometric'' variation.) * Non-photorealistic rendering * Physically based rendering – concerned with generating images according to the laws of geometric optics *

Real-time rendering Real-time computer graphics or real-time rendering is the sub-field of computer graphics focused on producing and analyzing images in Real-time computing, real time. The term can refer to anything from rendering an application's graphical user ...

– focuses on rendering for interactive applications, typically using specialized hardware like GPUs * Relighting – recent area concerned with quickly re-rendering scenes

Notable researchers

* Arthur Appel * James Arvo * Brian A. Barsky * Jim Blinn * Jack E. Bresenham * Loren Carpenter * Edwin Catmull * James H. Clark * Robert L. Cook *

Franklin C. Crow Franklin C. (Frank) Crow is a computer scientist who has made important contributions to computer graphics, including some of the first practical spatial anti-aliasing techniques. Crow also proposed the shadow volume technique for generating geo ...

* Paul Debevec *

David C. Evans David Cannon Evans (February 24, 1924 – October 3, 1998) was the founder of the computer science department at the University of Utah and co-founder (with Ivan Sutherland) of Evans & Sutherland, a pioneering firm in computer graphics hardwar ...

* Ron Fedkiw * Steven K. Feiner * James D. Foley * David Forsyth *

Henry Fuchs Henry Fuchs (born 20 January 1948 in Tokaj, Hungary) is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (AAAS) and the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and the Federico Gil Professor of Computer Science at the University of Nor ...

* Andrew Glassner * Henri Gouraud (computer scientist) *

Donald P. Greenberg Donald Peter Greenberg (born 1934) is the Jacob Gould Schurman Professor of Computer Graphics at Cornell University. Early life Greenberg earned his undergraduate and Ph.D. degrees from Cornell University, where he played on the tennis and socce ...

* Eric Haines * R. A. Hall *

Pat Hanrahan Patrick M. Hanrahan (born 1954) is an American computer graphics researcher, the Canon USA Professor of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering in the Computer Graphics Laboratory at Stanford University. His research focuses on rendering ...

* John Hughes * Jim Kajiya * Takeo Kanade * Kenneth Knowlton *

Marc Levoy Marc Levoy is a computer graphics researcher and Professor Emeritus of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at Stanford University, a vice president and Fellow at Adobe Inc., and (until 2020) a Distinguished Engineer at Google. He is noted ...

Martin Newell (computer scientist) Martin Edward Newell is a British-born computer scientist specializing in computer graphics who is perhaps best known as the creator of the Utah teapot computer model. Career Before emigrating to the US, he worked at what was then the Compute ...

* James O'Brien *

Ken Perlin Kenneth H. Perlin is a professor in the Department of Computer Science at New York University, founding director of the Media Research Lab at NYU, director of the Future Reality Lab at NYU, and the Director of the Games for Learning Institute. He ...

* Matt Pharr * Bui Tuong Phong * Przemyslaw Prusinkiewicz * William Reeves * David F. Rogers * Holly Rushmeier *

Peter Shirley Peter Shirley (born 1963) is an American computer scientist and computer graphics researcher. He is a Distinguished Scientist at NVIDIA and adjunct professor at the University of Utah in computer science. He has made extensive contributions to i ...

* James Sethian * Ivan Sutherland * Demetri Terzopoulos * Kenneth Torrance * Greg Turk * Andries van Dam * Henrik Wann Jensen * Gregory Ward * John Warnock *

J. Turner Whitted John Turner Whitted is an electrical engineer and computer scientist who introduced recursive ray tracing to the computer graphics community with his 1979 paper "An improved illumination model for shaded display". His algorithm proved to be a prac ...

* Lance Williams

Applications for their use

Bitmap Design / Image Editing * Adobe Photoshop * Corel Photo-Paint * GIMP *

Krita Krita ( ) is a free and open-source raster graphics editor designed primarily for digital art and 2D animation. The software runs on Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, and ChromeOS, and features an OpenGL-accelerated canvas, colour management su ...

Vector drawing * Adobe Illustrator * CorelDRAW * Inkscape * Affinity Designer * Sketch Architecture *

VariCAD VariCAD is a computer program for 3D/2D CAD and mechanical engineering which has been developed since 1988 in the Czech Republic. VariCAD runs on Windows and Linux. It features many tools for 3D modeling and 2D drafting. VariCAD provides supp ...

* FreeCAD * AutoCAD *

QCAD QCAD is a computer-aided design (CAD) software application for 2D design and drafting. It is available for Linux, Apple macOS, Unix and Microsoft Windows. The QCAD GUI is based on the Qt framework. QCAD is partly released under the GNU Genera ...

* LibreCAD * DataCAD * Corel Designer Video editing * Adobe Premiere Pro * Sony Vegas * Final Cut * DaVinci Resolve * Cinelerra * VirtualDub Sculpting, Animation, and 3D Modeling * Blender 3D * Wings 3D * ZBrush *

Sculptris Sculptris is a virtual sculpting software program, with a primary focus on the concept of modeling clay. It entered active development in early December 2009, and the most recent release was in 2011. Users can pull, push, pinch, and twist virtu ...

SolidWorks SolidWorks is a solid modeling computer-aided design (CAD) and computer-aided engineering (CAE) application published by Dassault Systèmes. According to the publisher, over two million engineers and designers at more than 165,000 companies w ...

* Rhino3D * SketchUp *

Houdini Harry Houdini (, born Erik Weisz; March 24, 1874 – October 31, 1926) was a Hungarian-American escape artist, magic man, and stunt performer, noted for his escape acts. His pseudonym is a reference to his spiritual master, French magician ...

3ds Max Autodesk 3ds Max, formerly 3D Studio and 3D Studio Max, is a professional 3D computer graphics program for making 3D animations, models, games and images. It is developed and produced by Autodesk Media and Entertainment. It has modeling capab ...

Cinema 4D Cinema 4D is a 3D software suite developed by the German company Maxon. Overview As of R21, only one version of Cinema 4D is available. It replaces all previous variants, including BodyPaint 3D, and includes all features of the past 'Studio' ...

* Maya *

Digital composition * Nuke *

Blackmagic Fusion Blackmagic Fusion (formerly eyeon Fusion and briefly Maya Fusion, a version produced for Alias-Wavefront) is post-production image compositing developed by Blackmagic Design and originally authored by eyeon Software. It is typically used to crea ...

* Adobe After Effects * Natron Rendering *

V-Ray V-Ray is a biased computer-generated imagery rendering software application developed by Bulgarian software company Chaos . V-Ray is a commercial plug-in for third-party 3D computer graphics software applications and is used for visualizati ...

* RedShift * RenderMan * Octane Render *

Mantra A mantra ( Pali: ''manta'') or mantram (मन्त्रम्) is a sacred utterance, a numinous sound, a syllable, word or phonemes, or group of words in Sanskrit, Pali and other languages believed by practitioners to have religious, ...

* Lumion (Architectural visualization) Other applications examples * ACIS - geometric core * Autodesk Softimage * POV-Ray * Scribus * Silo *

Hexagon In geometry, a hexagon (from Greek , , meaning "six", and , , meaning "corner, angle") is a six-sided polygon. The total of the internal angles of any simple (non-self-intersecting) hexagon is 720°. Regular hexagon A '' regular hexagon'' has ...

* Lightwave

References

External links

A Critical History of Computer Graphics and Animation

Industry

Industrial labs doing "blue sky" graphics research include:
Adobe Advanced Technology LabsMERLMicrosoft Research – GraphicsNvidia Research
Major film studios notable for graphics research include:
ILMPDI/Dreamworks AnimationPixar
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