Real-Time Collision Detection by Christer Ericson

Product Details

Synopsis

Today's sophisticated 3D games, virtual reality applications, and physical simulators involve rich graphical environments of millions of polygons. In these worlds, hundreds, perhaps even thousands of detailed animated objects may be interacting not only with these complex environments but also amongst themselves. With a typical update rate of 60 frames per second, a minimal amount of time is available for determining the intersection status of all objects in the world at a given time in order to maintain a believable simulation. Real-Time Collision Detection is a comprehensive, in-depth survey of the data structures and algorithms that make this possible. Taking a practical approach, the book discusses all the important components of an efficient real-time collision detection system. Topics covered include object representations, intersection tests, and distance queries, and the mathematics behind them: hierarchical and spatial partitioning methods, numerical and geometrical robustness issues, hardware acceleration methods, and advanced optimization for modern computer architectures. This book extends and broadens the discussion of collision detection in Collision Detection in Interactive 3D Environments.

Annotation

Written by an expert in the game industry, Christer Ericson's new book is a comprehensive guide to the components of efficient real-time collision detection systems. The book provides the tools and know-how needed to implement industrial-strength collision detection for the highly detailed dynamic environments of applications such as 3D games, virtual reality applications, and physical simulators.

Of the many topics covered, a key focus is on spatial and object partitioning through a wide variety of grids, trees, and sorting methods. The author also presents a large collection of intersection and distance tests for both simple and complex geometric shapes. Sections on vector and matrix algebra provide the background for advanced topics such as Voronoi regions, Minkowski sums, and linear and quadratic programming.

Of utmost importance to programmers but rarely discussed in this much detail in other books are the chapters covering numerical and geometric robustness, both essential topics for collision detection systems. Also unique are the chapters discussing how graphics hardware can assist in collision detection computations and on advanced optimization for modern computer architectures. All in all, this comprehensive book will become the industry standard for years to come.Presents algorithms and data structures with wide applications to the fields of game development, virtual reality, physically based simulation, CAD/CAM, architectural and scientific visualization, molecular modeling, engineering simulation, GIS, ray tracing, and more.

Biography

Christer Ericson is a senior principal programmer and the tools and technology lead at Sony Computer Entertainment America in Santa Monica. Before joining Sony in 1999, he was a senior programmer at Neversoft Entertainment. Christer received his Masters degree in computer science from Umeå University, Sweden, where he also lectured for several years before moving to the US in 1996. Christer has served on the advisory board for Full Sail's Game Design and Development degree program since 2002. His interests are varied, but he takes a particular interest in program optimization, a topic he has spoken on at the Game Developers Conference.