The Evolution of 3D Graphicse

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Slide 2 of 20

Notes:

Graphics APIs have evolved as hardware and customer requirements have evolved.

In the early eighties, state of the art consisted of raster terminals plugged into minicomputers and mainframes. Graphics applications were developed in FORTRAN using the CORE standard implementation called DI-3000. Developers were limited to primitives (lines, polylines, polygons, etc) and wireframe surfaces.

With the advent of workstations, graphics capabilities increased dramatically. Developers were now using the C programming language and making calls to PHIGS and PEX libraries. They were able to take advantage of display list technology and some solids modeling capabilities.

As workstations became more powerful and object-oriented programming gained in popularity, developers migrated to C++ and OpenGL became the defacto standard for 3D graphics development. Workstations capabilities routinely included texture mapping, additional controls over the rendering process, and lighting models.

Now we are entering the network age where collaboration is the key. Everyone wants to share information across the network. Developers are flocking to the Java programming environment, and don't want to be bothered with platform-specific rendering details.

The key point is that the advent of a new paradigm doesn't signal the demise of its predecessor . OpenGL will continue to be used for many years to come, and is, in fact, used by Java 3D as a device interface to the hardware.