GDC 2011 San Francisco

WebGL is a cross-platform, royalty-free web standard for a low-level 3D graphics API based on OpenGL ES 2.0, exposed through the HTML5 Canvas element as Document Object Model interfaces. Developers familiar with OpenGL ES 2.0 will recognize WebGL as a Shader-based API using GLSL. It stays very close to the OpenGL ES 2.0 specification, with some concessions made for what developers expect out of memory-managed languages such as JavaScript. Major browser vendors Apple (Safari), Google (Chrome), Mozilla (Firefox), and Opera (Opera) are members of the WebGL Working Group.

Learn about WebGL, a cross-platform, royalty-free web standard based on OpenGL ES 2.0. WebGL is Shader-based using GLSL, bringing plugin-free 3D to the web, implemented right into the browser.

OpenGL® is the most widely adopted 2D and 3D graphics API in the industry, bringing thousands of applications to a wide variety of computer platforms. It is window-system and operating-system independent as well as network-transparent. OpenGL enables developers of software for PC, workstation, and supercomputing hardware to create high-performance, visually compelling graphics software applications, in markets such as CAD, content creation, energy, entertainment, game development, manufacturing, medical, and virtual reality. OpenGL 3.2 exposes all the features of the latest graphics hardware.

Just like graphics hardware, OpenGL evolves with new graphics technology. This session will present an introduction to OpenGL, explain best practices for performance and compatibility with future versions of the API, and provide a glimpse of OpenGL's future directions.

Spend your lunch break checking out the hottest products running on Khronos APIs. We will have demos running in the back of the room and member presentations at the podium. Feel free to hang out and meet the creators of these technlogies!

Understanding POWERVR SGX Graphics Technology and Optimizing for Great Graphics Performance

Speakers: Joe Davis (Imagination Technologies) and Gordon MacLachlan (Imagination Technologies)
Day / Time / Location: Monday 28th February 4:15 - 5:15 pm Room 120, North Hall

Imagination's POWERVR SGX and SGX MP graphics IP is a crucial part of today's consumer electronics market, integrated into a wide variety of the latest mobile, computing and embedded products. Now - with new POWERVR Series6 cores, codenamed 'Rogue' on their way and multi-core SGX MP devices already coming to market in smartphones, tablets and games consoles it is becoming increasingly important for developers to understand how to take advantage of this hardware architecture in their applications.

The aim of this session is to give an expert insight into the POWERVR SGX and SGX MP Tile Based Deferred Rendering architecture and explain to developers how they can use the PVRTune analysis utility, and best programming practice, to optimize their applications for todays mobile devices.

Please note that an eligible GDC pass is required to attend this session: Audio Pass, Main Conference Pass, Summits and Tutorials Pass, All Access Pass

COLLADA™ defines an XML-based schema to make it easy to transport 3D assets between applications - enabling diverse 3D authoring and content processing tools be combined into a production pipeline. The intermediate language provides comprehensive encoding of visual scenes including: geometry, shaders and effects, physics, animation, kinematics, and even multiple version representations of the same asset. COLLADA FX enables leading 3D authoring tools to work effectively together to create shader and effects applications and assets to be authored and packaged using OpenGL® Shading Language, Cg, CgFX, and DirectX® FX

Attend the COLLADA DevU session to see numerous developers present the latest cutting-edge DCC tools and applications for gaming, automation, 3D web and visualization.

OpenCL™ is the first open, royalty-free standard for cross-platform, parallel programming of modern processors found in personal computers, servers and handheld/embedded devices. OpenCL (Open Computing Language) greatly improves speed and responsiveness for a wide spectrum of applications in numerous market categories from gaming and entertainment to scientific and medical software. OpenCL supports a wide range of applications, from embedded and consumer software to HPC solutions, through a low-level, high-performance, portable abstraction. By creating an efficient, close-to-the-metal programming interface, OpenCL will form the foundation layer of a parallel computing ecosystem of platform-independent tools, middleware and applications.

At this session you will meet designers and implementers of this significant new standard for heterogeneous parallel programming on GPUs and CPUs, and learn how OpenCL inter-operates with OpenGL, enabling advanced, cross-platform, visual computing applications.

Khronos has developed a complete ecosystem of mobile graphics and media APIs – including OpenGL ES, OpenMAX IL, OpenVG and OpenKODE – that is enabling advanced user interfaces, 3D games and other rich-media applications on a wide range of handheld devices. Come to the Khronos Mobile session and learn the inside track about the new media APIs being used to develop the billion-dollar, billion-user gaming and mobile multimedia markets!

This session will provide an overview of this evolving ecosystem and detailed insights into the widely adopted APIs for accelerated 2D and 3D graphics. If you develop multimedia content, these APIs will let you tap into cutting edge graphics and media processing on platforms ranging from high-end workstations to mobile phones.

• Applications driving next-generation handset requirements
• Opportunities opened up by innovation and standardization in graphics and mobile gaming
• Technological advances in multimedia handset technology