calvinnme said
This book does spend some time on Java 2D and 3D, but not so much as to be a book about those technologies. Instead there is just enough so that the author can focus on the real subject of the book - computer graphics techniques. Chapters 2, 3, and 4 cover fundamental aspects of the last part of the rendering pipeline focusing only on two-dimensional graphics.
Next the author focuses on modeling, representation, and rendering of three-dimensional virtual scenes and provides an introduction to Java 3D in parallel with this. Various techniques for the hidden line and hidden surface problems are described in chapter 7. Chapter 8 deals with generating photo-realistic effects like shading, shadows, and reflections. Chapter 9 covers selected topics such as special effects, interaction, and stereoscopic viewing which is necessary for understanding virtual reality applications.
There are plenty of illustrations in the book as well as exercises, and the author has a very conversational yet detailed writing style. I particularly like how the book builds from 2D to 3D methods. There are exercises at the end of each chapter making it a good selection for a textbook in a beginning class on the subject. It really isn't graduate material, but it would make a good undergraduate text. There are plenty of code snippets too. The author doesn't bog down the book in complete programs. That is really the domain of a book on Java itself, anyways. I recommend it.
W Boudville said
The author uses Java as a framework within which to teach graphics to an aspiring programmer. Java is useful because of its popularity and free availability on many platforms.
The exposition is straightforward. Simple operations that are expected in any graphics package. There are vector operations, involving positioning and drawing various geometric objects and text. All in 2 dimensions. The maths starts to get a little involved, when the text talks about translation, rotation and scaling. Hopefully, you have done an introductory course in matrix algebra.
There is also discourse on 3d graphics. Here, we move into the realm of virtual worlds. For some readers, this might be the main attraction. Where you get to model a 3d object and then render it.
The graphics facilities in Java are adequate. Not as fully fleshed out as OpenGL, perhaps. But for an introductory course in graphics, perfectly adequate. The reader should also be aware that there is little commercial game development in Java. Some people are attracted to computer graphics because they want to code games. Fine. And you can treat this book as a first text. Just know that most jobs in this field don't use Java.
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