13. Miscellaneous: hardware,...
Brock University
COSC 3P98 Computer Graphics
Instructor: Brian J. Ross
Hardware: 3D accelerators for the consumer market
- The two major manufacturers of 3D graphics cards:
- NVidia
- AMD (Canadian company, was ATI, then Radeon)
- typical features
- 60+ frames per second
- hardware polygon transformations, clipping, perspective projection,
lighting calculations, triangularization of polygons: per vertex
- hardware scan-conversion of triangles: per pixel
- textures: computationally intensive, and important in games
- texture lookup table: video RAM stores textures; need fast processing!
- basically a "texture pallette"
- graphics card will grab textures from main memory w/o CPU interference
(bus mastering)
- various texture mappings supported, including transparency
- vertex shaders: graphics hardware "machine language" for a variety of effects... particles, key frames, fur, ...
- pixel shaders: lighting and texture control
- hardware Z-buffering
- fog, blending, antialiasing, shadows,...
- Includes 2D graphics engine (for windows, other applications)
- 4K support
- NVidia GeForce RTC 4070 Ti
- Stream processors (cores): 7680
- Core clock: 2310 MHz (2360 MHz boost)
- Memory: 12 GB
- Memory clock: 21 Gbps
- $1100 CA
- NVidia GeForce RTX 4090
- Stream processors (cores): 16384
- Core clock: 2235 MHz
- Memory: 24 GB
- Memory clock: 21 Gbps
- $2100 CA
Game consoles
Comparison of different game console specs.
Nintendo Switch
- CPU: NZvidia cusom Tegra SOC: ARM 4 Cortex-A57 @ 1.02 GHz
- 4 GB memory @ 1331/1600 MHz
- GPU: 256 Maxwell CUDA cores @ 207 MHz (undocked) - 768 MHz (docked)
- Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
- Switch @ Wikipedia
Playstation 4 Pro
- CPU: x86-64 AMD Jaguar, dual 4 core, 2.1 GHz
- GPU: AMD GCN, 2304 cores, 4.2 TFlops
- price: $500
Playstation 5
- CPU: x86-64 AMD Ryzen Zen, 8 cores, 3.5 GHz (variable)
- GPU: AMD Radeon RDNA 2-based
- Ray tracing acceleration! Up to 2.22 GHz, 10.3 TFLOPS
- price: $630
- More info.
A selection of products
- 3D animation:
- 2D graphics:
- Post-production video editing:
- Multimedia authoring
- Adobe Flash: scripting
language for creating multimedia presentations (web)
Conclusion
- graphics advancing at fast rate, mostly due to hardware advances
- advances in microprocessor technology = better, faster graphics
- software technology likewise advancing
- the realtime 3D graphics normally only available on high-end graphics
workstations, is now commonplace on home PC's, game consoles, cell phones,...
- 3D cards with pixel and vertex shaders, graphics pipelines, OpenGL drivers
- Convergence of television, computers, gaming, internet...
- If you are interested in a career in graphics...
- Most common jobs: app development, GUI, data visualization
- others: games and entertainment, 2D and 3D applications, animation, Web programming
- Data visualization is an important application area: big data, data science & analytics.
- Graduate degree(s) specializing in graphics/visualization is worth considering.
It gives you more credentials in a competitive job market.
- Most jobs in game industry fall into 3 categories:
- Programmers, computer scientists (computer science degrees)
- Artists (fine arts degrees)
- Producers: directors, business, project leaders (film school, long-time game industry experience)
- Additionally, programming jobs in graphics/game companies often involve writing
tools for the artists, special FX modules, etc.
- Casual gaming is a big area.
- In any case, be sure to:
- a) stay on top of current technology: subscribe to (online) graphics mags and
journals; join SIGGRAPH.
- b) study advanced graphics on your own. This course has passed you the ball... now run with it!
wLI>c) Get a good handle on mathematics, especially linear algebra and calculus! Expand your library.
- d) DIVERSIFY... study art, drama, literature, history. Companies want
employees with not only specialist technical abilities, but breadth of interests!
- e) Stay on top of AI -- it will affect graphics, animation, games, programming (well, everything!).
- f) Doggedly follow your interests. They makes life interesting. Doing so might set a career path for you.
May you live in interesting times.
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COSC 3P98 Computer Graphics
Brock University
Dept of Computer Science
Copyright © 2023 Brian J. Ross
(Except noted figures).
http://www.cosc.brocku.ca/Offerings/3P98/course/lectures/misc/
Last updated: December 4, 2023