Book Image

OpenGL 4.0 Shading Language Cookbook

Book Image

OpenGL 4.0 Shading Language Cookbook

Overview of this book

The OpenGL Shading Language (GLSL) is a programming language used for customizing parts of the OpenGL graphics pipeline that were formerly fixed-function, and are executed directly on the GPU. It provides programmers with unprecedented flexibility for implementing effects and optimizations utilizing the power of modern GPUs. With version 4.0, the language has been further refined to provide programmers with greater flexibility, and additional features have been added such as an entirely new stage called the tessellation shader. The OpenGL Shading Language 4.0 Cookbook provides easy-to-follow examples that first walk you through the theory and background behind each technique then go on to provide and explain the GLSL and OpenGL code needed to implement it. Beginning level through to advanced techniques are presented including topics such as texturing, screen-space techniques, lighting, shading, tessellation shaders, geometry shaders, and shadows. The OpenGL Shading Language 4.0 Cookbook is a practical guide that takes you from the basics of programming with GLSL 4.0 and OpenGL 4.0, through basic lighting and shading techniques, to more advanced techniques and effects. It presents techniques for producing basic lighting and shading effects; examples that demonstrate how to make use of textures for a wide variety of effects and as part of other techniques; examples of screen-space techniques, shadowing, tessellation and geometry shaders, noise, and animation. The OpenGL Shading Language 4.0 Cookbook provides examples of modern shading techniques that can be used as a starting point for programmers to expand upon to produce modern, interactive, 3D computer graphics applications.
Table of Contents (16 chapters)
OpenGL 4.0 Shading Language Cookbook
Credits
About the Author
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
Index

Implementing per-vertex ambient, diffuse, and specular (ADS) shading


The OpenGL fixed function pipeline implemented a default shading technique which is very similar to the one presented here. It models the light-surface interaction as a combination of three components: ambient, diffuse, and specular. The ambient component is intended to model light that has been reflected so many times that it appears to be emanating uniformly from all directions. The diffuse component was discussed in the previous recipe, and represents omnidirectional reflection. The specular component models the shininess of the surface and represents reflection around a preferred direction. Combining these three components together can model a nice (but limited) variety of surface types. This shading model is also sometimes called the Phong reflection model (or Phong shading model), after Bui Tuong Phong.

An example of a torus rendered with the ADS shading model is shown in the following screenshot:

The ADS model is...