Book Image

Real-Time 3D Graphics with WebGL 2 - Second Edition

By : Farhad Ghayour, Diego Cantor
5 (1)
Book Image

Real-Time 3D Graphics with WebGL 2 - Second Edition

5 (1)
By: Farhad Ghayour, Diego Cantor

Overview of this book

As highly interactive applications have become an increasingly important part of the user experience, WebGL is a unique and cutting-edge technology that brings hardware-accelerated 3D graphics to the web. Packed with 80+ examples, this book guides readers through the landscape of real-time computer graphics using WebGL 2. Each chapter covers foundational concepts in 3D graphics programming with various implementations. Topics are always associated with exercises for a hands-on approach to learning. This book presents a clear roadmap to learning real-time 3D computer graphics with WebGL 2. Each chapter starts with a summary of the learning goals for the chapter, followed by a detailed description of each topic. The book offers example-rich, up-to-date introductions to a wide range of essential 3D computer graphics topics, including rendering, colors, textures, transformations, framebuffers, lights, surfaces, blending, geometry construction, advanced techniques, and more. With each chapter, you will "level up" your 3D graphics programming skills. This book will become your trustworthy companion in developing highly interactive 3D web applications with WebGL and JavaScript.
Table of Contents (14 chapters)

WebGL as a State Machine: Buffer Manipulation

When dealing with buffers for the getParameter, getBufferParameter, and isBuffer functions, new information about the state of the rendering pipeline becomes available to us.

Similar to Chapter 1, Getting Started, we will use getParameter(parameter), where parameter can have the following values:

  • ARRAY_BUFFER_BINDING: Retrieves a reference to the currently-bound VBO
  • ELEMENT_ARRAY_BUFFER_BINDING: Retrieves a reference to the currently-bound IBO

We can also query the size and the usage of the currently-bound VBO and IBO using getBufferParameter(type, parameter), where type can have the following values:

  • ARRAY_BUFFER: To refer to the currently-bound VBO
  • ELEMENT_ARRAY_BUFFER: To refer to the currently-bound IBO

And parameter can have the following values:

  • BUFFER_SIZE: Returns the size of the requested buffer
  • BUFFER_USAGE: Returns...