The Cg Tutorial: The Definitive Guide to Programmable Real-Time Graphics

Chapter 4. Transformations

When you write vertex or fragment programs, it is important to understand the coordinate systems that you are working with. This chapter explains the transformations that take place in the graphics pipeline, without going into detail about the underlying mathematics. The chapter has the following two sections:

• “Coordinate Systems” explains the various coordinate systems used to represent vertex positions as they are transformed prior to rasterization.

• “Applying the Theory” describes how to apply the theory of coordinate systems and matrices in Cg.

Coordinate Systems

The purpose of the graphics pipeline is to create images and display them on your screen. The graphics pipeline takes geometric data representing an object or ...