Rating: 
Summary: Clear and explanatory text about core 3d math.
Review: This book is a rare find. Many advanced math texts suffer from unclear prose or use cryptic symbols, but not this one. What you'll find are clear and well written explanations of each 3d math topic, followed by illustrative pictures and easy to read formulas. Highly recommended, especially as a starting point for learning 3d math.
Rating: 
Summary: What You Were Looking For
Review: For a long time I wanted to learn 3D programming, but the only options available to teach myself the core mathematics were Appendix A's in Direct3D Programming books or buying three or four Linear Algebra textbooks for college courses and hope that one of them would explain things in terms of 3D and not just "boxes of numbers."
But the 3D Math Primer was exactly what was needed to provide that gap--and even be readable! Just going through the first 11 chapters I was able to create my own spinning cube application that used no 3D libraries whatsoever. =D Previous to this, a dutifully followed Direct3D tutorial had once gotten me a spinning triangle but I can't honestly admit to having any idea what I had done to achieve it.
There are sections where mathematical topics are presented simply as "interesting things you can do with these boxes of numbers to get whole new boxes of numbers" which hopefully will be given some more 3D filling out in future editions. But I wouldn't recommend waiting as this is already an invaluable resource to anyone who hopes to teach himself 3D programming.
Rating:
Summary: If you really want to *understand* 3d graphics
Review: I bought Mathematics for 3D Game Programming & Computer Graphics and this book hoping to learn the basics of 3D for game development. I wanted a book to really help me to understand -not only know- the principles behind 3D development. I found that Mathematics for 3D Game Programming & Computer Graphics was a "copy and paste" of parts of a linear algebra textbook. It had the interesting parts for graphics developers, but it did nothing in terms of reaching / teaching the reader, explaining things and helping to smooth the learning curve. It was pure math. Well, 3D Math Primer for Graphics and Game Development it's just the opposite. It's clear, concise and mathematical rigorous, but at the same time it tries to reach the reader, explains the math of 3D graphics AND the reasons behind that math. Whenever possible it always gives you a graphic interpretation of what you are reading and if that's not possible, it gives you extra explanations. The authors know where the hard parts are and excel at helping you to understand them. Where most books give you a theorem and left you in your own (face it: most books) this one tries to help you to get a step beyond and understand the math and the workings of it. There is a clear feeling in all the book: usefulness. This book -in terms of smoothing the learning curve- is to current basic 3D math what Realtime Rendering is to current 3D algorithms and techniques. The bad: 1.It's very basic. Don't expect to go from 0 to 100 with this book. It will give you the basics, but you will need to continue.
2.It's not mean to give you full working code. The code examples are to illustrate how the concepts can be implemented in software, not to provide a full working library. To sum it up: a book to understand, not just "know" the math behind 3D math written in a clear and non-pretentious way.
Rating:
Summary: If you really want to *understand* 3d graphics
Review: I bought Mathematics for 3D Game Programming & Computer Graphics and this book hoping to learn the basics of 3D for game development. I wanted a book to really help me to understand -not only know- the principles behind 3D development. I found that Mathematics for 3D Game Programming & Computer Graphics was a "copy and paste" of parts of a linear algebra textbook. It had the interesting parts for graphics developers, but it did nothing in terms of reaching / teaching the reader, explaining things and helping to smooth the learning curve. It was pure math. Well, 3D Math Primer for Graphics and Game Development it's just the opposite. It's clear, concise and mathematical rigorous, but at the same time it tries to reach the reader, explains the math of 3D graphics AND the reasons behind that math. Whenever possible it always gives you a graphic interpretation of what you are reading and if that's not possible, it gives you extra explanations. The authors know where the hard parts are and excel at helping you to understand them. Where most books give you a theorem and left you in your own (face it: most books) this one tries to help you to get a step beyond and understand the math and the workings of it. There is a clear feeling in all the book: usefulness. This book -in terms of smoothing the learning curve- is to current basic 3D math what Realtime Rendering is to current 3D algorithms and techniques. The bad: 1. It's very basic. Don't expect to go from 0 to 100 with this book. It will give you the basics, but you will need to continue.
2. It's not mean to give you full working code. The code examples are to illustrate how the concepts can be implemented in software, not to provide a full working library. To sum it up: a book to understand, not just "know" the math behind 3D math written in a clear and non-pretentious way.
Rating:
Summary: WOW
Review: I bought this book with 'NO' experience in game programming or 3d math. I guess you could have called me a 'pre-beginner' if that says anything. I have tried to learn 3d programming from reading other books on this topic and found myself getting confused before finishing the first couple of pages. This book came to my house and I began reading chapter 1, before I knew it I was on chapter 5 (2 hours later) and knew a good bit about Vectors, Matrices, 3d Coordinate systems and the such. I have always been a firm believer in reference books to use as I learn rather than getting the step-by-step books. I am not one to read a book from front to back, but this book has really been an exception. I would recommend this book to ANYBODY who wants to learn 3d game programming. It is an easy read and really shows how easy the concepts are once you get the algorigthms down. I am now on chapter 10 and plan on reading more tonight. :) I can't wait to be done with it and start applying the code in this book... Thanks Fletcher Dunn!
Rating:
Summary: Deceptively good book
Review: I need to create a 3d math library for a project I was working on and wanted to take a look at some book on the subject. This one looked like one of the 14 year old 'how to make a video game' type books and I wasn't expecting much, however I was pleasantly suprised by the depth of the 3d mathematics in the book.
As an example i was unclear about how to calculate the inverse matrix correctly for an n-dimension matrix and the book goes over calculating adjucts and determinats, and inverses for a n-dimensional matrix both supplying the general math and some C code. The code i didn't find helpful, simply because I coding in the python c api and not straight c, however it could be helpful to someone writing in C.
I would recommend this book to anyone looking to brush up on quaternions, eulers, matrices, and vectors as this book is simple and to the point. I think the author did a great job balancing the complexty of the math with simplicity in the book's text. The book goes over what is really the essentials of any 3d math library.
Rating:
Summary: EXCELLENT BEGINNING BOOK
Review: I RECENTLY RETIRED AND DECIDED TO PLAY AROUND WITH GRAPHICS AND GAME PROGRAMMING, AND THIS BOOK IS JUST PLAIN EXCELLENT!!!!!. I WISH MORE AUTHORS COULD WRITE TECH SUBJECTS THIS WELL. THANK YOU FLETCHER DUNN AND IAN PARBERRY!!!
Rating:
Summary: Excellent.
Review: I think this book is one of the best books I've purchased on programming. It covers everything in detail, and really helps things make sense. It's especially good for someone who can program and knows a 3D API already(like me). It also requires no more than high school algebra (which is excellent because I'm 14). The only thing it lacked was triangle to triangle collision detection and collision response, but that is perhaps beyond the scope of the book.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent.
Review: I think this book is one of the best books I've purchased on programming. It covers everything in detail, and really helps things make sense. It's especially good for someone who can program and knows a 3D API already(like me). It also requires no more than high school algebra (which is excellent because I'm 14). The only thing it lacked was triangle to triangle collision detection and collision response, but that is perhaps beyond the scope of the book.
Rating:
Summary: superbly written
Review: i will not be able to praise this book more than the others did already . this book made love linear algebra ,its really very well written
i even recomend it for people like mathematics or want to learn linear algebra and not really necessary to be game developer .
to taste a bit from the honey in this book download a chapter from this book and enjoy.
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