Product Description
Thoroughly revised, this third edition focuses on modern techniques used to generate synthetic three-dimensional images in a fraction of a second. With the advent or programmable shaders, a wide variety of new algorithms have arisen and evolved over the past few years.

This edition discusses current, practical rendering methods used in games and other applications. It also presents a solid theoretical framework and relevant mathematics for the field of interactive computer graphics, all in an approachable style.

Amazon.com Review
One would think that the title of Tomas Moller's and Eric Haines's book, Real-Time Rendering, would be a contradiction in terms. How can such a computationally intensive process as rendering computer graphics ever hope to be done on the fly, in the blink of an eye, without delay--in short, in real time?

The term rendering, as it applies to computer graphics, refers to the mathematically intensive process of creating a picture or sequence of frames based on geometry. The duration of this process is dependent on the complexity of the scene (a forest with many trees and thousands of leaves will take much longer to render than a scene consisting of a white box over a gray background) and the speed of the hardware doing the calculations.

When Pixar's Toy Story was first released, the computer animation community was all abuzz with how it was done, and someone at Pixar mentioned that over 100 SGI workstations were used for rendering the frames over the course of almost two years. Someone else extrapolated this data and figured out that the same movie could have been rendered on one contemporary PC over the course of about 80 years.

The authors deftly answer the question, not only asserting that it can be done, but since this book is a programmer's guide, they list snippets of programming algorithms that help outline how it can be done.

Because the software and hardware is constantly and rapidly evolving due to the insatiable need for more realistic and complex graphics, the book avoids getting too specific. To quote the authors, "The field is rapidly evolving, and so it is a moving target." This lack of specificity doesn't detract from the usefulness of the book, though. Instead, it works at a higher, more abstract level, describing approaches to rendering techniques using generic algorithms. It is up to the programmer to apply these methods to the specific program or system on which it is to be implemented.

Real-Time Rendering describes some very complex methods, and this book is not for the average computer graphics creator. However, if you are working in an industry that depends on real-time rendered animation--like the gaming, medical, or military fields--or you are building the next-generation real-time render engine, this book will offer insight and concepts you can use to build some impressive software. --Mike Caputo

CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 4.5 based on 35 reviews)

must-have

Must-have for anyone who cares about real-time rendering. It will save you a lot of time -- trust me
September 19, 2008

No source code. This makes this book absolutely meaningless.

The primarily reason to buy that book was reviews. There is no CD and no examples. So if you are a developer and want to see some code or examples, do not waste money on it. I think I am the only one who gave this book 1 star. This makes this book absolutely meaningless.
December 19, 2007

how to live without it

Real-time rendering is a perfect resource to bring always :) with you and read something about this world.

I find it really useful and elegant and complete
January 24, 2007

Everything I was looking for

I acually read this book cover to cover theres alot of information in the book and its a great book to refer back to. Its really good as a companion with OpenGL. theres some directx stuff in it too but there seems to be more with OpenGL references.
March 25, 2006

High level presentation of rendering techniques

This is not a book of algorithms on computer graphics methods. Instead, it is a comprehensive high-level survey of rendering techniques for making the graphics appear to occur in real time. This book has a very academic tone to it, and with the exception of chapter 3 which is on matrix transforms, it has precious few implementation details. Some reviewers have called it a successor to Foley and Van Dam's classic text, but I find this misleading. That book is primarily about computer graphics techniques, and is not that concerned with real-time issues. The bibliography of this book is extensive and impressive, and if you are doing research on the subject it is probably essential, especially if you are interested in the subject of virtual reality where real-time presentation is a must. However, if you are just looking for pseudocode or more "cool effects" to insert into a game or graphics program you are writing/programming you would do best to look elsewhere.
January 01, 2006

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