In the preface to this book, the main author, Shirley, discloses the principles that guide its structure and content. He identifies two approaches to writing about computer graphics: one is to focus on the low-level, broadly applicable issues of computer graphics; the other is to illustrate those issues by working within a specific graphics application. Shirley opts for the former because it has been effective for him as a teacher in an academic setting and because learning the low-level details translates easily into mastering higher-level application programming interfaces. The book includes the work of seven other authors who contribute chapters in their areas of expertise. Shirley situates the text within both a collegiate and a software production environment. He maps part of the book to the semester structure of college courses. The book, however, goes beyond the formal constraints of academia because it provides software engineers with a broad introduction to the major topics in computer graphics. It can even function as a practical reference for those new to or working in this area of programming.

In terms of substance, Shirley makes plain the centrality of mathematics to graphics programming. Early on, he writes, “Much of graphics is just translating math directly into code.” The book demonstrates the truth of this statement because much of its narrative is grounded in mathematics. Most of the chapters, especially those on curves and sampling, are grounded in mathematical issues. Shirley complements the mathematical notation with well-designed and contextually appropriate illustrations that help flesh out the mathematics.

Recognizing the importance of mathematics in graphics, Shirley provides a broad-ranging chapter that reviews the essential mathematics used in the book and a chapter devoted to linear algebra. Readers who need more than a quick review of such topics as matrices, probability, and Fourier transformations will need to consult more extended treatments of these concepts. Shirley, however, does an excellent job of balancing the computational aspect of the mathematics with its conceptual core.

The organization of the graphics topics is not readily apparent from the book’s table of contents, but there is a division between the first nine chapters and the rest of the book. In addition to the sections on mathematics discussed above, the first nine chapters cover raster graphics, signal processing for audio applications, transformations, viewing hidden surface illumination, and surface shading. As Shirley indicates, these first nine chapters provide a coherent introduction to the field that corresponds to a one-semester college-level course. The remaining sections of the book deal with more advanced issues, and they are not arranged in any particular hierarchy or structure because the topics grow independently out of the practice of computer graphics. It would have been helpful if Shirley had provided visual reinforcement of this structure of coherently connected and then loosely connected chapters. The loose connection among the chapters is well designed for ready reference. That readers can treat the chapters as independent units is helpful, especially if they need to acquire knowledge of a particular issue as they are programming. In addition to the topics mentioned above, the book includes chapters on light, color, visual perception, tone reproduction, global illumination, reflection models, computer animation, and visualization.

This book is highly recommended as either a textbook for a course in computer graphics or as a reliable and wide-ranging handbook for those developing graphics applications. The book provides a firm foundation in the field that enables programmers to readily apply its content to a variety of graphics packages across a wide spectrum of platforms.