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

Using multisample anti-aliasing


Anti-aliasing is the technique of removing or reducing the visual impact of aliasing artifacts that are present whenever high resolution or continuous information, is presented at a lower resolution. In real-time graphics, aliasing often reveals itself in the jagged appearance of polygon edges, or the visual distortion of textures that have a high degree of variation.

The following images show an example of aliasing artifacts at the edge of an object. On the left, we see that the edge appears jagged. This occurs because each pixel is determined to lie either completely inside the polygon, or completely outside it. If the pixel is determined to be inside, it is shaded, otherwise it is not. Of course, this is not entirely accurate. Some pixels lie directly on the edge of the polygon. Some of the screen area that the pixel encompasses actually lies within the polygon and some lies outside. Better results could be achieved if we were to modify the shading of...