Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #157776 in Books
• Published on: 2002-06-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 429 pages

Synopsis
This book covers fundamental 3D fundamental maths concepts that are especially useful for computer game developers and programmers. The authors discuss the mathematical theory in detail and then provide the geometric interpretation necessary to make 3D maths intuitive. Working C++ classes illustrate how to put the techniques into practice, and exercises at the end of each chapter help to reinforce the concepts.

Customer Reviews

Amazing for begineers and advanced programmers
Beginners:

I would like to start off by saying that if you are a complete beginner, then you have come to the right place. This book is amazing in its introduction of maths concepts to beginner 3D programmers. The way that the author has written this book means that you won't be left with gappy knowledge on this already complex subject. Beginners will come away from this book knowing a good deal of the 3D math necessary for a game today.

Advanced:

Advanced users will not find the book as rewarding as beginners but will definitly learn a few new tricks. I personally found that the little concepts I new in vectors was deeply clarified by the author

Negatives:

Lack of CD and unavailable code via the URL when I looked..Buy this NOW!

Exceptionally good book
The authors of this book is a game programmer and a professor of Computer Science. This team is excellent!

The game programmer has alot of focus on making the material understandable, and the professor has focus on the mathematically correct semantics. Unlike other books, that teaches game programming (of which many have an author with his strength on either field), this book has the right blend of understandable text parred with the right mathematical semantics.

Furthermore the text is supported by code, so if you are shaky on some of the math, you can see the implementation in C++ code.

As a total math newbie, this book helped me alot, and today I understand totally and in detail what is going on in my 3D programming.

An ABSOLUTE MUST, if you want to learn 3D on top level.

Highly recommended
I love this book, and it has payed off very well for me.
The author has a remarkable skill to explain even the most difficult subjects in a way that everyone understands. For example, The Cartesian coordinate system is abstracted to a system of roads.
However, this simplification is not an issue for intermediate/advanced programmers or math students. All topics are provided with formulas and concise material; making this book good for everyone.
Topics covered (but not limited to) vectors, coordination systems, dot-product, cross-product, quaternions, matrices, Auler-angles, bsp-trees, screen projection, culling, bounding-boxes (and a load of other intersection tests).

Still I missed something. The author(s) also covers gourad shading, texture mapping and several other techniques, but they don't go into depth. Different lighting models were given a formula at best, which fortunately is good enough for me. Just don't expect the book to be API-specific or contain information about rendering methods.
The source code which came with the book compiled, but looks awful and very messy. The source code works very well as a reference, but it you are buying the book mainly for the code; don't. I hope they'll update their source code from the webpage soon.

Conclusion: This is a very good book to start with. It contains all the linear algebra math you'll need to start with 3D-programming, and is explained remarkably well. Yet the simplification is nevertheless no con for non-beginners, which will probably use this book as a reference laying on their desktop at all times :-)