7 replies to this topic

[sphyenx]

What about math do i need to know in C++, and animation programs like 3D MAX, photoshop.. anim8tor, blender ect..

[anubis]

c++ itself requires no understanding of math at all. although you won't get far without it :) linear algebra is probably the most common form of math used in computer science

[NomadRock]

For the modelers and integrating them with your C++ applications you will need to know some 3d math. For example how to do a 3d vector dot product without thinking. You can get pretty far without linear algebra, but many advanced techniques are heavy with linear algebra. You really should be at least familiar with it. Your life will be easier if you are comfortable with it.

[anubis]

"You can get pretty far without linear algebra, but many advanced techniques are heavy with linear algebra"

you should at least be familiar with vector spaces and matrices... this will in the end require you to have a good understanding of how to solve linear equations quickly. don't worry though you will learn all this in school soon

[davepermen]

i learned most of my math by writing an own raytracer. didn't even knew vectors before.. :D it was a fun way to learn all the stuff because of the immediate visual results.. that rocked!

[Chris]

You should have a thorough knowledge of

Linear Algebra, that is:
- vectors, matrices, rotations, maybe tensors, quaternions are useful
- coordinate systems and their different kinds of representation
- systems of linear equations and properties of their solutions

Algorithms, that is:
- conversion of representations (coordinate systems, rotations)
- determine and achieve properties of matrices (lookat, perspective, orthonormal, etc.)
- solve linear equation systems

Analysis, that is:
- series expansions of function (taylor, euler, whatever)
- differenciation, integration of functions of multiple independents

Numerics, that is:
- interpolation (functions, vectors, quaternions, etc.)
- numerical differenciation, integration (you want to actually DO it, don't you?)

You won't need it all at once, and you won't want to learn it all in parallel, of course. It's also certainly not a final list. For me, that's been covered by most of my first year at university, going on to more abstract and advances things later on.
You should really take your time and try to understand theses thing properly, if you manage to fit it into a personal project of your liking, like davepermen did, all the better.
I also like Maple V to play around with math tools and algorithms to get a better understanding, prior to coding them up in C++.

[Chris]

I'm sorry, Analysis is probably calculus in english. The differences between german and english are mostly subtle in these field of science so that I'm not always thinking about the few really different namings.

[davepermen]

i think statistics is very useful, too..

oh wait.. yeah, i'm all about raytracing and global illumination :D thats why :D