With a detailed explanation of vertex and pixel shader programming, coverage of the new Microsoft HLSL (High-Level Shader Language), and greater concentration of the fixed-function pipeline, the second edition of this popular reference guide will take you farther than you ever imagined! Written by an industry expert, this book will put an end to your struggle to master the concepts. Beginning Direct3D Game Programming, 2nd Edition serves as a comprehensive guide for learning DirectX graphics programming. It allows you to start with the basics and ease your way into graphics and animation. As you work your way through the book, however, you’ll get a chance to focus on some advanced shader effects to give your games that extra touch of realism.

This book consists of four parts. The first part will show you the essentials of Direct3D game programming. It deals with the programming conventions, basic algorithms, texture-mapping basics, 3D math, transformation pipeline, lighting, and depth buffers.

In the second part, you will learn how to use the transformation and lighting pipeline to map textures onto objects with different effects. All of the buzzwords, such as bump mapping, environment mapping, and procedural textures, are explained, and the effects are shown in sample programs.

In the third part of this book, you’ll deal with file formats and how to integrate them into your game engine. The file formats used are the greatly enhanced .X file format, introduced with the DirectX 8.0 SDK, and the MD3 file format used in most of the games driven by the Quake 3 engine. Additionally, an enhanced MD3 file format is shown in a character engine. This part of the book also features vertex- and pixel-shader programming from the ground up. It shows you how to use the new High-Level Shader Language (HLSL) from DirectX 9. The fourth part contains appendixes, which should be useful if you want to refresh your Windows programming, C++, or math skills.