Introduction to Direct3D with Code Example

Category:

Multimedia/Games

Type:

Applications

Difficulty:

Intermediate

Author:

Simon Price

Version Compatibility:

Instructions: Copy the declarations and code below and paste directly into your VB project.

Declarations:
' (None)

Code:

<h1 align="center"><u><b><a name="lesson">An Introduction To Direct3D</a></b></u></h1>
<h4 align="center"><u>By <a href="mailto:Si@VBgames.co.uk">Simon Price</a></u></h4>
<h3 align="left"><u>Tutorial Breakdown</u></h3>
<p align="left">This tutorial will consist of the following steps :</p>
<ul>
  <li>
    <p align="left"><a href="#explain">Explanation</a> of what Direct3D does and how you can use it
    from Visual Basic</li>
  <li>
    <p align="left"><a href="#demonstate">Definitions</a> of all the objects, types and enumerations you
    will need to know to get started</li>
  <li>
    <p align="left"><a href="#imitate">Example</a> source code with heavy commenting</li>
  <li>
    <p align="left"><a href="#practice">Summary</a> of what you have learnt</li>
  <li>
    <p align="left"><a href="#bingo">Exercises</a> to make you remember it all</li>
</ul>
<h3 align="left"><u><a name="explain">Direct3D Overview</a></u></h3>
<p align="left">Direct3D is a part of DirectX. This tutorial is specific to
Direct3D 7, so you will need DirectX 7.0 or higher if you are planning to use
what you learn here. DirectX has a component called DirectDraw, which is used to
perform graphics functions at a lower level that Windows GDI. If you have never
used DirectDraw before, I suggest you look at my tutorial "An Introduction
To DirectDraw", available on this site, or <a href="http://www.VBgames.co.uk">my
website</a>. Direct3D (D3D) has two main parts - Immediate Mode and Retained
Mode. This tutorial deals with Immediate Mode only. Immediate Mode (IM) is built
on top of DirectDraw. That means it uses DirectDraw to place graphics on the
screen, or in memory. D3D Retained Mode (RM) is built on top of D3D IM.
Therefore, D3D RM is not as efficient as D3D IM. This is why I have chosen to
learn D3D IM. However, I do not claim that one is better than the other, just
that IM is faster and RM is easier to learn and create applications very quickly
with. If you learn IM, heavy vector mathematics and slow development is involved
but you will be rewarded with more power and control. The choice is yours. If
you still want to learn IM, then read on.</p>
<p align="left">Direct3D has a job - to give programmers a common interface for
all 3D devices. In English - no matter what computer your application runs on,
whether it has a Voodoo Mega Wicked 10000 3D accelerator or a Omega Budget 256
Color Economy VGA card, you still use the same objects to program with. It means
that you don't have to learn about how every graphics card works for your
application to work on every computer. Direct3D also provides software
emulation. This means that if half your users have hardware acceleration, and
half don't, you can use hardware if available and then fall back to using
Direct3D software emulation if the hardware is not available. Of course software
emulation is alot slower.</p>
<p align="left">It's time to start Visual Basic! Create a new project and called
it something imaginative like "D3Dintro.vbp". Next, click Project -> References
and a dialog box will show a list of references your project uses. If you have
installed the DirectX7 For Visual Basic type library, scroll down to it and
check the check box next to it. Click OK to add the reference. Now Visual Basic
knows every single class, type and enumeration you need to use DirectX7. If you
do not have the DirectX 7 For Visual Basic Type Library, you can download it
from <a href="http://www.microsoft.com">www.microsoft.com</a> .</p>
<h3 align="left"><u><a name="demonstate">Get on with the programming!</a></u></h3>
<p align="left">Here are the declarations you will need for the tutorial
programs, with a short explanation as to what they are all about. First the
objects followed by the types.</p>
<ul>
  <li>
    <p align="left"><b>DirectX7</b> - this is the great big daddy of them all!
    It is from the DirectX7 object that you will create all the other objects,
...