| "Even though I've worked with these systems for years, I found new ways of looking at several topics that make them easier to remember and use. For someone new to 3D programming, it is extremely usefulit gives them a solid background in pretty much every area they need to understand." Peter Lipson, Toys for Bob, Inc.
Based on the authors popular tutorials at the Game Developers Conference, Essential Mathematics for Games and Interactive Applications presents the core mathematics necessary for sophisticated 3D graphics and interactive physical simulations. The book begins with linear algebra and matrix manipulation and expands on this foundation to cover such topics as texture filtering, interpolation, animation, and basic game physics. Essential Mathematics focuses on the issues of 3D game development important to programmers and includes optimization guidance throughout.
Features
*Covers concepts in sufficient detail for a programmer to understand the foundations of 3D without feeling overwhelmed by proofs and theory
*Companion CD-ROM with code examples built around a shared code base, including a math library covering all the topics presented in the book, a core vector/matrix math engine, and libraries to support basic 3D rendering and interaction
*Provides guidance for students trying to understand how games are actually developed, including optimization techniques
About the Author
James M. Van Verth is a founding member of Red Storm Entertainment, a division of Ubisoft, where he has been a lead engineer for six years. For the past five years he also has been a regular speaker at the Game Developers Conference, teaching the all-day tutorial "Essential Math for Programmers," on which this book is based. He began his game industry career at Virtus Corporation, working as a sound and graphics engineer for the title Tom Clancy: SSN. His first position at Red Storm was as project lead and designer of Tom Clancy's Politika, the first commercial Java game. This was followed by the land warfare game Force 21 where he acted as lead engineer, focusing on 3D graphics, vehicle physics, and pathfinding. His latest role at Red Storm is rendering technology lead for a well-known squad combat franchise. His background includes a B.A. in mathematics and computer science from Dartmouth College, an M.S. in computer science from the State University of New York at Buffalo, and a M.S. in computer science from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. This is his first book. Lars M. Bishop is an engineer in the Handheld Developer Technologies group at NVIDIA. Prior to joining NVIDIA, Lars was the Chief Technology Officer at Numerical Design Limited, leading the development of the Gamebryo3D cross-platform game engine. He received a BS in Math/Computer Science from Brown University and an MS in Computer Science from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His outside interests include photography, drumming, and playing bass guitar. |
