[Tutor] graphics in python

[Danny Yoo]

On Sat, 22 Mar 2003, pytutor wrote:

> I am a graphics programmer. I have worked on opengl and have written few
> experimental graphics programs. i want to do the same using python. can
> u tell me how python stands vis-a-vis other graphics language like
> opengl/java/vrml etc etc.

Hello!

Python and Java are themselves not specialized "graphics" languages ---
they're considered general programming languages; they don't have built-in
support for anything, but can be extended to many problem domains.


OpenGL is a set of functions that can draw graphics, and they're available
from a lot of different programming languages --- it's fairly language
independent.  For example, PyOpenGL compares very favorably to other
language bindings for OpenGL:

    http://pyopengl.sourceforge.net/


But there are other Python programs that try to make 3D programming
appealing to new programmers.  You may want to look at VPython:

    http://vpython.org/


> one of the graphics has an animated lever experiment for kids that shows
> the force/fulcrum/load relationships. which python package/library
> should i use? the library should have 2D/3D objects;animations;text
> display;maths;linux compatible;portable;free.

Hmmm... ah!  Then I highly recommend that you look at VPython!  VPython
sounds very applicable to your project, and may be what you're looking
for.  One more project that I'm remember offhand is the Alice project:

    http://www.alice.org/

which also looks awesome.  I wish I had more time to play with these
programs!  Does anyone have experience with these systems?


You may want to ask your question on a general Python forum like the
comp.lang.python newsgroup: there are folks there that may be able to give
good advice.