Course content

This course will teach you the fundamental techniques and underlying principles of computer graphics and interaction. We will start from a high abstraction level and look at the core processes underlying image generation. We will proceed to derive different mathematical models for describing this process based on different approximations of the underlying physical process. During the course you will implement some different interactive graphics techniques, noting the benefits and drawbacks of each approach.

In order to be able to successfully participate in the course you will need to do quite a lot of programming. However, this is not a programming course: we will assume that you are capable of using C and C++ as a tool and that you are capable of finding information regarding this on your own. If you wish to do some study to prepare for the course, making sure that you are proficient in C/C++ would be a good idea. We will provide a lecture detailing the development environment for the labs and aim to highlight some the important programming concepts necessary.

The course content involves the following themes:

Ray-tracing and Image Synthesis

Mathematics for Computer Graphics

Lighting and Shading

Global Illumination

Rasterisation

Animation

Scene Management