OpenGL Programming Guide: The Official Guide to Learning OpenGL, Versions 3.0 and 3.1, Seventh Edition

Chapter 1. Introduction to OpenGL

Chapter Objectives

After reading this chapter, you’ll be able to do the following:

• Appreciate in general terms what OpenGL does

• Identify different levels of rendering complexity

• Understand the basic structure of an OpenGL program

• Recognize OpenGL command syntax

• Identify the sequence of operations of the OpenGL rendering pipeline

• Understand in general terms how to animate graphics in an OpenGL program

This chapter introduces OpenGL. It has the following major sections:

• “What Is OpenGL?” explains what OpenGL is, what it does and doesn’t do, and how it works.

• “A Smidgen of OpenGL Code” presents a small OpenGL program and briefly discusses it. This section also defines a few basic computer-graphics ...