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Assignment

Orthographic Orthographic
Wireframe Wireframe
Elevation End-Elevation

Orthographic Perspective
Wireframe View
Plan
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Assignment (cont…)
Your application must include the following:
– Four different views of a scene:
• An orthographic wireframe elevation of the scene which
does not change
• An orthographic wireframe plan of the scene which does not
change
• An orthographic wireframe end-elevation of the scene which
does not change
• A perspective view of the scene in which the user should be
able to move the camera
– A scene composed of at least the following:
• 1 teapot
• Ten different objects
• One animating object
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Assignment (cont…)
– At least one light source
– At least one bitmap textured surface
– Controls (using whatever modality you see fit,
e.g. keyboard, mouse etc) that allow a user
to:
• Turn on and off the lights in the scene
• Navigate around the perspective view of the
scene
• Reset the view of the scene to the initial position
– A representation in each of the orthographic
views of the camera position used in the 3-D
perspective view
– Correct resizing of the window
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Assignment (cont…)
– JAZZ! A considerable portion of the marks
(20%) for this assignment will be awarded for
doing something interesting in the application
beyond what is given as the minimum
requirements. Examples might include:
• Using models designed in 3DS
max/Milkshape/Maya
• Adding interesting effects such as particle
systems
• Adding clever use of lighting – for example have
the light source appear to be the lamp in the
scene in figure 1
• Add a sky box
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Assignment (cont…)
Assignment submission deadline: 8th
December, 2006
Submission of the assignment will be
through WebCT

Any Questions?
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CGames

The 9th International Conference on Computer

Games: AI, Animation, Mobile, Educational &
Serious Games will be held at DIT from the
22nd – 24th of November
All DIT students are allowed attend all
sessions free of charge – graphics
labs/lectures will be rearranged to
accommodate this – more to follow
For more: www.comp.dit.ie/cgames
Computer Graphics 10:
3D Object
Representations

Course Website: http://www.comp.dit.ie/bmacnamee

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Contents
In today’s lecture we are going to start to
look at how objects are modelled in 3D
– Polyhedra
– Quadric surfaces
– Sweep representations
– Constructive solid geometry methods
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Polyhedra
Objects are simply a set of surface polygons
that enclose an object interior
Simplest and fastest way to render objects
Often referred to as standard graphics
objects
In many cases packages allow us to define
objects as curved surfaces etc but actually
convert these to polygon meshes for display
To define polyhedra we simply define the
vertices of the polygons required
Images taken from Hearn & Baker, “Computer Graphics with OpenGL” (2004)

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Polyhedra (cont…)
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Quadric Surfaces
A frequently used class of objects are
quadric surfaces
These are 3D surfaces described using
quadratic equations
Quadric surfaces include:
– Spheres
– Ellipsoids
– Tori
– Paraboloids
– Hyperboloids
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Quadric Surfaces - Spheres
A spherical surface with radius r centred on
the origin is defined as the set of points (x, y,
z) that satisfy the equation
x y z r
2 2 2 2

This can also be done in parametric form

using latitude and longitude angles
x  r cos  cos 
  
y  r cos  sin  2 2
z  r sin     
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Quadric Surfaces – Spheres (cont…)

z axis

P ( x, y, z )
r
φ
θ

x axis y axis
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Sweep Representations
Sweep representations are useful for
constructing 3 dimensional objects that
possess translational, rotational or other
symmetries
Objects are specified as a 2 dimensional
shape and a sweep that moves that shape
through a region of space
Images taken from Hearn & Baker, “Computer Graphics with OpenGL” (2004)

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Sweep Representations - Examples
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Constructive Solid Geometry Methods

Constructive Solid Geometry (CSG)

performs solid modelling by generating a
new object from two three dimensional
objects using a set operation
Valid set operations include
– Union
– Intersection
– Difference
Images taken from Hearn & Baker, “Computer Graphics with OpenGL” (2004)

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17

Inter
Diffe
r e

sect
n

io
ce

n
Constructive Solid Geometry Methods
(cont…)
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Constructive Solid Geometry Methods
25 (cont…)
CSG usually starts with a small set of
primitives such as blocks, pyramids, spheres
and cones
Two objects re initially created and
combined using some set operation to
create a new object
This object can then be combined with
another primitive to make another new
object
This process continues until modelling
complete
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Constructive Solid Geometry Methods
25 (cont…)
CSG models are
CSG
Object usually represented
as CSG trees
oper1 oper3

obj1 obj2 obj4 oper2

obj2 obj3
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25 (cont…)
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Ray-Casting
Ray-casting is typically used to implement
CSG operators when objects are described
with boundary representations
Ray casting is applied by determining the
objects that are intersected by a set of
parallel lines emanating from the xy plane
along the z axis
The xy plane is referred to as the firing
plane
Images taken from Hearn & Baker, “Computer Graphics with OpenGL” (2004)

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Ray-Casting (cont…)
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Ray-Casting (cont…)
Surface intersections along each ray are
calculated and these are sorted according to
distance from the firing plane
The surface limits for the composite object
are then determined by the specified set
operation
Images taken from Hearn & Baker, “Computer Graphics with OpenGL” (2004)

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Ray Casting Example
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Summary
In today’s lecture we began to look at how
objects are modelled in 3D
Polyhedra are by far the most common
modelling technique, but there are many
others
Often more exotic modelling techniques are
used in a modelling phase, but the resultant
models are converted to polyhedra before
rendering
Next time we will look at more modelling
techniques