TEACHING IMAGE SYNTHESIS AS A PHYSICAL SCIENCE

Most educators are teaching compter graphics in the same way, and covering the same material, as it was taught 10 years ago. These courses begin with 2D scan-conversion techniques, with 3D topics discussed at the end of the course. This does not take advantage of the great increase in computational and graphics capability of inexpensive computer systems. In this paper, the author proposes a radically different way to approach the introductory course. The new course starts with the basic physics of light-surface interaction, discusses global illumination, and derives the Phong illumination model. The students write ray-tracing programs that incorporate these principles plus shadows and texture mapping. Conventional scan conversion techniques are then discussed later in the course.