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Photoshop CS for Dummies

Deke McClelland, Phyllis Davis

Photoshop CS for Dummies Deke McClelland, Phyllis Davis Amazon Price: $16.49
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 3.0 of 5

Huh? 1 out of 5 stars.
13 of 41 people found this review helpful.

According to the authors the RAW file format is mainly for use in transferring graphics between Apple and PC computers and loses a great deal of detail. In other words they wrote a book about Photoshop CS but they know little if anything about the subject.

Editorial Review:

* Covers the main features of Photoshop-the industry standard software package for image creation, correction, and enhancement
* Explores the essentials: menu bar, tool palette, modifying images, retouching images, painting and drawing, creating type, adding special effects, creating and managing layers, preparing images for the Web, and much more
* Updated to cover all the new features in both the Mac and Windows versions of the latest Photoshop release
* A ready reference that helps Photoshop novices become productive quickly and introduces experienced Photoshop users to the latest Photoshop tricks and techniques
* Authored by Deke McClelland, a member of the Photoshop Hall of Fame, who has published more than sixty books on computer graphics and electronic publishing

Deconstructing the Elements with 3ds Max, Second Edition: Create natural fire, earth, air and water without plug-ins

Pete Draper

Deconstructing the Elements with 3ds Max, Second Edition: Create natural fire, earth, air and water without plug-ins Pete Draper Amazon Price: $32.97
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 14 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Get the most realistic effects from 3ds Max without having to spend more on plug-ins!

Boost your effects skill-set with this 3ds Max workshop. Tutorial lessons give you hands-on experience in creating realistic fire, earth, air and water effects. Updated to demonstrate production techniques suitable for any version of 3ds Max, this new edition is co-published by Autodesk Media and Entertainment, and includes new tutorials on entering the Earth's atmosphere, glaciers, lava eruptions and a Badlands landscape.

Inspirational color images cover every page of the book as the author shares his professional techniques and workflow processes. The companion DVD contains all of the required tutorial media as well as over 6 hours of video tutorials.


User level: Intermediate and advanced

· Realistic effects without plug-ins!
· Tutorial lessons demonstrate professional techniques and workflow processes.
· Companion DVD contains all of the required tutorial media plus additional video tutorials.
· Co-published by Autodesk Media and Entertainment.

Game Development With LUA (Game Development Series)

Paul Schuytema, Mark Manyen

Game Development With LUA (Game Development Series) Paul Schuytema, Mark Manyen Amazon Price: $32.97
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Lua has gained momentum in the game development world due to its power and easy control of complex GUIs and artificial intelligence. If you’re a developer just starting to use Lua, or you’re considering using it, Game Development with Lua will teach you everything you need to know. And if you’re new to scripting languages altogether, this book will also teach you how they can be used in game development effectively.

Written by practicing Lua game developers, the book teaches how to use Lua for commercial game development. It begins with a brief history of Lua and explains how to incorporate Lua into a C++ project. It details the key features and advantages of Lua and then takes you through the development of a "rapid prototype" game called Take Away. This game provides the context with which to explore the foundational C++ approaches and the Lua scripting approaches to saving and loading game data, building a modular and flexible GUI system, managing a game’s real-time events through Lua scripts, and using Lua to define and control game AI. There are also several smaller games along with a full technology base, so even non-programmers can look under the hood to see what makes a game tick.

If you’re looking for an efficient, affordable, and easy-to-learn language for your games, Lua is the right choice and this book will teach you how to use it effectively.

KEY FEATURES: * Teaches the ins-and-outs of game development with Lua * Explains how to link the Lua API into your C++ application so you can create your own LuaGlue functions that allow Lua to extend your C++ functionality. * Provides the fi rst book dedicated to teaching game programming with Lua * Enables new developers to rapidly prototype ideas, interfaces, and ideas without deep programming knowledge * Includes a CD-ROM with all the source code from the book and all the tools needed to create your own Lua games On the CD! * The Lua console, the Lua manual, and the source code for Lua 5.0 * Lua scripts and executable programs used within each chapter * Microsoft® DirectX® SDK DX9.0c plus the latest runtime distributable package * Figures from the book organized by chapter * Documents for the Take Away design and a Lua scripting style guide * License documents for both Lua and Ogg Vorbis * The OggVorbis music system source code * Complete version of Take Away, the game developed throughout the book * Shareware version of the Zeus program editor used for editing Lua scripts

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS P450 or better processor, Windows 2000/XP, 32MB of RAM. For the demos: DirectX 9 (included on CDROM), DX-compatible 3D video accelerator. DirectX SDK requires: Microsoft Windows® 98, Windows Millennium Edition (Windows Me), or Windows 2000, Windows Server 2003, Windows XP, ~65 megabytes (MB) of available space for installation. Lua runs on most any system that can compile standard C code. Ogg Vorbis requires: Microsoft Windows 95, 98, Me, NT, 2000 or XP, a soundcard. Processor: Pentium 200 mhz or more, 32 MB of RAM. Zeus requires: Microsoft Windows 95, 98, Me, NT, 2000 or XP, 4 MB RAM, and 4.5 MB available disk space.

Beginning Game Programming with Flash

Hamsa Suri, Lakshmi Prayaga

Beginning Game Programming with Flash Hamsa Suri, Lakshmi Prayaga Amazon Price: $19.79
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 3 Average rating: 3.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

If you are new to game programming and want to learn how to create dynamic, robust, and fun 2D games, "Beginning Game Programming with Flash" is the book for you! Written for introductory game programming students and other enthusiasts, the book begins with an overview of the Flash graphical user interface (GUI), explaining the four main components of the Flash authoring environment: the stage, timeline, tools and panels, and symbols. Once you are comfortable working with the GUI, you’ll dive into using ActionScript, the language used to write code in Flash, which controls the graphics, sound files, and interactivity between the player and the game assets. As you work through the book you’ll discover how to create a storyboard for a game, add animation and visual effects, insert movie clips and sound files, apply math and physics concepts to make game objects move, and develop and test a Flash game. Easy-to-follow, step-by-step instructions walk you through each step of the game-building process, and end-of-chapter exercises, tutorials, and games-based projects help you reinforce and apply the concepts you have learned. "Beginning Game Programming with Flash" covers all the essential elements of game programming, making it a comprehensive and fun guide for beginning game programmers.

Game Programming Gems 7 (Game Programming Gems Series)

Scott Jacobs

Game Programming Gems 7 (Game Programming Gems Series) Scott Jacobs Amazon Price: $44.09
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Total reviews: 1 Average rating: 2.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Welcome to the seventh volume of the must-have reference series for game developers, Game Programming Gems, the series that helped define the standards for game programming and continues to be an essential source for new, innovative techniques. "Game Programming Gems 7" provides the tools and inspiration that game developers need to excel. Featuring cutting-edge, ready-to-use techniques contributed by industry veterans and experts, this new collection is a key resource for inspiration, insight, and a plethora of time-saving, ready-to-use methods for the developer’s tool box! Gems 7 answers the needs of passionate developers, eager newcomers, voracious production requirements, and the demand for innovating and entertaining gameplay. Covering all the key development areas including math and physics, artificial intelligence, audio, and even scripting and data-driven systems, each section is edited by an expert in the field to ensure that the ideas are original, accurate, and useful.There are gems that contribute directly to a player’s experience of the game, including audio production gems and human-game interactions. Does your development team include a DBA? Inside you’ll find a gem that suggests ways to integrate your object system with a relational database. Recognizing the need for good solutions for managing ever-increasing team sizes and facilitating efficient internal and external communications, there is a networking gem that applies tools to multiplayer development that are common to many network administrators, but may not yet have widespread use in our industry. Dig into this new volume of useful, practical ideas and techniques and get ready to make games that are more inventive, entertaining, and satisfying!

Pro Java 6 3D Game Development: Java 3D, JOGL, JInput and JOAL APIs (Expert's Voice in Java)

Andrew Davison

Pro Java 6 3D Game Development: Java 3D, JOGL, JInput and JOAL APIs (Expert's Voice in Java) Andrew Davison Amazon Price: $43.99
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Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Create strange lands filled with mysterious objects (cows frozen in blocks of ice, chirping penguins, golden globes with wavering eyes) and throw away your keyboard and mouse, to go exploring armed only with a gamepad, power glove, or just your bare hands…

Java gaming expert Andrew Davison will show you how to develop and program 3D games in Java technology on a PC, with an emphasis on the construction of 3D landscapes. It's assumed you have a reasonable knowledge of Java - the sort of thing picked up in a first Java course at school.

Topics are split into three sections: Java 3D API, non-standard input devices for game playing, and JOGL. Java 3D is a high-level 3D graphics API, and JOGL is a lower-level Java wrapper around the popular OpenGL graphics API.

Youll look at three non-standard input devices: the webcam, the game pad, and the P5 data glove.

Along the way, youll utilize several other games-related libraries including: JInput, JOAL, JMF, and Odejava.

Learn all the latest Java SE 6 features relevant to gaming, including: splash screens, JavaScript scripting as well as the desktop and system tray interfaces.

Unique coverage of Java game development using both the Java 3D API and Java for OpenGL, as well as invaluable experience from a recognized Java gaming guru, will provide you with a distinct advantage after reading this book.

Essential Mathematics for Games and Interactive Applications, Second Edition: A Programmer's Guide

James M. Van Verth, Lars M. Bishop

Essential Mathematics for Games and Interactive Applications, Second Edition: A Programmer's Guide James M. Van Verth, Lars M. Bishop Amazon Price: $47.96
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Editorial Review:

Essential Mathematics for Games and Interactive Applications, 2nd edition presents the core mathematics necessary for sophisticated 3D graphics and interactive physical simulations. The book begins with linear algebra and matrix multiplication and expands on this foundation to cover such topics as color and lighting, interpolation, animation and basic game physics. Essential Mathematics focuses on the issues of 3D game development important to programmers and includes optimization guidance throughout.

The new edition Windows code will now use Visual Studio.NET. There will also be DirectX support provided, along with OpenGL - due to its cross-platform nature. Programmers will find more concrete examples included in this edition, as well as additional information on tuning, optimization and robustness.

The book has a companion CD-ROM with exercises and a test bank for the academic secondary market, and for main market: code examples built around a shared code base, including a math library covering all the topics presented in the book, a core vector/matrix math engine, and libraries to support basic 3D rendering and interaction. There is also an associated website with updates and code patches, and PowerPoint slides from presentations.

--Simple game engine with math, rendering, and input libraries on the CD-ROM, so that game developers can immediately start applying the techniques they learn in a basic codebase.
--Exercises on the CD-ROM for educators to use for course material
--Code samples shown throughout the book for real-world application

GPU Gems 2: Programming Techniques for High-Performance Graphics and General-Purpose Computation (Gpu Gems)

Matt Pharr, Randima Fernando

GPU Gems 2: Programming Techniques for High-Performance Graphics and General-Purpose Computation (Gpu Gems) Matt Pharr, Randima Fernando Amazon Price: $55.99
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 7 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Pretty pictures 2 out of 5 stars.
20 of 54 people found this review helpful.

This book is targeted at people who have a good solid grasp of either OpenGL or D3D as well as a grounding in programming languages such as C/C++ or Java. While this much is obvious, the book is still painfully difficult to get anything useful out of.
The problem amounts to the fact that there is no cohesion between chapters - each one is written by a different author (and clearly they have not read each other's material) - there is no reference or introduction but worst of all, no common terms.
Example; What D3D calls a "pixel shader", OpenGL call "fragment shader", but there are also "vertex shader", "vertex program", "pixel program" and "fragment program"... some of these are the same thing while others are wildly different, but I found at least 4 references in this book to what I could only make sense of by substituting another term (the correct one). Each author has written their part from their own view point using their own terms.
The code snippets contained rarely have any comments or even descriptions of how they work.
Overall I generally felt like I was either reading someone's thesis or a marketing spiel about a particular aspect of some game.
There are many pretty pictures though.

Information Design

Information Design Amazon Price: $24.69
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 14 Average rating: 2.5 of 5

Illustrates Why Info Design Is More Than Just Flowcharts 5 out of 5 stars.
37 of 39 people found this review helpful.

I am a professional Information Architect; However, I picked up the book without any preconcieved notions or superficial expectations. I found especially illuminating (and actually empathisized with) the comparisons between IAs conceptualizing Information Design and Traditional Architects conceptualizing "wayfinding" through building structures. For those of you who are looking for a Home Deopt style "How-To" manual on creating intuitive interface design for software applications; you simply have to surf the web for 1001 lessons on HOW NOT TO do it. Seriously, the only effective Information Design training program is years of experience in software development. A "blueprint" or plan is key to useful execution, but there is a lot more to good Information Design than a pile of flowcharts. The best an author can do is to share some of his/her insight on ergonomic design with the rest of us. While many of the reviewers found this book's exposition of visionary and philosophical approaches to design impractical; I found it to be both informative and refreshing. Information design is not about how rigidly organized the branching structure is; instead, it's about how the user "moves through" an application (hopefully with pleasure and ease of use). This calls for a combination of clever engineering and artistic design, and cannot be accomplished simply by "keeping all your ducks in a row" The most significant aspect of good Info Design, in the end, is clear, intuitive, useable interface.

Editorial Review:

Information design is the newest of the design disciplines. As a sign of our times, when the crafting of messages and meaning is so central to our lives, information design is not only important—it is essential. Contemporary information designers seek to edify more than to persuade, to exchange more than to foist upon. With ever more powerful technologies of communication, we have learned that the issuer of designed information is as likely as the intended recipient to be changed by it, for better or worse.

The contributors to this book are both cautionary and hopeful as they offer visions of how information design can be practiced diligently and ethically, for the benefit of information consumers as well as producers. They present various methods that seem to work, such as sense-making and way-finding. They make recommendations and serve as guides to a still young but extraordinarily pervasive—and persuasive—field.

Mapping Hacks: Tips & Tools for Electronic Cartography (Hacks)

Schuyler Erle, Rich Gibson, Jo Walsh

Mapping Hacks: Tips & Tools for Electronic Cartography (Hacks) Schuyler Erle, Rich Gibson, Jo Walsh Amazon Price: $19.77
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 18 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Since the dawn of creation, man has designed maps to help identify the space that we occupy. From Lewis and Clark's pencil-sketched maps of mountain trails to Jacques Cousteau's sophisticated charts of the ocean floor, creating maps of the utmost precision has been a constant pursuit. So why should things change now?

Well, they shouldn't. The reality is that map creation, or "cartography," has only improved in its ease-of-use over time. In fact, with the recent explosion of inexpensive computing and the growing availability of public mapping data, mapmaking today extends all the way to the ordinary PC user.

"Mapping Hacks," the latest page-turner from O'Reilly Press, tackles this notion head on. It's a collection of one hundred simple--and mostly free--techniques available to developers and power users who want draw digital maps or otherwise visualize geographic data. Authors Schuyler Erle, Rich Gibson, and Jo Walsh do more than just illuminate the basic concepts of location and cartography, they walk you through the process one step at a time.

"Mapping Hacks" shows you where to find the best sources of geographic data, and then how to integrate that data into your own map. But that's just an appetizer. This comprehensive resource also shows you how to interpret and manipulate unwieldy cartography data, as well as how to incorporate personal photo galleries into your maps. It even provides practical uses for GPS (Global Positioning System) devices--those touch-of-a-button street maps integrated into cars and mobile phones. Just imagine: If Captain Kidd had this technology, we'd all know where to find his buried treasure!

With all of these industrial-strength tips andtools, "Mapping Hacks" effectively takes the sting out of the digital mapmaking and navigational process. Now you can create your own maps for business, pleasure, or entertainment--without ever having to sharpen a single pencil.


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