Hello there,I'm a new entrant in this animation-lover community.I'm a final year undergraduate computer science student.Skills:C,C++,algorithm analysis.As per these skills,should I learn Open GL and DIRECTX? I'm very much keen to create an Windows 'VISUAL EFFECTS' application.Please guide me.I'll be obliged for your useful advice.
Hey Cyrus welcome to AWN. I am afraid your programming background is way past what most of us scribblers can relate to, but if you can help develop new plugins and programs to let us continue with our craft...hey that's big stuff. Let us know what you need to know to do something like that and remember to speak in layman's terms.
Pat Hacker, Visit Scooter's World.
Hi Pat,thnx for the instant reply and of couse,sorry if I've managed to confuse u.I'm a total newbee in this field of animation.No knowledge how to proceed.I heard a lot regarding OpenGL(for graphics programming) and DirectX(for multimedia applications).I thought that they would b useful tools in this field.Please share your knowledge regarding the field of animation.
Cyrus, most of us just draw and make animations and music. We don't get into the internal works of the programs that make these things run. I tried to about five years ago, but I couldn't learn the graphics and programming end of things at the same time. Everything changes so fast and there is so much to learn. It was just too much. So I focussed on the pretty stuff, and let the logic go out the window. And that's pretty much the crowd you are working with here. So work with us and we'll work with you.
Pat Hacker, Visit Scooter's World.
There used to be some "numbers/logic" people here that posted some of their experiments and they were fantastic, but haven't seen them around in a while. Maybe some of the 3d guys here will give you a run for your money?
Pat Hacker, Visit Scooter's World.
Hi there. I'm a CS and Animation major and my answer to your question would be to learn both but only one at a time. Both are widely used in the Videogame and CGI industry and you make yourself more marketable if you know both. There are plenty of books out that can get up to speed on graphics programming and since your Computer Science major with an understanding of C/C++ and Algorithms it shouldn't be hard at all for you to learn.
Software: TVPaint Pro, Harmony Standalone, Storyboard Pro, Maya, Modo, Arnold, V-Ray, Maxwell, NukeX, Hiero, Mari, RealFlow, Avid, Adobe CS6
Hardware: (2) HP Z820 Workstations + 144-core Linux Render Farm + Cintiq 24HD Touch
This is off topic for your thread but I wont to learn programming so where do I start? Oh I only know some Applesoft so if you do not know what that is, don't worry about, it is from the stoneages.
You can learn programming two ways. Either by taking a class or reading and praticing from a book. Most people start out with either C++ or Java which are both available for free on the internet for people just starting out and learning programming.
Microsoft C++: http://msdn.microsoft.com/visualc/
Java: http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.2/download.html
Note about Java though. Java does not come with its own IDE(iIntegrated Development Environment). This the interface the user uses to write the code and conntect to the compiler. This is the IDE I would suggest to someone just starting out in Java: http://www.jcreator.com/
A good beginning book for both programming languages is the dietel books for both C++ and Java.
http://www.deitel.com/books/index.html
Well thats how to start in a nutshell. Hope this helps. Sorry if this is a little confusing but I don't know how to explain it any other way.
Software: TVPaint Pro, Harmony Standalone, Storyboard Pro, Maya, Modo, Arnold, V-Ray, Maxwell, NukeX, Hiero, Mari, RealFlow, Avid, Adobe CS6
Hardware: (2) HP Z820 Workstations + 144-core Linux Render Farm + Cintiq 24HD Touch
Move over there and make room for your fellow caveman, Wontobe. I used to know how to program in COBOL. Part of it involved reading messages in chicken bones :)
Yeah I used do a little Cobol, Fortran and Visual Basic back in my day. But I concentrate on finessing the graphic tools these days. The other stuff gives me a headache. Been trying to wrap my head around CSS these days, and have almost given up on it. Sad state of affairs. Nothing I put together validates. Just don't want to focus on those sort of details any longer.
Pat Hacker, Visit Scooter's World.
If you really want a headache try learning Assembly.
Software: TVPaint Pro, Harmony Standalone, Storyboard Pro, Maya, Modo, Arnold, V-Ray, Maxwell, NukeX, Hiero, Mari, RealFlow, Avid, Adobe CS6
Hardware: (2) HP Z820 Workstations + 144-core Linux Render Farm + Cintiq 24HD Touch
My programming days are over I am afraid. Too old for it now. Can't stay focussed. Back when I was getting my feet wet, it was the eighties and computers were monchrome, graphics ascii based and a dos environment. You had to master the programming just to get a job done. And it was a challenge, but one I stepped up to then, and had a lot of fun. Even developed some apps to make my employers job easier at the time.
I admire programmers, they have logical minds.
Pat Hacker, Visit Scooter's World.
I have a question to 3dGC regarding Graphics programming.Is it necessary to learn both DirectX and OpenGL or grasping just one of these tools would be okay?
LOL.Believe it or not Cobol is still in use today. There are over 200 jobs cobol programming jobs listed on monster.com. There are more cobol jobs out there than Fortran, thas for sure.
Software: TVPaint Pro, Harmony Standalone, Storyboard Pro, Maya, Modo, Arnold, V-Ray, Maxwell, NukeX, Hiero, Mari, RealFlow, Avid, Adobe CS6
Hardware: (2) HP Z820 Workstations + 144-core Linux Render Farm + Cintiq 24HD Touch
Oh, I'm sure COBOL is still used. It's been around forever in computer-years. I earned my computer science degree in 1984, and COBOL was my main language. And I did a bit of Assembly too - enough to know better....
BTW, great to have some folks like mlmiller and Cyrus on the boards. Occasionally I get the urge to delve into the technical side of things more, and it's great to have resources to ask questions of.
Can you explain a little more of what do you mean by “Windows Visual Effects Application”?
There are 2 aspects of Computer Graphics: Technical and Artistic. So there are normally people from both sides involved in any products (related to computer graphics) from industries such as Software/Gaming/Cinematic/Virtual Reality and so on.
Now to your question about Windows. Whenever Microsoft release any of their new products (operating system/software packages, Multimedia applications), 2 departments work hand in hand to introduce any new GUI elements and changes in Visual Appearance/Color palettes. The first department starts from paper& pencil and go up to creating the mockups using popular graphic suites such as Adobe and Macromedia collections. They basically bring forward new ideas to make the whole thing look fresh, sleek and different (this may include the changes in color palettes we saw from Windows 95 to Windows Vista). The second department (or the technical people) writes APIs (Application Programming Interface) or just collection of code to incorporate the graphics with rest of the application. They bring life to the ideas and visual styles forwarded to them by the first department. They are also responsible to write ‘effective code’ or ‘optimized code’ to make the application efficient and fast while at the same time supporting the new ‘heavy and trendy’ graphic elements. (The latest edition of Windows released by MS (vista) support a graphics engine called Aero – basically to support their new transparent look).
Apart from the main UI things, the technical side is also responsible to create these screen savers, media player skins(their outer look) etc. And that’s where these languages/packages called OpenGL/DirectX comes in. These are simply collections of already written API’s (code) which can be use to create a ‘screen saver’ in Windows for example. Moreover, these (and similar libraries) are also mainly used in creating 3d Animation/Graphics packages and their renderers(the program that outputs/creates the final image on screen). For example, one of the industry famous renderer is Pixar’s RenderMan which is used by many big guns in animation business and was also used in many movies that supported visual effects.
So basically the choice is to whether go with the creative side or the technical side ‘specifically’ supporting this creative side. But I honestly don’t have much idea about fields that require you to have knowledge of both. Gaming is one but the division is pretty blurred.
3dGC.