The CG Tutorial: The Definitive Guide to Programmable Real-Time Graphics

"Cg is the key to unlocking the power of a new generation of programmable graphics hardware. This book is the definitive introduction to Cg, and will be essential for anyone programming high-quality real-time graphics. The Cg Tutorial will teach you to use Cg to create effects never before available for real-time applications."
--Larry Gritz, Author of Advanced RenderMan (Morgan Kaufmann, 2000)

"An important and timely book: Pixel-level procedural textures--animated clouds, fire, water, the whole bag of procedural tricks--finally go from the movie screen to the desktop. Access to computation of this power through a C-like language will usher in an exciting new era for the graphics community."
--Ken Perlin, Professor, New York University

Cg (C for graphics) is a complete programming environment for the fast creation of special effects and real-time cinematic quality experiences on multiple platforms. By providing a new level of abstraction, Cg lets developers more directly target OpenGL®, DirectX®, Windows®, Linux, Mac OS X®, and console platforms, such as the Xbox™, without having to program directly to the graphics hardware assembly language. Cg was developed by NVIDIA® Corporation in close collaboration with Microsoft® Corporation, and is compatible with both the OpenGL API and Microsoft's HLSL for DirectX 9.0.

 

The Cg Tutorial explains how to implement both basic and advanced techniques for today's programmable GPU architectures.

 

Major topics covered include:

3D transformations

Per-vertex and per-pixel lighting

Skinning and key-frame interpolation

Environment mapping

Bump mapping

Fog

Performance optimization

Projective texturing

Cartoon shading

Compositing

 

The accompanying CD-ROM includes the tools needed to run the sample programs in the book.

Randima (Randy) Fernando is Manager of Developer Education at NVIDIA.

Mark J. Kilgard is a Senior Software Engineer at NVIDIA.