Hey, let’s turn this into 7 great links (use Chrome or Firefox to view them, or enable WebGL in Safari):

• Why WebGL? - nice page (with a clever header) pointing out some of the best WebGL work out there. His math visualizations page is also cool.
• Mind-numbingly well-done and instructive terrain rendering demo in WebGL.
• Morph targets rigging for a face looks good in a browser.
• Using particles for model display gives an interesting look, with more data streaming in filling in gaps vs. the usual LOD popping.
• Some great slidesets on animation, collision detection, and other kinds of math from GDC 2012.
• To be honest, WebGL is a bit behind at this point, in DirectX terms being sort of Shader Model 2.0 to 3.0. But boy can that little dog dance: irradiance volumes, for example.
• Useful? Beats me, but it’s fun to watch Gource show the last year of development of three.js in two minutes. I like seeing myself flit in at the end and help shoot lasers at the source tree.

I know there are a bunch more links in the Instructor Notes that are worthwhile (things like the GLSL shader validator plug-in for Sublime Text 2), but these particular ones stuck with me.

I did get to visit the shrine one morning while in Mountain View recording:

Some of the slick things Udacity has done is integrate video lessons, WebGL/three.js demos, and exercises and questions all in a continuous series. I’d point at an URL, but you do have to sign up for the course to see its structure. Also, wait a day or so: by tomorrow a bunch more links to resources should be in place, at least for Unit 1. Soon the course code will be githubbed, the videos all downloadable, etc. (update: this is now done.)

By the way, this is only the first half of the course. I’m in the throes of writing the second half, which will come out May 1st. I’m learning the video creation process as I go, so I think the quality is increasing as the units progress. Gesturing at the screen and reading what I wrote at the same time gives me a new-found respect for weathermen.

Even if you already know about 3D graphics, you might want to check out the history of the teapot video, which Martin Newell kindly fact-checked. And if you don’t know who Martin Newell is, or only know that he created the teapot model, then you definitely should watch the video. Oh, and then try the WebGL/three.js demo here.

What’s nice is that all the course videos are hosted on YouTube, so it’s easy for anyone to link to any of the lessons (well, except where YouTube is blocked; Udacity has  alternate delivery methods). I hope that these videos and demos will be handy for other people explaining 3D graphics.

So, here’s my New Year’s thingy for you to try out:

The Teapot – nicer controller, not currently working on mobile

The Teapot - semi-mobile friendly, annoying trackball

[Mac/Safari users: follow these simple instructions to enable WebGL on your machine. Other users: if stuck, try this site.]

Nothing deep, as it’s meant for teaching about Gouraud vs. Phong shading: the mouse changes the view (left: trackball, right: pan, middle: zoom), there are a few keyboard controls to switch from vertex to pixel shading and change the tessellation, a GUI for messing with the model and scene, and a little FPS counter in the corner. If the mouse or GUI doesn’t work the first time, hit refresh (and if anyone knows a fix for this glitch, speak!). If you see the FPS counter consistently below 60 FPS for your machine, please let me know your hardware configuration. The heresies I commit in this program:

• You can add a bottom to the teapot (SJ Baker’s excellent page considers this a major sin).
• You can expand the lid 7.7% horizontally to give a solid seal between the teapot and the lid (this gap looks goofy to unbelievers).
• You can scale the model up by 30% so it actually looks more like the real teapot (read the end of this section for one explanation of why the model was changed – short version: Blinn hack to adjust for non-square pixels).

• An unusual thing at SIGGRAPH 2010 was a talk about visualizing the 6502 processor. It’s got heavyweights such as Greg James (formerly of NVIDIA) working on it. This is a famous chip: Apple II, Atari 2600, Commodore 64, etc. They simulate (not emulate) the chip by creating and manipulating a polygonal model of it. See their website for much more.
• The day has finally arrived: Microsoft Office 2010 requires a GPU supporting DirectX 9.0c, along with 64 MB of GPU memory. I was interested to see such a mainstream application requiring graphics hardware. Admittedly, DirectX 9.0c was released in 2004, but still.
• Polygonal sculpture. Wireframe teapot. Painted people. Cartoon hotel room. Mirror man. Shadow rendering error. See, the world can simulate all sorts of media and artifacts.
• In a similar vein, some lovely images of light that look simulated (link from Vincent Scheib).
• Showing a person’s eyes both open and shut in the same photo is surprising (and not Photoshop). Turns out this effect is due to the rolling shutter used by many cameras. Works for video, too. The first chapter of Andrew Glassner’s Other Notebook talks about simulating this type of shutter and many others (readable on Google Books).
• This was quite clever, a music video that uses Google maps and street view to pull in your childhood neighborhood.
• Some sharp and colorful synthetic holograms of buildings.
• Is there nothing that cannot be a user interface?
• The game “Devil’s Tuning Fork” has a mind-frying rendering style (link from Morgan McGuire).
• Wow, chromakeying truly is omnipresent.
• Animated reverse perspective.
• I have a few RenderMan walking teapots, but never realized there was quite this much interest in them.
• Which reminds me of renderfarms. Marcos Fajardo mentioned in his talk at SIGGRAPH about the Arnold raytracer that interactivity is critical, as CPU time is $0.10 an hour while artists cost $40 an hour. I expect artists actually cost more (insurance, office space, tools, etc.), and it’s interesting to note that the spot instance price for Amazon’s cloud computers is now as low as $0.03, depending.
• This game effect is simply magical (and one day will be as common as, well, 3D graphics).
• There’s a new system for 3D scans of building interiors. I like the concept of grad students carrying packs of lasers – what could possibly go wrong?
• This projection onto a building is just plain brilliant (how can those people just walk by?!). More info here; the clip has better sound but is not continuous.
• A fine illusion, and a similar one with Legos. Another illusion that amazes, though it takes a little effort to understand.
• I mentioned the Meta Cookie project before. I finally got around to downloading my ancient cell phone’s pictures, so here’s proof I survived the process: