History of Computer Graphics
The history of computer graphics , the computer-aided generation of images, was generally influenced more by new developments in hardware than in software .
In the 1950s, some of the first computers were equipped with screens. The first graphics computer systems appeared in the 1960s, but they were extremely expensive and were not replaced by affordable devices until the end of the decade. Ready-to-use complete systems that shielded the user from software details appeared in the 1970s. Significant rendering techniques, some of which are still in use today , were developed. In the 1980s, computer performance increased to such an extent that PC users could also produce computer graphics themselves. In addition to technical applications, multimedia and other non-technical applications became increasingly important.
1950s: beginnings
Whirlwind and SAGE
Early computers used teleprinters and chain printers as output devices , with which figures and diagrams could only be drawn very roughly. The Whirlwind computer developed at MIT is often seen as the beginning of computer graphics. From 1951 he had a cathode ray tube screen, which was intended both for the user and for cameras that took the picture for later printing. He was also equipped with a device similar to a light pen developed by Bob Everett , with which entries could be made directly on the screen.
Whirlwind served as the basis for the prototype of the SAGE air surveillance system , which was designed for the US Air Force and which converted radar information interactively into computer displays. From 1955, SAGE was operated with the help of a light pen: if you pointed it at an aircraft, the system provided more detailed information.
First CAD systems
In 1951, General Motors' research laboratory began to examine the role that future CAD systems could play. IBM presented the IBM 740/780 system, which could display points or lines on a CRT screen in conjunction with the IBM 704 mainframe computer.
General Motors' research resulted in the first CAD system, the DAC-1 , in 1959 , which was developed by Don Hart and Ed Jacks in collaboration with IBM and only presented to the public in 1964. This groundbreaking system demonstrated the benefits of graphical interaction for the design process.
Arts and entertainment
In 1950, the artist Ben Laposky drew abstract figures with the help of oscilloscopes controlled by analog computers. In 1958, William Higinbotham developed one of the first video games , Tennis for Two .
1960s: First theoretical and commercial breakthroughs
In the mid-1960s there were already some research projects and commercial products dealing with computer graphics. Since at that time input and output were mainly via punched cards , there was great hope that interactive user interfaces would become generally accepted. At first, however, only a few companies could afford interactive computer graphics systems; it was not until the end of the decade that more affordable products appeared. After acceptable output devices became available, software issues began to arise again as computer graphics required more complex data structures than arrays and linked lists .
The first associations of researchers and users who dealt with computer graphics were founded in the 1960s: The Society for Information Display was followed in 1963 by the ACM Special Interest Committee for Computers , which in 1969 became the SIGGRAPH thematic group . Much of the US research in computer graphics, as well as computer science in general, has been funded by the ARPA .
Graphics hardware
A major hardware problem in the early 1960s was how characters and lines could be displayed on a screen. Character generators were not standardized and cost between $ 2,000 and $ 10,000.
The first storage tube-based graphic computer terminals came onto the market in 1968: Computer Displays offered the Advanced Remote Display Station and Computek offered the 400 series. Both devices were based on the Tektronix 611 storage tube and cost $ 12,000 to $ 15,000. Tektronix then launched the T4002A, which cost approximately $ 9,000, followed by the $ 4,000 4010 of its own products. These viewing devices, based on so-called Direct-View Storage Tubes (DVSTs), were able to display graphics without the need to periodically redraw them. Three-dimensional representations were not possible with them. Despite their primitive graphics, they provided tens of thousands of users with access to computer graphics because, prior to the advent of DVSTs, graphics terminal hardware alone cost $ 50,000 to $ 200,000.
As a result, other manufacturers with other technologies such as vector and plasma screens entered this comparatively inexpensive price segment. The first experimental frame buffer for raster graphics was developed in 1969 by Bell Laboratories . He used 3 bits per pixel , corresponding to eight shades of gray.
Interactivity and user interfaces
Ivan Sutherland 's sketchpad drawing system, presented in his doctoral thesis in 1963, was a milestone in the history of interactive computer graphics. This program made it possible to save individual drawings as templates and to build them up hierarchically so that a drawing could be put together from already existing "modules". Sutherland also introduced novel ways of interacting , many of which are still in use today, such as context menus . With the keyboard and light pen, commands could be given, objects selected and drawings made. Sutherland's dissertation focused on the creation and optimization of a graphical data structure.
A few years later, Timothy Johnson added 3D capabilities to the system and named it Sketchpad 3. The screen was divided into the three side views and a perspective view, which are still used today.
Alan Kay developed the first graphical user interface for the Xerox Alto in 1969 , which also had a considerable influence on the later Apple Macintosh .
CAD, modeling and virtual reality
William Fetter, a Boeing employee , used the term computer graphics in 1960 for his computer drawings of aircraft cockpits with a pilot. Together with Walter Bernhardt and others, he entered the point coordinates of an airplane model into a database and printed out an automatically calculated perspective representation on a plotter .
In 1963, John Lansdown made perspective drawings on an Elliott 803 computer and wrote his own CAD programs. Edgar Horwood developed a mapping system for the US Department of Building . At MIT, Steven Anson Coons began to develop techniques for parametric modeling of surfaces.
An early virtual reality system using the first head-mounted display was developed by Ivan Sutherland and his students. It displayed more or less simple wireframe models .
In 1968, Sutherland and David Evans founded Evans & Sutherland , the first company to specialize in computer graphics. In 1969 it introduced LDS-1 (Line Drawing System-1), the first commercial CAD graphics system that displayed wireframe models.
Screening and rendering processes
For digital plotters, in which the pen was moved on a grid, rasterization algorithms were developed in the 1960s , around 1962 the Bresenham algorithm for rasterization of lines .
To solve the visibility problem , John Warnock developed the Warnock algorithm in 1969 . Around the same time, the ray tracing algorithm was discovered.
Arts and entertainment
From 1961 to 1962, MIT students developed the first popular computer game, Spacewar, on a PDP-1 . In 1963 Ken Knowlton developed the BEFLIX and EXPOR programs, which were used to produce early computer-generated films. Frieder Nake made four-color drawings with the Z64 Graphomat . In the same year the first computer art competition took place, sponsored by Computers and Automation magazine . In 1965 the first computer art exhibition took place at the Technical University of Stuttgart, which was followed by many more worldwide. From 1966 Ralph Baer developed Odyssey , the first commercial game console (later marketed by Magnavox ). Also in 1966, John Whitney sr. the first digital computer-generated short film, Permutations ; Various other computer animations followed, such as Charles Csuri's Hummingbird (1967).
1970s: Complete systems and raster graphics
While users previously had to write the software for their graphics terminals themselves, the situation gradually changed in the 1970s. Various software packages that made it possible to draw graphics or provided a user interface came onto the market. In addition, complete systems were sold that almost completely isolated the user from the software details. To cope with the growing diversity of manufacturers and technologies, graphics standards have been developed. The first ACM SIGGRAPH conference took place in 1974 and attracted 600 visitors.
Graphics hardware
From around the mid-1970s, storage hardware became cheap enough to drive pixel-based raster screens with several hundred image lines. Despite the inevitable staircase effect , raster graphics offered a number of advantages compared to vector graphics : low-flicker display even with complex graphics, filled areas and inexpensive screens that could also display color. By the end of the decade, raster screens were more popular than DVSTs and vector screens.
The first commercial framebuffer appeared in 1973. It was developed by Evans & Sutherland based on the experimental 3-bit framebuffer from Bell Labs. Richard Shoup developed the first 8-bit framebuffer at Xerox PARC in 1978 .
Input and output devices
While the early graphics systems could only be operated using keyboards and light pens, a large number of other input devices such as mouse , trackball , graphics tablets and touch-sensitive devices established themselves in the 1970s .
Among the output devices , electrostatic plotters became available that provided fast, high quality monochrome output. Slower, multi-pen electromechanical plotters also allowed color output. Slide recorders and inkjet printers also appeared , which also supported color graphics.
Perhaps the most far-reaching impact of the decade was the advent of the personal computer . Despite its poor graphics, it persuaded manufacturers to make inexpensive plotters and graphics tablets.
Rendering process
Henri Gouraud and Bùi Tường Phong developed the shading processes Gouraud Shading and Phong Shading (published in 1971 and 1975) for Evans & Sutherland .
In 1974 Edwin Catmull described the Z-Buffer for occlusion calculation and texture mapping , with which the surface of 3D models can be equipped with images. In 1976 Jim Blinn developed Reflection Mapping , which enables reflections, and two years later bump mapping for simple simulation of surface irregularities.
Around 1979 Douglas Scott Kay and Turner Whitted independently developed recursive ray tracing, a ray tracing extension that can be used to simulate reflections and refraction.
Arts and entertainment
In 1973 the first real object was created that was completely modeled on the computer. It was designed by the artist Ronald Resch and depicted a large Easter egg. Peter Foldes ' short film Hunger , drawn using the tweening technique, was the first fully animated, computer-based film to depict a living being. The first feature film with 3D Computer Generated Imagery (CGI) was Futureworld (1976), which showed the polygon model of a hand and a head. The polygon model of the hand comes from Edwin Catmull , who digitized and animated his left hand in 1972. At the same time, Fred Parke created the first computer graphics of a human face (his wife's face). Both films were hailed as pioneers in computer animation and were used in Futureworld.
1980s: performance jumps and graphics for end users
With the dramatic increase in system performance of PCs and workstations in the 1980s, end users also had access to computer graphics. In this very eventful decade, many important companies related to computer graphics such as Silicon Graphics (1981), Adobe , Autodesk and Sun Microsystems (1982), Aldus (1984) or Softimage and Pixar (1986) were founded.
hardware
In the 1980s, high-end workstations in the $ 30,000 to $ 100,000 price range were able to render plausible images in near real time . Parallel processors and graphics accelerators were used to improve graphics performance . The first cost color framebuffer for PCs was 1985 with the TARGA - Vector map of AT & T introduced. True color screens with over 1000 lines of display became widely available; Monochrome screens with 3,000 lines of display could be had for around 5,000 dollars. The mouse evolved into the ubiquitous pointing device; the first data gloves appeared. Color printers of various types conquered the market.
Effective stereoscopic displays became affordable. Earlier devices were unwieldy and mostly based on red-green filters. In 1989, 3D glasses or polarizing liquid crystal screens could be purchased for $ 2,000. Such devices were mainly used in scientific visualization .
Towards the end of the decade, a viable market for optical data acquisition devices and associated software emerged. The original idea was, technical drawings scan automatically vectorize and in the then usual CAD - file formats to convert. Scanning of images later became the main application.
Application programs
CAD / CAM achieved a full breakthrough in the 1980s. The systems began as mainframes and were gradually replaced by workstations in the mid-1980s. The first version of the successful AutoCAD software from Autodesk appeared in 1982.
The first PC applications such as word processing and spreadsheets were text-based. With graphics-capable PCs, inexpensive graphics applications came onto the market, including CAD / CAM applications, presentation and painting programs. The first graphics programs for commercial PCs were MacDraw and MacPaint , which were introduced in 1984 along with the first Macintosh . By the end of the decade, graphics software was available for all applications.
Alias Research and Wavefront Technologies developed one of the first 3D animation tools for the professional market .
Graphic norms and standards
In 1985, ANSI and ISO passed the first 2D computer graphics standard, GKS , which prescribed certain minimum requirements for conforming application programs. GKS-3D and PHIGS followed in 1988 for 3D computer graphics . In addition, important industry standards such as the PostScript page description language from Adobe or the X Window System , a system managed by an MIT consortium for providing graphical user interfaces, emerged.
In 1981 IBM published the first color graphics standard , CGA , for the IBM PC , which was replaced by EGA (1984) and VGA (1987).
Rendering process
In 1984 a group of researchers from Cornell University developed Radiosity , together with ray tracing, one of the two great methods of calculating light distribution and the first method that can simulate global lighting under certain conditions . Two years later, Jim Kajiya published the rendering equation , which puts global lighting on a mathematical foundation, and the path tracing algorithm .
Arts and entertainment
In the 1980s, computer graphics began to find widespread use in the film industry. For the film Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan , the first fully digital, computer-generated image sequence was created in 1982, inspired by Jim Blinn's fly-by animations of the Voyager spacecraft . Tron , shown in the same year, was the first feature film to use 3D CGI on a large scale. The first 3D video games appeared, such as Cube Quest (1983) by Simutrek . Taran and the Magic Cauldron (1985) was the first full-length animated film to contain computer-generated 3D elements. In the same year a computer-generated being - a glass knight - was shown in a feature film for the first time in The Secret of the Hidden Temple . Willow (1988) was the first feature film to contain a digital morphing sequence. A pioneer who experimented with computer graphics in the field of fine arts in the 1980s was Jürgen LIT Fischer .
1990s: multimedia and non-technical applications
From the 1990s, the boundaries between computer graphics and related areas such as image processing became increasingly blurred . While both fields previously required different workstation architectures, the computers are now fast enough to handle both tasks. In addition, it became possible to combine video and audio content. Flat screens increasingly came onto the market, not least because of the demand for notebooks .
CAD and visualization penetrated more and more application areas, such as architecture or medicine.
In 1992 the first version of the 3D graphics programming interface OpenGL was published by Silicon Graphics.
While scientific and technical applications still predominated at the beginning of the 1990s, over the course of the decade the weight increasingly shifted to non-technical areas of application.
Computer animation for the advertising industry as well as animation and feature films experienced a real boom . Bernard and Bianca im Kangaroo Land (1990) exclusively used Disney's CAPS process and was thus the first completely digitally produced cartoon. The computer-generated, realistic dinosaurs in Jurassic Park (1993) set new standards for CGI. In 1995, Toy Story , the first fully computer-generated movie, was released.
In 1996, 3dfx with Voodoo Graphics the first graphics processor front, the 3D hardware acceleration offered for non-professional use.
See also
Literature and film
- Jules Bloomenthal: Graphics Remembrances. IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 20, 2 (April 1998): 35-51, ISSN 1058-6180
- SH Chasen: Historical Highlights of Interactive Computer Graphics. Mechanical Engineering 103, 11 (November 1981): 32-41, ISSN 0025-6501
- Kristine K. Fallon: Early Computer Graphics Developments in the Architecture, Engineering, and Construction Industry. IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 20, 2 (April 1998): 20-29
- Carl Machover: A Brief, Personal History of Computer Graphics. Computer 11, 11 (November 1978): 38-45, ISSN 0018-9162
- Carl Machover: Four Decades of Computer Graphics. IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications 14, 6 (November 1994): 14-19, ISSN 0272-1716
- Terrence Masson: CG 101: A Computer Graphics Industry Reference. Digital Fauxtography 2007, ISBN 0-9778710-0-2
Documentary:
- ACM SIGGRAPH Studios, Frank Foster (Director): The Story of Computer Graphics (SIGGRAPH Video Review, Issue 137, 1999). Entry in the Internet Movie Database (English)
Web links
- Wayne Carlson: A Critical History of Computer Graphics and Animation . Ohio State University
- Daniel Sevo: History of Computer Graphics .
- Matthew Ward: A (Spotty) History and Who's Who of Computer Graphics . Worcester Polytechnic Institute
- Seminal Graphics - Pioneering Efforts That Shaped The Field . ACM SIGGRAPH
Individual evidence
- ↑ James Foley, for example: Computer Graphics: Principles and Practice . Addison-Wesley, Reading 1995, ISBN 0-201-84840-6 , p. 8.
- ↑ Machover 1994, p. 14.
- ↑ Masson 2007, p. 386.
- ↑ Machover 1978, p. 41.
- ↑ a b Machover 1994, p. 15.
- ↑ Masson 2007, p. 397.
- ↑ Masson 2007, p. 396.
- ↑ According to Fetter, the name came from his colleague Verne Hudson, see design.osu.edu ( Memento of the original from May 5, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ a b c d Masson 2007, p. 393.
- ↑ Masson 2007, p. 395.
- ↑ Masson 2007, p. 390.
- ↑ Masson 2007, p. 392.
- ↑ a b Masson 2007, p. 399.
- ↑ a b c Masson 2007, p. 154.
- ↑ a b c d Machover 1994, p. 16.
- ↑ Masson 2007, p. 400.
- ↑ Masson 2007, p. 401.
- ^ David A. Price: The Pixar Touch. The Making of a Company New York 2009, ISBN 978-0-307-27829-6 , pp. 14-15.
- ↑ a b Masson 2007, p. 408.
- ↑ Masson 2007, p. 411.
- ↑ Masson 2007, p. 412.
- ↑ Masson 2007, p. 417.
- ↑ Machover 1994, p. 18.
- ↑ Masson 2007, p. 419.
- ↑ Masson 2007, p. 423.
