Educational software for teaching basic concepts in computer graphics

• Main Author: Nallalagi Asha Nadarajan
• Other Authors: Henry Johan
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2009
• Subjects: DRNTU::Engineering::Computer science and engineering::Computer applications::Computers in other systems
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/16931
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Computer graphics is a broad topic covering issues such as modeling, rendering and animation. Each of these topics has many sub topics. Likewise drawing of lines falls under the sub topic of rendering. There is no software today to educate the public about the concepts of line drawing but there are informational web pages. The project to develop a software, was then taken as a challenge. Much research went into finding out what others have been doing in this field and the algorithms that were invented by them. From all that was gathered, four algorithms such as Bresenham Algorithm, Direct Scan Algorithm, Digital Differential Analyser Algorithm and Line 2 Step Algorithm were singled out. Prototypes were built to ensure that as a developer, concepts were clarified and a strong foundation about the algorithms was possessed. After this stage, brainstorming was done on which functionalities to include and confirmed the graphical user interface designs. Much time was spent in developing software and it is named as Explore Computer Graphics Algorithms System (ECGA System). The main purpose of the system was to allow users to grasp the concepts of the four algorithms. This is possible by enabling the user to plot two points on the grid panel provided, to view the line drawn and the animation and to compare the algorithms. Upon completion of the development and the launch on the internet, evaluation was conducted by using an evaluation form and inviting people to participate. Their feedbacks were taken into consideration. Further work could be carried out to include more algorithms not only on line drawing but also on circles, polygonal fill and upgrade the system to have forums, username and passwords, Flash movie for the user manual and to look into the issue of lagging of the user interface components.