Book Image

Mathematics for Game Programming and Computer Graphics

By : Penny de Byl
5 (1)
Book Image

Mathematics for Game Programming and Computer Graphics

5 (1)
By: Penny de Byl

Overview of this book

Mathematics is an essential skill when it comes to graphics and game development, particularly if you want to understand the generation of real-time computer graphics and the manipulation of objects and environments in a detailed way. Python, together with Pygame and PyOpenGL, provides you with the opportunity to explore these features under the hood, revealing how computers generate and manipulate 3D environments. Mathematics for Game Programming and Computer Graphics is an exhaustive guide to getting “back to the basics” of mathematics, using a series of problem-based, practical exercises to explore ideas around drawing graphic lines and shapes, applying vectors and vertices, constructing and rendering meshes, and working with vertex shaders. By leveraging Python, Pygame, and PyOpenGL, you’ll be able to create your own mathematics-based engine and API that will be used throughout to build applications. By the end of this graphics focussed book, you’ll have gained a thorough understanding of how essential mathematics is for creating, rendering, and manipulating 3D virtual environments and know the secrets behind today’s top graphics and game engines.
Table of Contents (26 chapters)
1
Part 1 – Essential Tools
9
Part 2 – Essential Trigonometry
14
Part 3 – Essential Transformations
20
Part 4 – Essential Rendering Techniques

Summary

In this chapter, the fundamental elements of a graphics rendering engine were explored. It was a whirlwind introduction to numerous concepts that will be thrashed out in later chapters but was essential to gaining an overview of how to move our coding structure forward.

We began by looking at the complexities of the main game loop and the many processes an object moves through to be updated and drawn. Using this knowledge, we then added component functionality to the objects in our project to ready them for the expansion of the engine we are developing. In addition, we also explored how time is an essential controlling component of the main loop and added this practicality to the code base. There was more programming in this chapter than mathematics, but again, a lot of it was laying down a good base on which to build our mathematics functionality.

In the next chapter, we will add functionality to our application that will cater to user input through the integration...