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Geek Culture / Cel vs Phong vs Gouraud vs Flat

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Solidz Snake
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Posted: 22nd Nov 2002 05:18
Anybody can help to tell the differences between these 4 rendering techniques?

1. Cel-Shaded
2. Phong
3. Gouraud
4. Flat

I mean , something like graphic-wise , technical-wise , and example-wise?
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rapscaLLion
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Posted: 22nd Nov 2002 05:32
This is my best guess:
4. Flat
This is the most basic of techniques, it just sorta fills each polygon with a flat shade...
3. Gourad
Simple shading applied to the polygons.
2. Phong
Full shading of polygons
1. Cell shaded gives a cartoony feel, because it does shading in a cartoony style....

Ok so I don't really know what I'm talking about...

Alex Wanuch
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DrakeX
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Posted: 22nd Nov 2002 22:16
lol let's hope vegeta doesn't disagree

1: cel-shaded. a good example would be the new zelda game for the gamecube. it looks almost like it's a drawn cartoon.

2: phong. don't have an example and i'm not real clear on what it is, but i think it has something to do with shading the polygons together so they don't look so polygonal. almost like shading it as though the object wasn't made of polygons or something.

3: gourad. this is what DB/DBP/most everything (and by most everything i mean most game engines) uses nowadays. basically each polygon is shaded with a gradient of light. might also be thought of as vertex shading as the light is calculated per-vertex and averaged out across the face as opposed to per-face.

4: flat. per-face lighting. each face's brightness is calculated by what angle it is compared to the light source. it's almost as though the faces don't even know each other is there.

i'm looking at yooooou!
rapscaLLion
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Posted: 22nd Nov 2002 22:44
ya, are you TRYING to start another flame war Solidus?

Alex Wanuch
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DrakeX
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Posted: 22nd Nov 2002 22:49
lol

(if you've never been on the RGT boards or you don't know what it means, don't worry about it)

i'm looking at yooooou!
Solidz Snake
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Posted: 23rd Nov 2002 01:42
No! No! I'm not trying to start any Flames or whatsoever! Just wanna know the difference between 4 of these! Honest! Mark my word!

Thanks for ur feedback guys! I really appreciate it!

Hehehe! I can't wait for the full loooooooooong explaination from Raven Vegeta!

And I really appreciate & thankful for any more opinions & answers!

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rapscaLLion
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Posted: 23rd Nov 2002 02:51
oh god, I hope raven vegeta doesn't see this...

Alex Wanuch
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Dean
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Posted: 23rd Nov 2002 19:18
hehe, I remember that thread, I remeber trying to explain with my teapot pictures, and the vegeta exploded all over me lol

he was calling me an idiot with no experience because he called it something different.. ah, good times


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rapscaLLion
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Posted: 23rd Nov 2002 20:59
ya... as I recall, I almost found it funny... everyone bickering, he-who-shall-remain-nameless saying he was right because he is a pro, and has experiance and he's much superior. Etc....

Alex Wanuch
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The Wendigo
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Posted: 23rd Nov 2002 21:55
here's my shot: dif between phong and gourad - one is point shaded the other is vertex shaded???????

P.S. Proud to say I have never been flamed by Vageta!!! (But this might lead to my first)

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Puffy
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Posted: 23rd Nov 2002 21:58
vegeta makes a sport out of flamin me... O_O

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AlecM
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Posted: 23rd Nov 2002 22:21
I think flat fills the object with one color. I believe that Facet shading is what you were describing. Maybe not though.

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Puffy
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Posted: 23rd Nov 2002 22:23
same here...

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Solidz Snake
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Posted: 24th Nov 2002 00:21
Hey thanks for the info guyz!

But can u like give it more of how the main 3 (phong, gouraud & flat) go against cel-shading? Or vica versa, how cel-shading tops these three. I think this would be my main question.

Beside, it won't create any flames if 1 shading go against 3 rite? (hopefully! Okay okay, so I'm dumb, but i'm not asking a stupid question! Hehehe! I just need a very certain answer, thats all!)

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DrakeX
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Posted: 24th Nov 2002 03:56
what do you mean by "how cel-shading tops these three"?

i'm looking at yooooou!
Dean
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Posted: 24th Nov 2002 05:13
cell shading is good if you want to make your game look like a cartoon..

flat shading is usually only used when the people making the game were too lazy to add shades


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Solidz Snake
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Posted: 24th Nov 2002 06:26
Nazca , Thanks!

DrakeX , wat i mean is wat are the disadvantages (in rendering aspects) of the 3 shadings that Cel Shading have advantages of?

Hmm .. another way of putting it : Wat r all bad things that happen in the 3 shadings , that didn't happen or solve by Cel Shading technique?

Its just advantages vs disadvantages thingy question.

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Dean
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Posted: 24th Nov 2002 06:39
oh, well

flat shading: fastest, but ugliest

gourad: still fast, better looking than flat

phong: best looking, but takes WAY to long to render in real time

cell shaded: not really sure of how fast that can be rendered


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Puffy
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Posted: 24th Nov 2002 08:04
=\ hrmmm phong shading ... real time??? only if you have a super computer...

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haggisman
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Posted: 24th Nov 2002 13:44
phong shading can be easily done using vertex/pixel shaders in real time on my computer

Specs:- 1GHZ athlon, Radeon8500, 192mb ram, winxp
Puffy
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Posted: 24th Nov 2002 20:23
same here... but not everyone has a computer like yours or mine... some people even have 166 pentiums O_O...

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David T
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Posted: 24th Nov 2002 20:49
Actually, the new Zelda for GC is not cel-shaded, it's just that all the textures are flat shades to produce the effect. A game like Jet Set Radio Future or Cel Daage is celshaded.

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Especially the Episodes with Starships in.
Shadow Robert
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Posted: 24th Nov 2002 22:30
hehee i make a sport outta flaming anyone

1. Cel-Shaded
A combinations of techniques used to resemble the minor shade colours and black outline which you'd find on an animation Cel/Cartoon (^_^)
2. Phong
There are two variations of this you'll find, but phong shading is the shade of an entire mesh based on the vertex points and angles providing a very smooth blend depending on the range of angles that are being used. Games tend to use the quicker technique of shading each polygon(triangle face) from vertex point centers, whereas most Render engines will use the combined shading angles form all faces calculated to blend with each other.
The difference is minimal if you're moving but for a standing object can become quite obvious (^_^)
3. Gouraud
This was the first game used Shading technique to produce a smooth shading and used face centers as the base, is good for perfect 90° angles but falls short for any other form
4. Flat
Ahh the form that caused such a flame war the likes of RGT forums had never seen
Flat technically is a perfect single shade of colour across and object essentially what DB does if you don't let light interact with objects, HOWEVER recently it has been misconstrude for Facet Shading which gives each individual face of an object its own shade angle or rather Phong at 0°

Hopefully thats all to everyones liking
There are about another 10 types of shading that i can think of offhand, and i'd be happy to explain them all provided no one decides to start up that senseless argument that was on RGT.

Anata aru kowagaru no watashi!
The Wendigo
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Posted: 25th Nov 2002 03:59
hey nazca, nice baby pic thingamagigger. That's funny!

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rapscaLLion
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Posted: 25th Nov 2002 04:15
pheew, tragedy averted

Alex Wanuch
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Puffy
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Posted: 25th Nov 2002 04:35
I AGREE WHOLY WITH VEGETA O_O...

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rapscaLLion
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Posted: 25th Nov 2002 04:56
me too lol

Alex Wanuch
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Puffy
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Solidz Snake
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Posted: 25th Nov 2002 13:46
Thanks Vegeta!

It would be nice if u could explain about the 10 more types of shading.

(Everybody keep quite! I wanna listen & learn!)

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Digital Awakening
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Posted: 25th Nov 2002 14:33
Celshading has nothing to do with the outlines. Celshading devides the shading into segments usually 3 (highlight, normal and shadow)

Phongshading is what 3D program use to render perfect images.

Gouraudshading looks horrible if you don't have enough polys. Overuse of polys will make this look really good though. It's really fast though.

Flatshading is when the whole object is shaded the same, often used to describe facet shading (as do I =)). Many games use this instead of gouraud. They paint the shadows on the textures instead.

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Shadow Robert
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Posted: 25th Nov 2002 18:50
1. Anistrophic
This form of shading uses a combination of vertex points with face orientation which produces a nice phong style shade across the object and pans out the corners to give the object a better overall shade (used primarily as OpenGL's default Shading)
2. Meta
A variation on phong will has a much higher tolerance balance from the vertex point using the object as a whole to calculate a second shade of highlight across the object giving it more of a metallic shine
3. Ovelyin
One of the more interesting shading techniques, specifically designed to reproduce the dull reflection of skin and such ... Uses 3 layers to produce a Flat Shade, a Higlight Shade and a Shadow Shade based on the overall vertex from a given camera Vector
4. Blinn
This is a deeper form of Phong generally used for Rendering purposes only, calculates the colours to a higher precision whilst blending them together
5. Bump
Oftenly faked alot during games, a true form of this takes a fast phong to gain the normal points and then plots similar to a texture the pixels inbetween using displacement - it gives the effect of object having more polygons and detail than it actually has. This is also camera Vector based, but is mainly light dependant as well
6. Tessel Spline
From what i know this is only used in Softimage and Maya by film studios, but it creates a smooth surface shade by creating splines over a surface and calculating the normal points based on thier intersections from the light vector(s)... it adds a great deal of polygon render work however is probably the best you'll see as the smoothness is able to use layer shades (probably updated with Pixel/Texel Shaders by now)
7. Strauss
A form of shading specifically more for plastics and windows, resulting in a high reflection and high light absorbtion. Calculated by the Quad Vertex points of an object and overlapped as a whole, it allows for the whole object to be rendered with a spherical shade

can't think of any more at the moment, i know there are some but right one can't lol
thing is most of these won't help without the mathematics behind them, so I'll see about getting one of the guys to write up the fast versions of the major forms and you pick which you want to use (^_^)

Anata aru kowagaru no watashi!
Digital Awakening
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Posted: 25th Nov 2002 19:26
Anistrophic filtering (not shading) makes textures look sharper futher away from the camera. R300 is very good att using up to 16x AF.

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Shadow Robert
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yeah OpenGL uses a form of it for shading as well (^_^)
its why the models are smoothed out because they ignore the actual normals and calculate its own per second

But yeah the filtering is cool too (^_^)

Anata aru kowagaru no watashi!
rapscaLLion
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Posted: 26th Nov 2002 04:41
David89- the new Zelda game is cel shaded... not just textures trust me.

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Shadow Robert
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Posted: 27th Nov 2002 00:06
Hey anyone got some shots of it, the only place i can find any is on GameSpot and I'm not gonna subscribe just to see pictures
Last time I saw Zelda was before the Engine remake and the cel shading was introduced.

Anata aru kowagaru no watashi!
rapscaLLion
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Posted: 27th Nov 2002 00:17
http://www.gamesasylum.com/articles/showarticle.php?id=854

Alex Wanuch
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Puffy
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oh its tight... its very tight.. .ahem classic phrase.. ME WANT ME WANT...

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Posted: 27th Nov 2002 22:04
I was shocked to see the new Zelda looks. The old one was much better. I hear that they're making a classic-looking one aswell as the funky cel-esque version.

Who wants cake? I've got a little slice of hell for everyone.
Shadow Robert
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Posted: 27th Nov 2002 23:20
Eck... thats the new zelda then, WTF happened to that lovely hyper-real one i was shown two years ago

I swear someone at nintendo right now has a freakin' screw loose or something. But atleast it doesn't have ugly black lines too lol

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The man in question is Shigeru Myamoto - creator of Zelda, Mario, Metroid, pretty much all the signature Nintendo characters, minus Donkey Kong.

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actarus
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So now I know who to worship at last!!!Thank you!

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rapscaLLion
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Posted: 28th Nov 2002 00:08
Nope, the "hyper-real" one was just a GameCube demo... the cel-shaded look has always been, and at first I was against it too, but then I realized that it is perfect! IT is exactly the style of the old Zelda games we all love, the ones on SNES and such! Except 3D... but they still look cartoony. Anyway, I can't explain it, but I now believe that I would prefer this new zelda game to have that look to it.

Alex Wanuch
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Mirthin
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Posted: 28th Nov 2002 00:10
NP, BTW, the director's name is Hiroshi Yamauchi. He's the great grandson of the founder. Back then, Nintendo made trading cards. The origin of the word "Nintendo" remains uncertain.

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actarus
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I know it meant entertainment and mother screams to me such as:'Gimme back ma TV'! lmao

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The hyper real demo was confirmed to be a game. Trust me, I'm so informed on Nintendo that I'm pretty sure I need to get out more. And the hyper real one is much more akin to the N64 games, which were more recent. The double game idea was probably implemented to please both sides.

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Puffy
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Posted: 28th Nov 2002 00:30
I guess, =\ I still prefer the old zelda for NES. It rocked!

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Shadow Robert
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Posted: 28th Nov 2002 02:38
Well i'm not against the cartoon style... but i dunno - it could be done alot better with the Gekko.

As for the hyper-real, i never got to see the E3 Movie demo until after i'd actually played an earli beta of the title. And it was truely outstanding made the XBox's graphics seem a little basic - i'm still baffled to why they changed OR if it is a different company why there has been no new news!

I prefer N64's Animé stylee more than the pure cartoon.
But game like Jet Set Radio as well as Sheep, Dog 'n' Wolf have shown that decent cartoon graphics are entirely possible

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Puffy
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Posted: 28th Nov 2002 05:15
your right... i like photo real games... that new game being put out by the us army for free looks awesome...

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DrakeX
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Posted: 30th Nov 2002 04:18
i saw metroid prime and the thought running through my mind was "man, if this looks this good, i wonder what zelda'd look like if it were done realistically."

i'm not real sure if i like or dislike the new look; i haven't really seen it in action, just a few stills.

although they could stand to use a FEW more colors; from what i saw it looks less colorful than even the SNES zelda. as in the textures are 2 or 3 colors, sometimes 1.

i'm looking at yooooou!
Puffy
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Posted: 30th Nov 2002 10:40
O_O lol... your right... tne snes zelda was very colorless.. its the same as the nes zelda... then again more snes work than nes...

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