Rule-based 3D modeling for chinese traditional architecture

The Chinese traditional architecture called as DaMu structure, which wooden materials were used mainly. The work of historic
heritage conservation needs the surveying maps and the 3D model of the building. Laser scanning techniques can provide the best
potential for high efficient and more safety recording of the 3D data. read more

Image-Based Lighting

A light probe image is an omnidirectional, high dynamic range image that records the incident illumination conditions at a particular point in space. Light Probe images are measurements of light in the real world, and thus are high dyanmic range. As a result, these images are provided in the RADIANCE Synthetic Imaging System .hdr image format  read part 1
read part 2
http://www.debevec.org/IBL2001/

The Golden Rule in design

The golden ratio is an irrational mathematical constant, approximately 1.6180339887.Two quantities are in the golden ratio if the ratio of the sum of the quantities to the larger one equals the ratio of the larger one to the smaller.How can I use it in my art? read more

Trichromatic color vision

Trichromatic color vision is the ability of humans and some other animals to see different colors, mediated by interactions among three types of color-sensing cone cells. The trichromatic color theory began in the 18th century. read more

Color temperature

Color temperature is a characteristic of visible light that has important applications in lighting, photography, videography, publishing, and other fields. The color temperature of a light source is determined by comparing its chromaticity with that of an ideal black-body radiator.read more

HDR Imaging Approach 

Render into floating-point color space; Store entire perceivable gamut (at least); Post-process in extended color space; Apply tone-mapping for specific display...all this and more in this pdf file from Greg Ward on High Dynamic Range Imaging. read more

Ambient Aperture Lighting

This paper introduces a new real-time shading model that uses spherical cap intersections to approximate a surface’s incident lighting from dynamic area light sources...thanks to Christopher Oat and Pedro V. Sander. read pdf file 

Ambient Occlusion 

3DATS and CGarchitect.com have partnered to bring you a one time exclusive training event for Architectural Visualization Artists. Featuring industry experts Brian Smith and Chris Bullen, each class includes 18 hours of intense instruction over 2 days. read more

Touch Sensors and VRML

This tutorial will guide you through one way of setting up an animated sliding door in a vrml world using 3ds max. You will animate the door to make it slide, and then create a ‘touch sensor’ helper to control the door opening. Finally you export as a virtual reality model in the form of a VRML file. 
read pdf file 

Euler Rotations 

Euler Rotations, the most common method for orienting objects in 3d.   Here we learn how euler's "rotation order" is a bit like hierachies, and how changing this order can help us to avoid gimbal problems.  This is demonstrated with a solution to a common camera problem, by finding the correct rotation order.
see the video