Rating: 
Summary: Definitely written by a mathematician for mathematicians
Review: This book reminds me of all the reasons I struggled through school trying to comprehend math. Most books then were written like this one, with unending streams of heiroglyphics representing formulas from somewhere in the book, if you could only remember where. A thoughtful use of white space would help and . . . use short sentences! Why writers like to use huge, uncommon words to muddy an already complicated subject is beyond me.After reading and re-reading just two sentences of a chapter I feel somewhat knowledgeable in, I got a headache. The book is hardly practical as it's subtitle indicates. Most will not be able to comprehend it. There are many other more practical and understandable books out there. This is not to say Mr. Eberly knows not what he speaks. He is very well known in these circles. He says he changed careers from being a mathematician to a computer scientist. I only hope he doesn't try to change careers to book writing.
Rating: 
Summary: frustrated
Review: When I first used Dr. David H. Eberly free codes several years ago before this book came about, I was frustrated. His codes were so badly organized that it took me ages to even plug his codes into any useable form. So, naturally, this book turn out to be rather complex to read. I hope people like Dr. David H. Eberly writes more book. But I hope even more that they are willing to seriously rethink their ways of communicating basic and complex ideas. What's there to teach if only the elites can understand you? Life is complex enough, please make things easier for normal human like us. If not, dont write a book with title that misleads and content beyond understanding. This book is really for academics. It has no practical use.
Rating: 
Summary: Worst programming book I have ever reviewed
Review: This book should have been called Advanced Calculus 27! This book is absolutely appalling! I would rate it negative stars if I could! It does not even come close to how modern 3D engines are built. The book contains an erratta of archaic formulae that only a nuclear physicyst would have even the slightest incling of understanding. I have been programming for over 13 years and have read many programming books. I'm not new to 3D graphics programming so I believe I know how to review this book. There are no chapters on lighting, creating point and spot lights, or much of anything except advanced math formulae. Modern 3D game engines contain Sky Boxes, Particle Systems, Bump Mapping, maybe some BOIDS, staic and dynamic lighting techniques (very important), and 3D sprite animation via Inverse Kinematics. A very few engines may contain support for curved surfaces and bezier patches. What does this book cover? The curved surfaces, of course! A little is mentioned about Inverse Kinematics, but the explaination is very cloudy at best. Even the chapter in which I was most interested, Terrain, was a complete dissapointment. No mention is made to the current state of the art method of terrain simulation called ROAM. The author even states the code on the CD isn't even optimized! This book looks reads like a Ph. D thesis. The author has a Ph. D in math. Surprise! Surprise! Most doctorate holders become disconnected when dealing with real scenarios. They tend to hide themselves away and create books like this to show how learned they are. The author of this book holds 2 doctorates degrees. He has definitely lost touch with how to explain things to even a math or programming scholar. Bottom line, skip this one folkes! In fact, run away! This book should be burned - it's that bad.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Book For The Serious
Review: Not so long ago, I hated math. I've taken college calculus, etc. I hated it all! Now that I've started diving into the world of 3D, I love math. Some may feel this book is too math intensive, but I've found that a good background in math is really needed to develop a professional product. I give thanks to Mr. Eberly for filling an open gap. Most of the "this is a polygon" books will not teach you any math. I've found the book's descriptions and the provided code base to be very helpful. Once you are up to speed, I'm sure you will also.
Rating:
Summary: A very good piece of work
Review: A precise, detailed description of the mathematics for 3D computer graphics. This book is a must for everyone who wants to understand the things which are happening in a 3D application or in a 3D graphic software. Some readers seems to criticize, there are too much mathematics or only mathematics in this book. My opinion is: This book explains you the mathematics, which you have to understand, if you want to write serious 3D applications. Perhaps the title should be better "A Theoretical Approach to Real-Time Computer Graphics". Maybe real mathematicians disagree in this point, but for programmers is this book a very useful source of theoretical questions with less practical advices.
Rating:
Summary: Awesom Work!
Review: Eberly know what his talking about when we said 3D Computer Graphics, I enjoy it a lot this book and help me to understand and learn new things i was trying to get but in the wrong way!, Thanks Eberly for this peace of Really Good Work!, Congratulations!.
Rating:
Summary: You'd better know a *lot* of advanced math before starting
Review: First off, the positives: 1. Dr. Eberly is writing about a subject which has never really been dealt with at an intermediate or advanced level. "Game Programming For Dummies" this ain't. 2. The discussions and subjects tackled are top-notch. If you really want to know how a solid graphics engine works, aside from stealing the code to Quake 2 and sifting through it (not an easy read, I'm sure), this is the best place to begin. All sorts of advanced topics are touched upon, things you won't find in any other book. 3. The writing itself is quite good, especially considering the technical discussions involved. Sad to say, however, the book gets only rates average for the following reasons: 1. The mathematical understanding needed to make sense of much of the text is considerably more than the preface and some reviewers would have you think, and 2. For a 3D "Game Programming" book, there are damn few illustrations in parts. The math used in this book requires you to know a fair amount of later-semester calculus, to be very fresh on your advanced linear algebra, and to even know some statistics. Covariance matrices? They're in there. Those of you who took calculus a few years back and forgot some of it, or maybe had linear algebra as a freshman, are in for quite a surprise. And those who haven't taken many math classes, period, can save your $60 and just forget it. I don't disagree with anyone who says you need to know a lot of math in order to work with computer graphics, and 3D in general. Anyone tackling the subjects Dr. Eberly does had better know their stuff. It's just that a shameless plug by the author for his favorite math texts (or a better primer) might have helped a lot of readers get up to speed. Even if you've got enough of a math background to follow the technical discussions, the bigger problem is the lack of diagrams in the book. When you're talking about bounding volumes or collision detection, it really helps to be able to see a sample of what the author is talking about. Instead, all we get for much of the book is equation after equation, with no images to try and place things against. Whether this was Dr. Eberly's oversight, or the fault of the publisher is unimportant. The book in it's present form just won't do for any but those looking for a code tidbit, or your run-of-the mill PhD who likes to sketch out his own illustrations as he reads the text. The rest of us will have a hard time making use of it. It's too bad, considering it's strengths.
Rating:
Summary: A Good Book -- If Know the Background Materials
Review: I'm giving this book an average rating because it tends to mislead folks. If you are not well grounded in mathematics before undertaking this book you will quickly find yourself lost. If you are just starting out I would recommend Foley & van Damm, Computer Graphics : Principles and Practice, Second Edition in C or Alan Watt, 3D Computer Graphics 3rd Edition. These books provide a much gentler introduction to the topics, but do not cover 3D game engine design. My favorite 3D game engine text is by Alan Watt and Fabio Policarpo, 3D Games, Volume 1 : Real-time Rendering and Software Technology -- my only complaint about that book is its Windows-centric nature. One great thing about this book is that the examples work under both Linux and Windows -- and as someone who's completely ditched Windows for Linux, I really appreciate this fact. This book is an excellent reference for those intermediate to advanced computer scientists with an interest in 3D graphics/game engine design. If this doesn't sound like you, first get up to speed with the books I mentioned above and then come back to this one.
Rating:
Summary: Dissapointed
Review: I bought this book solely based on the title and the table of contents. It seemed to cover alot of areas I was interested in, in my desire to expand my ability to contribute to various areas of the game projects I program for. This book's preface mentions an assumption that the reader has "a basic understanding of vector and matrix algebra, liner algebra, multivariate calculus, and data strucutres." Atfer spending several hours with the book, I found that to be a huge misstatement. Rather, a reader of this book must be *extremely* well-versed in matrix and linear algebra. I consider myself somewhat knowledgable in various mathemetics: I've done some work with 3D graphics and simple maxtrix operations, have a CS degree from a top engineering school, and have taken my fair share of math courses in the past, but this book completely eluded me at every turn. It frequently used mathematical constructs without explaining their overall purpose or their usage in a particular context, introduced variables and terms ad hoc without explanation, and never provided an illustration or an example to drive home the intent of the complicated mathematics it presented. I simply did not find the book to be readable at all, as the amount of math interspersed with the text was staggering. I agree that mathematics is of course completely necessary for the material involved, but the manner is which this book presented the mathematics failed to provide me with any further understanding of the subject matter. I'm get the impression it is a 4-star book if you can grok it, so obviously your mileage may vary.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Reference, a must for any serious developer.
Review: I have read the majority of the comments about this book, and I must say that I strongly disagree with some of you. There seem to be an abnormal number of "math haters" buying this book, such that one does wonder as to the type of developer who is reading it. In developing an advanced, or even not so advanced, 3D graphics engine, there is no getting around the Mathematics involved. I feel that Dr. Eberly has done a terrific job of covering the general gamut of what is needed for such an indepth and difficult task. I apologize if I stereotype anyone here, but no serious, professional developer in his right mind is going to whine over needing to learn the Mathematics behind their work. Computer languages are built around the Mathematical principles that bore them, so please, before you blast a book and its author over _your_ inability to understand the material, consider a different job. As a side note, I believe that Dr. Eberly intended his book primarily as a reference guide, not so much a learning tool. And I would also wager that Dr. Eberly himself has such a reference guide on his desk as well. On the subject of reviewing this book, I thoroughly enjoy it, and it has a permanent place on my reference shelf, within easy reach. Even though I myself do not yet posess the knowledge to encompass ALL of the Mathematics in this book, knowing that it is there, and that more remains to be learned, is a great motivation to continue Mathematical study. In closing, I applaud Dr. Eberly for writing a concise, accurate, and excellent Mathematical reference book, he has made a difficult subject significantly simpler.
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