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ShaderX4: Advanced Rendering Techniques (Graphics Series)

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ShaderX4: Advanced Rendering Techniques (Graphics Series) (Hardcover)

by Wolfgang Engel (Author)

4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)

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Editorial Reviews

Product Description
The ShaderX series provides a complete toolbox of cutting-edge advanced graphics hardware and software techniques for all levels of graphics programmers, from novices to graphics gurus.

With the increasing pixel shader power of current graphics cards, techniques that were once done on the CPU or simply avoided due to their expense are now possible, and this latest volume of the ShaderX series is filled with articles that provide methods for performing these techniques. The collection covers state-of-the-art, shader rendering techniques that will bring your graphics to a new level of realism. Throughout the book you’ll find a plethora of all new, ready-to-use solutions and tools for the many graphics programming challenges you face everyday. These solutions will save valuable programming time, helping to make you more efficient and productive.

Throughout the collection you’ll find: * How to simulate cloth on the GPU * How to use ambient occlusion efficiently in a game environment * Several global illumination approaches suitable for current hardware platforms * How to do real-time caustics on the GPU * Several ways for how to make your shadow penumbra software for shadow volumes and shadow maps * Tips for using the D3DXEffects framework efficiently and how to integrate post processing * Real-time damage system that uses a damage map to store damage data * Snow rendering * Procedural generation of textures * Tricks, tips, and techniques for super shader, a light map precomputation tool that stores radiosity light maps, and a system for debugging and optimizing applications

And much more… This is an indispensable series that should be on ever graphics programmer’s bookshelf!

Sections Included: Geometry Manipulation: Kenneth Hurley Image Space: Natalya Tatarchuk 3D Engine Design: Tom Forsyth Environmental Effects: Matthias Wloka Rendering Techniques: Sebastian St. Laurent Shadows: Eric Haines Beyond Pixels & Triangles: Dean Calver Tools, Tips, and Tricks: Wolfgang Engel

On the CD: The CD-ROM contains the example programs with source code accompanying the chapters, along with demos where applicable.

System Requirements: Pentium IV/ATHLON with more than 1/5 GHz, DirectX 9 June 2005 update SDK, OpenGL 1.5-compatible graphics card, a DirectX8, 8.1, or 9.0-compatible graphics card, Windows XP with the latest service pack, Visual C++ .NET 2003, (some files require Visual Studio C/C++ 6.0), 512MB RAM, 500MB of free space on your hard drive, and the latest graphics card drivers.

About the Author
Wolfgang Engel is a Senior Special FX Engineering at wings Simulations. He is the editor of the ShaderX book series and the author Programming Vertex and Pixel Shaders. Wolfgang is a frequent speaker at conferences world-wide and publishes articles on several Web sites.

Product Details

Hardcover: 640 pages
Publisher: Charles River Media; 1 edition (January 12, 2006)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1584504250
ISBN-13: 978-1584504252
Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 7.3 x 1.6 inches
Shipping Weight: 2.6 pounds

Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)

Amazon.com Sales Rank: #356,386 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)
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#19 in Books > Computers & Internet > Graphic Design > Rendering & Ray Tracing

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	30% buy the item featured on this page: ShaderX4: Advanced Rendering Techniques (Graphics Series) 4.3 out of 5 stars (6)
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	17% buy ShaderX5: Advanced Rendering Techniques 5.0 out of 5 stars (1) $37.77

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Customer Reviews

6 Reviews

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Average Customer Review

4.3 out of 5 stars (6 customer reviews)

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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Perhaps could be better, March 19, 2007

By	M. Duncan "Micky D" (Australia) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Whilst the content is quite good it probably isn't on par with some other books by say Matt Pharr, books from ACM or Academic Press I think the biggest issue with the book is that the quality of the paper is a bit below par and all images are black and white.

Normally black and white isn't a problem, but when the book is about graphics and there is a statement in the book like (e.g.) "...notice the unique HLSL effect on the blue ball compared to the green..." it makes it a bit difficult. Even a color plate section would have been nice.

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9 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars showoffs, June 23, 2006

By	Stylianou Soteris "Invest in Yourself" (Cyprus) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I was disappointed not to find any code - only demos of applications on a few of the chapters (e.g radiosity tool, gpu terrain). IMHO it is better to have fewer topics/chapters and better coverage of each topic, with source code etc. As M. Severino 's review correctly states 'Each article is a source of ideas ', so don't expect to learn how to implement all the techniques in the book.
Some authors have included lots of code, others have included none.
I vote against the "*gems-style" books, more attention to the educational side of these books is needed. Flashy programmers who want to show off please go elsewhere.

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3 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The State of the Art in Advanced Graphics Programming, March 2, 2006

By	John Matlock "Gunny" (Winnemucca, NV) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This is the fourth edition in this series of books on advanced graphics.

This book is a collection of forty-three articles around the common theme of shading images in real time. Many of these effects have been common in the movie world for many years, but in that application the shading can be done on very expensive machines and the time it takes to produce an image is not important because the resulting image is to be shown on screen rather than immediately on a display. Now, with the increasing power in the PC's in widespread use, these techniques are being brought down to the standard desktop.

In this book a wide selection of authors discuss the start of the art in shading. They are, for the most part, active professionally in the graphics display business. A number of them work for video card companies, a number work for gaming companies, or for companies producing software used in gaming. Many are involved with the computer science departments of universities around the world where the most advanced image programming is being researched.

This approach provides for a fast time to print, rather than one author taking a year to write the book. In this industry a year is a lifetime, well, at least a generation in the software.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Good series
Its hard for me to treat the books of this series separately (ShaderX 3, ShaderX 4, ShaderX 5). They are all very good books of GPU-Gems level or higher. Read more

Published on May 13, 2007 by Petr Sikachev

5.0 out of 5 stars Advanced graphics hardware and software techniques
Wolfgang Engel edits SHADER X4: ADVANCED RENDERING TECHNIQUES, a toolbox of advanced graphics hardware and software techniques for any student of graphics programming. Read more

Published on March 16, 2006 by D. Donovan, Editor/Sr. Reviewer

5.0 out of 5 stars It's a great book
This book is the best than previous editions.
Each article is a source of ideas for developing your engine or demo. Read more

Published on March 7, 2006 by M. Severino

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