Computer graphics is a sub-field of computer science which studies methods for digitally synthesizing and manipulating visual content. Although the term often refers to the study of three-dimensional computer graphics, it also encompasses two-dimensional graphics and image processing.

Overview

Computer graphics studies manipulation of visual and geometric information using computational techniques. It focuses on the ''mathematical'' and ''computational'' foundations of image generation and processing rather than purely

aesthetic Aesthetics (also spelled esthetics) is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature of beauty and taste, which in a broad sense incorporates the philosophy of art.Slater, B. H.Aesthetics ''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy,'' , acces ...

issues. Computer graphics is often differentiated from the field of visualization, although the two fields have many similarities. Connected studies include: *

Applied mathematics Applied mathematics is the application of mathematics, mathematical methods by different fields such as physics, engineering, medicine, biology, finance, business, computer science, and Industrial sector, industry. Thus, applied mathematics is a ...

* Computational geometry * Computational topology *

Computer vision Computer vision tasks include methods for image sensor, acquiring, Image processing, processing, Image analysis, analyzing, and understanding digital images, and extraction of high-dimensional data from the real world in order to produce numerical ...

Image processing An image or picture is a visual representation. An image can be two-dimensional, such as a drawing, painting, or photograph, or three-dimensional, such as a carving or sculpture. Images may be displayed through other media, including a pr ...

Information visualization Data and information visualization (data viz/vis or info viz/vis) is the practice of designing and creating Graphics, graphic or visual Representation (arts), representations of a large amount of complex quantitative and qualitative data and i ...

* Scientific visualization Applications of computer graphics include: * Print design * Digital art * Special effects *

Video game A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...

s *

Visual effects Visual effects (sometimes abbreviated as VFX) is the process by which imagery is created or manipulated outside the context of a live-action shot in filmmaking and video production. The integration of live-action footage and other live-action fo ...

History

There are several international conferences and journals where the most significant results in computer graphics are published. Among them are the SIGGRAPH and Eurographics conferences and the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Transactions on Graphics journal. The joint Eurographics and

ACM SIGGRAPH ACM SIGGRAPH is the international Association for Computing Machinery's Special Interest Group on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques based in New York. It was founded in 1969 by Andy van Dam (its direct predecessor, ACM SICGRAPH was ...

symposium series features the major venues for the more specialized sub-fields: Symposium on Geometry Processing, Symposium on Rendering, Symposium on Computer Animation, and High Performance Graphics. As in the rest of computer science, conference publications in computer graphics are generally more significant than journal publications (and subsequently have lower acceptance rates).

Subfields

A broad classification of major subfields in computer graphics might be: #

Geometry Geometry (; ) is a branch of mathematics concerned with properties of space such as the distance, shape, size, and relative position of figures. Geometry is, along with arithmetic, one of the oldest branches of mathematics. A mathematician w ...

: ways to represent and process surfaces #

Animation Animation is a filmmaking technique whereby still images are manipulated to create moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Animati ...

: ways to represent and manipulate motion # Rendering:

algorithm In mathematics and computer science, an algorithm () is a finite sequence of Rigour#Mathematics, mathematically rigorous instructions, typically used to solve a class of specific Computational problem, problems or to perform a computation. Algo ...

s to reproduce light transport # Imaging: image acquisition or image editing

Geometry

The subfield of geometry studies the representation of three-dimensional objects in a discrete digital setting. Because the appearance of an object depends largely on its exterior, boundary representations are most commonly used. Two dimensional surfaces are a good representation for most objects, though they may be non-

manifold In mathematics, a manifold is a topological space that locally resembles Euclidean space near each point. More precisely, an n-dimensional manifold, or ''n-manifold'' for short, is a topological space with the property that each point has a N ...

. Since surfaces are not finite, discrete digital approximations are used. Polygonal meshes (and to a lesser extent subdivision surfaces) are by far the most common representation, although point-based representations have become more popular recently (see for instance the Symposium on Point-Based Graphics). These representations are ''Lagrangian,'' meaning the spatial locations of the samples are independent. Recently, ''Eulerian'' surface descriptions (i.e., where spatial samples are fixed) such as level sets have been developed into a useful representation for deforming surfaces which undergo many topological changes (with fluids being the most notable example). Geometry subfields include: * Implicit surface modeling – an older subfield which examines the use of algebraic surfaces, constructive solid geometry, etc., for surface representation. * Digital geometry processing – surface reconstruction, simplification, fairing, mesh repair, parameterization, remeshing, mesh generation, surface compression, and surface editing all fall under this heading.
CS 598: Digital Geometry Processing (Fall 2004)
* Discrete differential geometry – a nascent field which defines geometric quantities for the discrete surfaces used in computer graphics. * Point-based graphics – a recent field which focuses on points as the fundamental representation of surfaces. * Subdivision surfaces * Out-of-core mesh processing – another recent field which focuses on mesh datasets that do not fit in main memory.

Animation

The subfield of animation studies descriptions for surfaces (and other phenomena) that move or deform over time. Historically, most work in this field has focused on parametric and data-driven models, but recently physical simulation has become more popular as computers have become more powerful computationally. Animation subfields include: * Performance capture * Character animation * Physical simulation (e.g. cloth modeling, animation of

fluid dynamics In physics, physical chemistry and engineering, fluid dynamics is a subdiscipline of fluid mechanics that describes the flow of fluids – liquids and gases. It has several subdisciplines, including (the study of air and other gases in motion ...

, etc.)

Rendering

Rendering generates images from a model. Rendering may simulate light transport to create realistic images or it may create images that have a particular artistic style in non-photorealistic rendering. The two basic operations in realistic rendering are transport (how much light passes from one place to another) and scattering (how surfaces interact with light). Rendering subfields include: *

Transport Transport (in British English) or transportation (in American English) is the intentional Motion, movement of humans, animals, and cargo, goods from one location to another. Mode of transport, Modes of transport include aviation, air, land tr ...

describes how illumination in a scene gets from one place to another. Visibility is a major component of light transport. * Scattering: Models of ''

scattering In physics, scattering is a wide range of physical processes where moving particles or radiation of some form, such as light or sound, are forced to deviate from a straight trajectory by localized non-uniformities (including particles and radiat ...

'' (how light interacts with the surface ''at a given point'') and '' shading'' (how material properties vary across the surface) are used to describe the appearance of a surface. In graphics these problems are often studied within the context of rendering since they can substantially affect the design of rendering algorithms. Descriptions of scattering are usually given in terms of a bidirectional scattering distribution function (BSDF). The latter issue addresses how different types of scattering are distributed across the surface (i.e., which scattering function applies where). Descriptions of this kind are typically expressed with a program called a shader. (There is some confusion since the word "shader" is sometimes used for programs that describe local ''geometric'' variation.) * Non-photorealistic rendering * Physically based rendering – concerned with generating images according to the laws of

geometric optics Geometry (; ) is a branch of mathematics concerned with properties of space such as the distance, shape, size, and relative position of figures. Geometry is, along with arithmetic, one of the oldest branches of mathematics. A mathematician ...

* Real-time rendering – focuses on rendering for interactive applications, typically using specialized hardware like GPUs * Relighting – recent area concerned with quickly re-rendering scenes

Notable researchers

* Arthur Appel * James Arvo * Brian A. Barsky * Jim Blinn * Jack E. Bresenham * Loren Carpenter *

Edwin Catmull Edwin Earl Catmull (born March 31, 1945) is an American computer scientist and animator who served as the co-founder of Pixar and the President of Walt Disney Animation Studios. He has been honored for his contributions to 3D computer graphics, ...

* James H. Clark * Robert L. Cook * Franklin C. Crow * Paul Debevec * David C. Evans * Ron Fedkiw * Steven K. Feiner * James D. Foley * David Forsyth * Henry Fuchs * Andrew Glassner * Henri Gouraud (computer scientist) * Donald P. Greenberg * Eric Haines * R. A. Hall * Pat Hanrahan * John Hughes * Jim Kajiya * Takeo Kanade * Kenneth Knowlton * Marc Levoy * Martin Newell (computer scientist) * James O'Brien * Ken Perlin * Matt Pharr * Bui Tuong Phong * Przemyslaw Prusinkiewicz * William Reeves * David F. Rogers * Holly Rushmeier * Peter Shirley * James Sethian * Ivan Sutherland * Demetri Terzopoulos * Kenneth Torrance * Greg Turk * Andries van Dam * Henrik Wann Jensen * Gregory Ward * John Warnock * J. Turner Whitted * Lance Williams

Applications for their use

Bitmap Design / Image Editing *

Adobe Photoshop Adobe Photoshop is a raster graphics editor developed and published by Adobe Inc., Adobe for Microsoft Windows, Windows and macOS. It was created in 1987 by Thomas Knoll, Thomas and John Knoll. It is the most used tool for professional digital ...

* Corel Photo-Paint * GIMP * Krita Vector drawing *

Adobe Illustrator Adobe Illustrator is a vector graphics editor and Computer-aided design, design software developed and marketed by Adobe Inc., Adobe. Originally designed for the Apple Inc., Apple Mac (computer), Macintosh, development of Adobe Illustrator began ...

* CorelDRAW *

Inkscape Inkscape is a vector graphics editor. It is used for both artistic and technical illustrations such as cartoons, clip art, logos, typography, diagrams, and flowcharts. It uses vector graphics to allow for sharp printouts and renderings at ...

* Affinity Designer * Sketch Architecture * VariCAD * FreeCAD * AutoCAD * QCAD * LibreCAD * DataCAD * Corel Designer Video editing *

Adobe Premiere Pro Adobe Premiere Pro is a video editing application developed by Adobe Inc. and is distributed as part of the Adobe Creative Cloud suite. It is primarily used for producing high-quality videos across various industries. History Original A ...

* Sony Vegas * Final Cut *

DaVinci Resolve DaVinci Resolve is a proprietary color grading, color correction, visual effects, and audio post-production video editing application for macOS, Windows, and Linux, developed by Australian company Blackmagic Design. It was originally deve ...

* Cinelerra * VirtualDub Sculpting, Animation, and 3D Modeling * Blender 3D * Wings 3D * ZBrush * Sculptris * SolidWorks * Rhino3D * SketchUp * 3ds Max * Cinema 4D * Maya * Houdini Digital composition * Nuke * Blackmagic Fusion *

Adobe After Effects Adobe After Effects is a digital visual effects, motion graphics, and compositing application developed by Adobe Inc.; it is used for animation and in the post-production process of film making, video games and television production. Amo ...

* Natron Rendering * V-Ray *

RedShift In physics, a redshift is an increase in the wavelength, and corresponding decrease in the frequency and photon energy, of electromagnetic radiation (such as light). The opposite change, a decrease in wavelength and increase in frequency and e ...

* RenderMan * Octane Render * Mantra * Lumion (Architectural visualization) Other applications examples * ACIS - geometric core * Autodesk Softimage * POV-Ray * Scribus *

Silo A silo () is a structure for storing Bulk material handling, bulk materials. Silos are commonly used for bulk storage of grain, coal, cement, carbon black, woodchips, food products and sawdust. Three types of silos are in widespread use toda ...

* Hexagon * Lightwave

References

External links

A Critical History of Computer Graphics and Animation
*

Industry

Industrial labs doing "blue sky" graphics research include:
Adobe Advanced Technology LabsMERLMicrosoft Research – GraphicsNvidia Research
Major film studios notable for graphics research include:
ILMPDI/Dreamworks AnimationPixar
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