Home builders, architects, and media agents can thank 3-D rendering the assets it brings to building marketing and promotions. And 3-D rendering can thank its creative and insightful parents for making it what it is today.
3-D rendering has only recently been making the practices of those in the architectural arena easier, more efficient, and more marketable. Before its creation, as we know, architectural rendering had been done only in the media that was available in the times in which the architect lived--the pencil, or graphite, was the primitive yet urbane tool to capture textures and tones in black and white 2-d perspectives; pen and ink was the next medium to depict three dimensions on a 2-d platform (evolving from the rich shadow and line of the fountain pen and separate ink bottle to the pristine definition of the Tungsten12mm Rapidiograph nib we have available today); and the addition of color helped artists to render architecture in more realistic and denser visual richness--with the versatility of water color and water color washes; colored markers; oils; the layering of dark to light in Gouache opaques; and the exacting of mass, volume, surface, texture, color, and light by way of the air brush.
But despite the seeming vastness and variety of media available, and despite the stunning stellar rendering being done with those tools, the early 1960»s needed something more»a way to harness and depict that illusive third dimension. And thanks to the industry and ambition, the fortitude and foresight of great minds, they found it. Working for years tweaking computer graphical representation, or imaging, known now as CGI, then becoming unsatisfied with CGI limitations, scientists, engineers, computer designers and others tweaked for another 40 years, to give us interactive computer graphics»and 3-D rendering.
3-D rendering, the stuff of science fiction, is here»to enable the depiction and display of an object (in the case of architectural rendering, a floor plan, a building, the landscape»that was, pre-computer, limited to a 2-D print). Architects, designers, and/or real estate developers, for instance, are able to «turn quantified data into a 3-dimensional representation,» (as described by Lev Manovich) and to in turn enable computer users to view that real time object from «an arbitrary viewpoint in order to understand the object»s structure. By this act, too, the user/consumer is visually and aurally encouraged to «emotionally experience» the object on display in 3-D.
Such 3-D architectural rendering technology, then, has interactive capabilities, animation properties, and the tools for providing marketing take-aways»tools such as Flash animation, Javascript, mp3 interface, avi and mpeg formats, PowerPoint integration, VRML (virtual reality modeling language), and RealNetwork, QuickTime, and Windows Media. So in other words, the client can experience home-buying from a remote distance»even another country»from the actual property, can get what would be the equivalent of a walk-through (or fly-through), can point and click to look more closely or look from a different vantage point, and then can get the «brochure» or print rendering of yore on a CD»in the equivalent of a tour video tape he/she might have taken in person, to share the same experience with friends and family members who can load/play the virtual tour on their own computers.
A conceptual dream turned true, 3-D rendering owes its virtue to hundreds of out-of-the-box (or off-the-paper) thinkers:
3-D rendering owes tribute to William Fetter.
In 1960, William Fetter was working to re-design the layout of the Boeing airplane cockpit--to maximize the efficiency of the layout. What he created was a computer generated orthographic view of the human body. Fetter is also the one who coined the term 'computer graphics' to describe what he had crafted.
3-D rendering owes tribute to Ivan Sutherland
In 1963, Ivan Sutherland published his Ph.D. thesis, Sketchpad: A Man-machine Graphical Communications System , pointing to the software he created which allowed a person to create a computer display image»for the first time in history.
After the first Sketchpad, Sutherland went on, in 1966, to create the first head-mounted display, and to co-found Evans and Sutherland.
Sutherland is vice president of Sun Microsystems, whose spokesperson once noted, «Sketchpad pioneered the concepts of graphical computing, including memory structures to store objects, rubber-banding of lines, the ability to zoom in and out on the display and the ability to make perfect lines, corners, and joints. This was the first GUI (Graphical User Interface) long before the term was coined.» (Shklyar)
3-D rendering owes tribute to Babcock and Appel
One night in 1967, Ray Babcock dreamed about a graphics rendering technique called «Ray tracing,» [«a method that allows you to create stunning photo-realistic images on a computer» (Haines)]. He woke up and immediately called a friend to tell him about it. When he awoke the next morning, he had no recollection of the dream or of calling Appel. Then why is tribute to Babcock due, if «most people will say Appel [invented ray tracing] in 1968, though twelve years later Whitted did the paper that brought it all together, and Doug Kay also was working along similar lines at the time.» (Haines) « For the vision, the name, the concept».
3-D rendering owes tribute to Henry Gouraud
In 1971, Henry Gouraud developed an intensity interpolated shading method for polygon smoothing which resulted in a smoother graphic surface. In other words, Gouraud devised way to «remove sharp angles and corners that are formed where the edges of polygonal faces meet along the surface of an object,» (Costigan) so that the image does not reveal the unrealistic alter-dimension»or the hidden side that the viewer when facing an object would not possibly normally see. That means for the architect or home-builder using 3-D imaging today, his/her client will not be able to see «through» a staircase to the back (normally unseen) side of the steps, for instance, which would be a crude, unrealistic visualization»when the goal is realistic.
3-D rendering owes tribute to E. L. Goldstein and J. A. Nagel
In 1971, Goldstein and Nagel performed «the first raytracing, using Boolean set operations (the basis of Constructive Solid Geometry).» (Ward)
3-D rendering owes tribute to Richard Shoup
In 1972, Richard Shoup, working at the Xerox PARC, built the first 8-bit frame buffer with color map, a reservoir for holding complete bit-mapped images sent to the computer monitor. Then, in the latter part of «72, Shoup develoed the complete frame buffer system, SuperPaint, with Alvy Ray Smith.
3-D rendering owes tribute to Frank Crow and Phong Bui-Toung
In 1973, Frank Crow developed anti-aliasing, a technique for refining both graphics and text by eliminating the course, jagged lines (that look like steps) caused by low resolution and other earlier computer limitations.
And between 1973-1974, Phong Bui-Toung, a Stanford Professor, developed Phong shading, an alternate to Gouraud shading that resulted in exceptionally smoother surfaces and more accurate highlighting.
3-D rendering owes tribute to Alvy Ray Smith
Starting in 1974, Alvy Ray Smith collaborated with Shoup to develop SuperPaint.
A major contributor at NYIT and Lucasfilm/Pixar, Smith has directed, collaborated with other greats like Ed Catmull, and continues to bring us graphic excellence by way of Microsoft.
3-D rendering owes tribute to Benoit Mandelbrot and Martin Newell
In 1975, graphics researching pioneer Martin Newell created a 3-D model that revolutionized 3-D computer graphic experiments many were doing at the time: he created mathematical data (that at the time was hand figured on graph paper and/ manually typed) for three-dimensional coordinates that would describe (and therefore allow for replication) the geometry (the concavity, the degrees of roundness, the saddle-points) of the object being rendered. In this case, he used a household object suggested by his wife in their Utah home one breakfast time. He modeled what has become the infamous Utah Teapot.
Also in 1975, French mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot brought fractal geometry into computer representation work by showing how fractal principles, applied to computer imagery, could make realistic simulations»using natural phenomena like mountains, coastlines, and wood grains as his examples. (Shklyar)
3-D rendering owes tribute to Edwin Catmull and Jim Blinn
Besides discovering Z-buffering (for managing 3-D coordinates), texture mapping (image-processing shortcut for added realism to CGI»s), and bi-cubic patches (for more accurate modeling of geometric lines/curves), in 1976, NYIT computer scientist Edwin Catmull developed "tweening" software. This breakthrough discovery made it possible to generate an intermediate frame in between two images to make the first image appear to evolve smoothly into the second (hence the name, betweening, and the nickname, tweening). Tweening software made the computer animation what it is in 3-D animations today.
Next to impact the computer animations design process, educator, engineer, pioneer Jim Blinn, in 1976, developed reflectance, environment mapping and bump mapping, changing the way specular is calculated and making the process cheaper, and as Microsoft fellow, has since created many more tools--tools used today, for example, in animated computer imaging for architectural rendering.
3-D rendering owes tribute to Alan Kay
In 1979, Alan Kay (with Greenberg) came up with the first possibility for the synthesis of rendering transparent surfaces. Later, Kay would be the one to design by experiment the Dynabook, the first laptop.
3-D rendering owes tribute to Frank Gehry
In 1981, Frank Gehry became one of architecture's earliest practitioners of BIM, building information modeling, replacing blueprints and other 2-D models with 3-D computer models, which revealed real-world properties element by element. (Shklyar) By 2001, Gehry would introduce to building teams Digital Project, a digital software platform that assists in realizing construction projects by supporting the lifecycle of the projects.
And 3-D rendering owes tribute to Gary Demos, John Whitney, Sr., John Whitney Jr., Jack Bresenham, Bill Gates, and Steve Jobs, as well as all of the technology pioneers not mentioned here.
Without snubbing the traditions of en plein air architectural rendering and still image artistry, these innovators have exponentially enhanced architectural rendering, giving us 3-D computer graphics technology that allows us the detail and virtual navigation of an actual or planned building. We architects, interior designers, real estate developers, home buyers, and home sellers have benefited greatly: we can now more comprehensively and accurately show structure, materials, colors, details; we can present options, influence and simulate ideas, and provide visual dimensions that prospective buyers will be able to «emotionally experience.» And we embrace this 3-D rendering technology, clutching it with the same gratitude and respect as we had (and have) for the pencil and pen.
SOURCES
Becker, David. «Bye-bye, Blueprint: 3D Modeling Catches on. CNET News.com October 4, 2004, 4:00 AM PT. Reprint. Zdnews.net.
Costigan, Drew. Tutorial. «Optimizing Imported 3-D models: Smoothing Polygon Vertices.» 3Dplants.com.
Haines, Eric. «Ray Tracing News.» 1 July 1993. Volume 6, Number 2. www.acm.org.
Manovich, Lev. «From New Vision to New Media.» Artnodes. www.uoc.edu/artnodes/eng/art/manovich1002/manovich1002.html.
Shklyar, Dmitry. «Humble Beginnings.» CGNetworks. http://cgnetworks.com/story_custom.php»story_id=1647&page=
Ward, Matthew. «A (Spotty) History and Who»s Who of Computer Graphics.» WPI CS Department. www.cs.wpi.edu/~matt/courses/cs563/talks/history.html
