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May 24

Final Projects - Great job, everybody!
Get QuickTime
Homework 3 Morphing Movie [High-res: 19 MB-Quicktime .mov]

Homework 3 Morphing Movie [Low-res: 5 MB-Quicktime .mov]

May 14
Lecture 14
Web page template for final projects

May 6
Lecture 13
George's slides

April 26
Note: Next class is on Thursday, May 2, same room (MD G125)
Lecture 12
Joel's slides

April 22
Lecture 11
Gershon's slides + demo
Final Projects requirements [99 kB-PDF]

April 11
Lecture 10

April 3
Lecture 9
Homework 3
Corrected BRDF slides [408 kB-PDF]

March 21
Homework 2 (Note: Updated version!) [129 kB-PDF]
Lecture 8
Updated Radiometry slides from lecture 7 [280 kB-PDF]

March 14
Lecture 7
Lecture 5 & 6


February 25
Lecture 4


February 13
Lecture 3
Homework 1 (New deadline: March 13)


February 7
New classroom: Maxwell-Dworkin G125
Lecture 2
Schedule of class presentations
How to prepare and give your talk [52 kb-PDF]


January 30
Lecture 1
Morphing video last year's class. Watch a scary movie...
QuickTime [3.2 MB-mov]

Lectures: Wednesday, 7:35-9:35 PM, Maxwell Dworkin G125 
Sections: Monday, 7:35-9:35 pm, Sever Hall 107
There will be no section unless requested by at least one student. Please send email to Jeroen (jeroen@merl.com) and wait for his confirmation on the class mailing list.
Virtual Office Hours: The TA will be online on weekends for certain periods of time. The exact time of the virtual office hours will be announced on the mailing list every Friday.

 

Hanspeter Pfister 
email: pfister@merl.com
MERL - A Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratory
201 Broadway
Cambridge, MA 02139
Office Phone: 617-621-7566 
URL: http://www.merl.com/people/pfister/

Lectures: Wednesday, 7:35-9:35 PM,  Maxwell Dworkin G125

Material for this course was gratefully contributed by the following people:

• Tom Funkhouser, Princeton University
• Oliver Staadt, ETH Zürich
• Markus Gross, ETH Zürich
• Anselmo Lastra, UNC

 

Teaching Assistant
Jeroen van Baar 
email: jeroen@merl.com 
MERL - A Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratory
201 Broadway
Cambridge, MA 02139
Office Phone: 617-621-7577 
URL: http://www.merl.com/people/jeroen/

Sections: Mondays, 7:35-9:35 PM, Sever Hall 107 
By appointment only! Send email to jeroen@merl.com.

Mailing List
Post message: e235@yahoogroups.com
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List owner: e235-owner@yahoogroups.com
URL: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/e235/

 

E-234, Introduction to Computer Graphics
We have been teaching E-234 in the fall since 1999. Have a look at the E-234 course pages. Here is a collage of images from the fall 2000 final class projects. We were very impressed with the results!

 

In this course we will discuss several advanced concepts and methods of three-dimensional computer graphics. The course builds directly on the course E-234 "Introduction to Computer Graphics". This is a programming class with the goal of providing you with sufficient background to write advanced computer graphics applications. Topics covered will include multi-resolution modeling, subdivision surfaces, image processing, image-based rendering, ray tracing, radiosity, and computer animation.

You must have completed CSCI E-234 "Introduction to Computer Graphics". Or you must have multiple years of experience in 3D computer graphics programming. This is an advanced course and we will assume that you are completely familiar with the topics taught in E-234. Please have a look at the E-234 syllabus to make sure you have the necessary computer graphics background.

You must have a couple of years of experience writing computer programs in C, C++, or Java. This is an advanced class and we will not have time to teach you basic programming skills. The programming effort for this class is substantial! Do not take this class if you have a heavy course load.

We will use C, C++, and OpenGL throughout the course.

Required Textbooks

Unfortunately, no single textbook covers all the material of this course. We will hand out class notes and photocopies of papers instead. And we highly recommend the textbooks below.

 

Recommended Textbooks

We recommend all books listed for E-234 "Introduction to Computer Graphics". The following books are available at the Harvard Coop:

Real-Time Rendering by Tomas Moller, Eric Haines (June 15, 1999), A K Peters Ltd; ISBN: 1568811012.

This is an excellent book about many aspects of computer graphics. I like the in-depth discussions and the breadth of the covered topics. The book also discusses many recently developed techniques.

 

Advanced Animation and Rendering Techniques : Theory and Practice by Alan H. Watt, Mark Watt (November 1992), Addison-Wesley Pub Co; ISBN: 0201544121.

A very good book about many advanced computer graphics topics. It does not include the latest research, but it is still one of the best books out there.

The following books may not be available at the Harvard Coop. Alternative book sellers include Quantum books, amazon.com, or Barnes and Noble.

Game Programming Gems by Mark DeLoura (Editor) (August 2000), Charles River Media; ISBN: 1584500492.

A nice book about many aspects of game programming, including real-time rendering gems. Not as comprehensive as the other books, but more practical.

Reading assignments will accompany the lectures.

None.

One presentation of a (set of) paper(s), three programming assignments, and a term project will be required of all students. A list of suggested papers and term projects will be provided. You are also free to do a project of your own devising, subject to approval. You need to discuss your paper with the TA one week before the presentation.

The programming assignments will be three week projects of appropriate scope. Each programming assignment should take thirty hours of work on average. The term project should take approximately forty hours.

All programming assignments have to be handed in electronically by noon on the due date. No extensions allowed, except per approval from us far in advance of the due date.

Collaboration on the assignments and final project is not allowed: What you turn in must be your own work. If you use somebody else's code as part of your solution you need to acknowledge it clearly.

Grade Percentage
Class / Mailing List Participation.........................................5%
Paper Presentation.............................................................10%
Homeworks......................................................................... 60%
Final Project........................................................................ 25% 

The most important grading criterion is functionality: A working program will always garner the majority of available points; no credit will be given for non-working programs. A modest solution that works will be graded much more favorably than an ambitious "solution" that core-dumps! The following secondary criteria will be used to differentiate among working programs: scope of the problem solved by your program; data structure and algorithm design; clarity and documentation of the code; efficiency and elegance of the implementation. 
 

This is a preliminary syllabus. The actual content of the course may slightly change, based on student interests.

• Introduction 
• Introductions: Instructor, TA 
• What is this course about? 
• Administrative matters 
• Overview
• Multiresolution Techniques
  • Overview
  • Mesh Datastructures
  • Top-Down Methods
  • Bottom-Up Methods
• QEM and ROAM
  • Heckbert and Garland's QEM
  • ROAM Terrain Rendering
  • Triangle Bintrees
  • Lindstrom's View-dependent Error Metric
• Progressive Meshes
  • Introduction
  • Edge Collapse / Vertex Split
  • View-Dependent PM
• Subdivision Surfaces
  • Introduction to Subdivision
  • Classic subdivision operators
  • Applications
• Image Processing
  • Sampling and Reconstruction
  • Convolution
  • Fourier Transforms
  • What is aliasing? 
  • Antialiasing 
    • Prefiltering 
    • Supersampling 
    • Stochastic Sampling 
  • Image Warping and Morphing
• Radiometry
  • Light
  • Radiometric Concepts
  • Light Transport
• BRDFs and the Rendering Equation
  • Irradiance
  • Parametric BRDF Models
  • The Rendering Equation
• Ray Tracing
  • Global Illumination
  • Recursive Ray Tracing
  • Monte Carlo Methods
  • Stratified Sampling
  • Distributed Ray Tracing
• Radiosity
• Mathematical Foundations
• Form Factors
• Solving the Matrix
• Meshing and Display
• Animation
  • Keyframe Animation
  • Kinematics and Dynamics
  • Physically-Based Animation
• Particle Systems
• Particle Systems
  • Differential Equations
  • Forces
  • Solvers
• Rigid Body Systems
  • States and State Derivatives
  • Rigid Body State
  • Rigid Body Equation of Motion
• Image-Based Rendering
  • Geometry vs. Images
  • Plenoptic Function and Plenoptic Rendering
  • Layered Depth Images
  • Light Field Rendering
  • Lumigraph
  • The Matrix
  • 3D Photography

The course notes are in Adobe Acrobat format and can be read with the free Adobe Acrobat Reader (.pdf). Postscript files can be viewed with the PostScript (.ps) Viewer for Windows.

January  2002
Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
27	28	29	30	31
			Class 1

 

February  2002
Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
					1	2
3	4	5	6	7	8	9
Registration Ends			Class 2
10	11	12	13	14	15	16
Late Registration Ends			Class 3 Neal HW 1 Out
17	18	19	20	21	22	23
			Class 4
24	25	26	27	28
			Class 5 Matt

 

March  2002
Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
					1	2
3	4	5	6	7	8	9
			Class 6
10	11	12	13	14	15	16
			Class 7
17	18	19	20	21	22	23
	Presidents Day		Class 8 Miriah HW 1 Due HW 2 Out
24	25	26	27	28	29	30
Spring Vacation

 

April  2002
Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
	1	2	3	4	5	6
			Class 9 HW 2 Due HW 3 Out
7	8	9	10	11	12	13
			Ben Class 10
14	15	16	17	18	19	20
			Gershon Class 11
21	22	23	24	25	26	27
			Joel Class 12 HW 3 Due Final Projects Out
28	29	30
Last day to drop for WD grade.

 

May  2002
Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
			1	2	3	4
			George Class 13
5	6	7	8	9	10	11
			Class 14
12	13	14	15	16	17	18
			Project Presentations Final Projects Due
19	20	21	22	23	24	25
26	27	28	29	30	31
			Grades Out

 

Here are some of the comments we received last year. Here are the evaluation statistics and the evaluation form. You can also look at the comments we received for E-234 in the fall of 2001.

• "The lectures were very informative. I like that we were able to choose which topics were covered. The demos / movies were helpful in understanding the material in class and HW."
• "Topics were interesting. Appreciated the commentary on current threads in computer graphics. Liked the guest lecture."
• "I think the lectures are great. You do a wonderful job making the material understandable, and you also do a good job of keeping the format interactive so the students remain interested and engaged. I can't really think of improvements - just keep up the good work."
• "I liked the fact that we covered some state of the art computer graphics topics (i.e., image-based rendering). I think the lectures were very good."
• "Probably focusing more on the practical issues and what is being done in the real world of the graphics industry would give us a better idea of what do we need to become part of it."
• "Having to present one paper in class was very helpful for me. It forced me to read on a level that I normally would not - i.e., I had to understand it very well. The homeworks were good. I learned a lot from doing the HW."
• "Maybe less class time for the student presentations? They are a good idea, but they did take up a lot of class time. Assignments were good."
• "The assignments weren't as much "hard" really as they were time consuming. I always understood what I was supposed to be doing, but given the reading load as well I found it hard to spend enough time on them."
• "I think the assignments are doable, but I didn't like the Wednesday noontime deadline...I don't think it was realistic to expect really good shaders."
• "Since it takes a lot of time to implement graphics applications, even the simple ones, and there is not enough time to do it, it would be nice to have homeworks that can be re-used, like small parts of a bigger project, probably the final project. By reusing code, we could focus more on the main point of the assignment, and not on the implementation details."
• "The course overall was very good. Hanspeter was very prepared for all lectures and was confident about the material presented. The slides were good."
• "Jeroen was very helpful when planning the presentation."
• "Liked learning about current areas of research in graphics, since that is something you don't get in the "Intro to Graphics" course. Likes being "forced" to read the graphics papers. Could do better: maybe more time for the final project?"
• "Jeroen is very generous with his time and is always willing to help, which is very much appreciated. However, I didn't always find his explanations to be as clear."
• "I think that you are a great team and that you've developed and presented two great courses that I have thoroughly enjoyed."
• "I liked the variety of graphics topics that were covered. I feel I have the ability to pick up SIGGRAPH papers and understand (maybe implement) them. It would have been nice to have had an assignment on subdivision or ray tracing, but with only 15 classes I don't see how you could assign that much work. With the amount of notes I got, I think I can try learning more at my own leisure."
• "I think Jeroen did a great job at answering the (few) e-mail questions and also in the pre-presentation discussion. Probably a little bit overstrict at grading the assignments."
• "Great work. Graphics is for sure something I want to keep doing and learning. Hopefully in the future I could actually work in graphics. It would not be such a great thing for me if it wasn't for your superb job. I would definitely take a follow on class, workshop, or whatever."
• "I am very much interested in pursuing further study in graphics. I would like to see enough graphics-related courses at the Extension School to make it a meaningful concentration of study. How about getting some of your colleagues to present courses as well? Any number of topics we've covered could be turned into more in-depth courses. We could also use more graphics programming courses rooted in OpenGL or DirectX. Another idea would be to take some current topic of research and tackle it as a team, maybe coming up with some new solution."