3D Game Engine Design, Second
Edition: A Practical Approach to
Real-Time Computer Graphics (The
Morgan Kaufmann Series in
Interactive 3D Technology) by David
H. Eberly
Everything You Need, And Then Some
Aimed at the working Visual C++ game developer, 3D Game Engine
Design provides a tour of mathematical techniques for 3-D graphics, and
the source code thats used to implement them in state-of-the-art video
game engines. If you work in the game industry (or would like to), this
book will serve you well, because it delivers excellent best practices for
algorithms and programming techniques thatll help your software keep up
with the competition. This text is a virtual encyclopedia of expertise

thats based on the authors own work and research in the gaming
industry. It provides the mathematical notation, algorithms, and C++ code
(on the accompanying CD-ROM) that are needed to build fast and
maintainable game engines. Early sections start with the basics, with the
math thats used to work with common 3-D objects (like spheres and
boxes). Highlights include a high-powered review of quaternion algebra--in
many cases, the preferred way to transform 3-D data. The chapters on
graphics pipelines explain the math thats behind representing and
rendering a 3-D world in 2-D with intervening effects like lighting and
texture mapping. A variety of current algorithms are provided for
representing 3-D scenes, efficient picking (which allows a programmer to
determine the object in a 3-D world that has been selected), and collision
detection (in which objects collide virtually). In the game software of
today, curves--and not individual triangles or polygons--often are used to
represent 3-D objects. Algorithms that are used to turn curves into
rendered surfaces are provided, too. Later sections look at the current
thinking about animation techniques for characters (including key frames,
inverse kinematics, and skinning (in which digital skin is fitted over digital
bone to create more realistic-looking movement)). How to represent
terrain inside virtual worlds also is explained. The book closes with
excellent material on such cutting-edge special effects as lens flare and
projected shadows, which can add an extra level of realism to a video
game. An appendix examines guidelines for designing object-oriented
game software in C++. Filled with mathematical insight and expert code
that puts each principle or algorithm to work, 3D Game Engine Design
provides an expert view of what goes into building a state-of-the-art game
engine. --Richard Dragan Topics covered: Mathematical methods and
sample source code for 3-D game development Geometrical
transformations Coordinate systems Quaternions Euler angles Standard
3-D objects: spheres, oriented boxes, capsules, lozenges, cylinders,
ellipsoids Distance methods for a variety of shapes Introduction to the
graphics pipeline Model and world coordinates Projecting perspective
Camera models Culling techniques Surface and vertex attributes
Rasterizing Efficiency issues for clipping and lighting Hierarchical scene
representation, using trees and scene graphs Picking algorithms for a
variety of 3-D shapes Collision detection for static and dynamic graphical
objects Oriented bounding-box (OBB) trees Basics of curves and special
curves (including Bezier curves and various splines) Curves (generating
surfaces from curves by using different techniques) Character animation,
using keyframe animation and inverse kinematics Skinning Geometrical
level of detail considerations Techniques for generating game terrain
Spatial sorting and binary space partitioning (BSP) Special effects: lens
flare, bump mapping, volumetric fogging, projected light and shadows,
particle systems, morphing techniques C++ language features for
effective object-oriented design Reference to the numerical methods
required for game mathematics
Personal Review: 3D Game Engine Design, Second Edition: A
Practical Approach to Real-Time Computer Graphics (The

Morgan Kaufmann Series in Interactive 3D Technology) by David
H. Eberly
Are you a professional or student working in game development? If you
are, then this book is for you. Author David H. Eberly has done an
outstanding job of writing a second edition of a book which focuses on the
design of the scene graph management system and its associated
rendering layer.
Eberly, begins this book by discussing the details of a rendering system,
including transformations, camera models, culling and clipping, rastering,
and issues regarding software versus hardware rendering and about
specific graphics application programmer interfaces in use these days. In
addition, the author discusses rendering from the perspective of actually
writing all of the subsystems for a software renderer. He also takes a look
at the essentials of organizing your data as a scene graph. Then, he
focuses on specifically designed nodes and subsystems of the scene
graph management system. The author then looks at some general
concepts you see in attempting to have physical realism in a three-
dimensional application. Next, he discusses a lot of mathematical detail for
much of the source code you will find in Wild Magic. Then, he takes a brief
look at the basic principles of object-oriented design and programming.
The author continues by discussing memory management. Finally, he
takes a look at a handful of sample shaders and the applications that use
them.
This most excellent book is very much enhanced, describing the
foundations for shader programming and how an engine can support it.
Perhaps more importantly, the book is the most comprehensive reference
available for the development of shader-based 3D graphics engines!
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3D Game Engine Design, Second Edition: A Practical Approach to Real-Time Computer
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Eberly 5 Star Customer Reviews and Lowest Price!