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OpenGL 1.5 introduces the OpenGL Shading Engine. This engine is comprised of multiple ARB extensions to the already established OpenGL 1.x architecture. OpenGL 1.5 is a step towards OpenGL 2.0, but the programming interface still essentially parallels former OpenGL 1.x revisions.
Key OpenGL 1.5 features include:
- Vertex Buffer Object: vertex arrays for higher performance rendering
- Shadow Function: additional comparison functions for shadow mapping
- Occlusion Query: asynchronous occlusion test for better culling
- Non power-of-two Textures: for more efficient use of texture memory, including mipmaps
- Shader objects, vertex shaders, and fragment shaders, all for use of programmable shader hardware
OpenGL 2.0 goes beyond the ARB extension process by providing high-level, hardware-independent programmability. Read through my OpenGL 2.0 article for the details. OpenGL 2.0 concentrates more on streamlining the programming interface than anything else. 3Dlabs has already issued an OpenGL 2.0 driver and complier for its VP series of chipsets.
The current OpenGL 2.0 driver includes:
- Procedural texturing - bricks, stripes, dots, bumps, glass
- Image-based texturing - bump mapping, environment mapping, multitexturing
- Noise-based effects - clouds, granite, marble, turbulence, wood
- Animated effects - translation, oscillation, computed trajectories
- Non-photorealistic effects - hatching, Gooch shading
- VPU-based computation - Mandelbrot and Julia sets
- Imaging - Convolution, blurring, sharpening, complex blend modes, color space conversion
- Particle systems
- Volume rendering
- Metallic - Polished (gold, chrome), Matte (brushed, stainless, galvanized), Dull (cast iron) surfacing
Hope this helps,
Robert Richmond
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Too bad the counting system went active at a later date, as it only shows a mere 3000 reads.
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