Lectures for CMSC 427: Introduction to Computer Graphics

This page has pointers to the material covered in each lecture and will be updated throughout the semester. The lecture notes appearing on this page are copyrighted by Amitabh Varshney, except for images and slides that appear with appropriate credits. Use of these lecture notes by students of the class CMSC 427 at the University of Maryland is permitted for their educational purposes. Any other use requires permission of the author.

These course notes are visible only from umd.edu domains.

Following each lecture I have listed the approximate (but usually not exhaustive) coverage of the topics that we covered in our lectures from the textbook by Hearn and Baker. The following reading suggestions are for the case when you do not fully understand what was discussed in the lectures. Unfortunately, the following list does not cover everything discussed in the class (there is no perfect textbook yet).


August 31

Discussion of course policies and course plan
Motivation, Overview
applications, pipeline
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Chapter 1, Section 2.2

September 6

Graphics APIs
OpenGL, Event-Driven Computing, GLUT, Pixel Operations
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Sections 2.9, 3.1 to 3.4, 3.16, 3.19, 3.24, 4.1 to 4.3

September 8

Geometric Primitives and Transforms
basic linear algebra, 2D transforms, homogeneous coordinates, composition
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Chapter 5 and Appendix A-1 through A-5

September 13

2D and 3D Transformations
hierarchical transformations, 3D rotations
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Chapter 5

September 15

Line Scan-Conversion
overview, various alogrithms
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Sections 3.4, 3.5
Assignment 1 handed out.

September 20

3D Transformations and Viewing
parallel and perspective
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Chapter 7

September 22

3D Viewing and Picking
canonical views and selection
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Chapter 7

September 27

Polygon Scan-conversion
overview, algorithms
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Sections 3.14, 3.15

September 29

Color Spaces and Transparency
color models, gamma correction, dithering, blending
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Chapter 12
Assignment 2 handed out.

October 4

Cullings, Depth Cues, and Collisions
VFC, backface, coherences, collision detection techniques
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Sections 7.1, 9.2, 9.14 (collisions are not covered in textbook)

October 6

Visibility Determination
visibility techniques, Z-buffer, Painter's algorithm, Cells/Portals, BSP trees
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Sections 9.1, 9.3, 9.5, 9.6, 9.7, 9.14

October 11

Illumination and Shading
Ambient, Diffuse, Specular Illumination; Flat, Gouraud, Phong Shading
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Sections 10.1, 10.2, 10.3, 10.10, 10.20

October 13

Textures
Texture representations, Mapping, OpenGL texturing, Texturing generalizations
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Sections 10.13, 10.17, 10.18, and 10.21

October 18

Sampling and Filtering
aliasing causes, antialiasing
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Section 4.17

October 20

Midterm Recap
overview of the course
PDF(2), PDF(6)
Assignment 3 handed out.

October 25

Ray Tracing
overivew, acceleration approaches
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Section 10.11

November 1

Shadows
types, generation, mapping
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Section 10.6 (negligible coverage)

November 3

Global Illumination
radiosity and photon mapping
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Sections 10.12, 10.14
Assignment 4 handed out.

November 8 and 10

Modeling Overview
implicit, parametric, procedural, and CSG
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Sections 8.3, 8.4, 8.5, 8.7, 8.20, 8.24

November 10 and 15

Parametrics and Mesh LOD
piecewise interpolation, Bezier, B-Spline curves and surfaces, level of detail for meshes
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Sections 8.8, 8.9, 8.10, 8.11, 8.12, 8.13

November 17

Graphics Display Technology
human visual system, display technologies
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Sections 2.1, 2.2, 2.3

November 22

Graphics Processing Units
architecture, applications
PDF(2), PDF(6)

November 29

Point-based and Image-based Graphics
overview, applications
PDF(2), PDF(6)

December 1

Volume Rendering
applications, overview
PDF(2), PDF(6)
HB: Section 8.27

December 6

Virtual Environments
overview, technologies
PDF(2)
HB: Sections 2.1 (pages 48-50), 2.4, 11.5

December 8

Computer Animation
overview, quaternions
PDF(2), PDF(6), animations (winzip file)
HB: Sections 13.2 through 13.10

December 13

Course Recap
discussion of the course and the sample final exam
PDF(2), PDF(6)


December 19

Final Exam
CSI 1121, 10:30am - 12:30pm

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