Unit-1
Introduction to Computer Graphics
Display CRT Monitors
Device Refresh Cathode Ray Tube
Random Scan And Raster Scan Display
Display CRT Monitors
The primary output device in a graphics system is a video monitor.
The operation of most video monitors is based on the standard Cathode-
Ray Tube (CRT) design, but several other technologies exist and solid-
state monitors may eventually predominate.
Device Refresh Cathode Ray Tube
A beam of electrons (Cathode Rays), emitted by an
electron gun, passes through focusing and
deflection system that direct the beam toward
specified positions on the phosphor-coated screen.
The phosphor then emits a small spot of light at
each position contacted by the electron beam.
Since the light emitted by the phosphor fades very
rapidly , some method is needed for maintaining
the screen picture.
One way to keep the phosphor glowing is to redraw
the picture repeatedly by quickly directing the
electron beam back over the same points.
This type of display is called a refresh CRT.
1 Electron Gun
2 Focusing System
3 Electrostatic Focusing
4 Magnetic Deflection
5 Control Grid
The primary component of CRT is the heated metal cathode and a control grid.
Heat is supplied to the cathode (Negative Charge) by directing a current through a coil of wire,
called the heating filament, inside the cylindrical cathode structure.
Heat causes electrons to be boiled off the hot cathode surface.
In the vacuum inside the CRT envelope , the free, negatively charged electrons are then
accelerated toward the phosphor coating screen, or an accelerating anode can be used.
Intensity of the electron beam is controlled by setting voltage levels on the control grid, which is
metal cylinder that fits over the cathode.
A high negative voltage applied to the control grid will shut off the beam of repelling electrons and
stopping them from passing through the small hole at the end of the control grid structure.
Since the amount of light emitted by the phosphor coating depends on the number of electrons
striking the screen, we control the brightness of a display by varying the voltage on the control
grid.
1 Electron Gun
2 Focusing System
3 Electrostatic Focusing
4 Magnetic Deflection
5 Control Grid
The Focusing System in a CRT is needed to force the electron beam to converge into a small spot as
it strikes the phosphor. Otherwise, the electron would repel each other , and the beam would
spread out as it approaches the screen.
Also the distance that the electron beam must travel to different points on the screen varies
because the radius of curvature for most CRTs is greater than the distance from the focusing system
to the screen centre.
As the beam moves to the outer edges of the screen, display images become blurred.
To compensate for this, the system can adjust the focusing according to the screen position of the
beam.
Focusing is accomplished with either electric or magnetic fields.
1 Electron Gun
2 Focusing System
3 Electrostatic Focusing
4 Magnetic Deflection
5 Control Grid
Electrostatic focusing is commonly used in television and computer graphics monitors.
With electrostatic focusing, the electron beam passes through a positively charged metal
cylinder that forms an electrostatic lens.
The action of the electrostatic lens focuses the electron beam at the screen , in exactly
the same way that an optical lens focuses a beam of light at a particular focal distance.
In electrostatic deflection- two pairs of parallel plates are mounted inside the CRT
envelope.
One pair of plate is mounted horizontally to control the vertical deflection, and the other
pair is mounted vertically to control horizontal deflection.
1 Electron Gun
2 Focusing System
3 Electrostatic Focusing
4 Magnetic Deflection
5 Control Grid
Similar lens focusing effects can also be accomplished with a magnetic field set up by a coil
mounted around the outside of the CRT envelope.
Two pairs of coiled are used , with the coils in each pair mounted on opposite sides of the neck of
the CRT envelope.
One pair is mounted on the top and bottom of the neck, and other pair is mounted on opposite
sides of the neck.
The magnetic field produced by each pair of coils results in a transverse deflection force that is
perpendicular both to the direction of magnetic field and to the direction of travel of electron
beam.
Horizontal deflection is accomplished with one pair of coils, and vertical deflection by the other
pair.
The proper deflection amounts are attained by adjusting the current through the coils.
1 Electron Gun
2 Focusing System
3 Electrostatic Focusing
4 Magnetic Deflection
5 Control Grid
Intensity of the electron beam is controlled by setting voltage levels on the control grid, which is
a metal cylinder that fits over the cathode.
A high negative voltage applied to the control grid will shut OFF the beam by repelling electrons
and stopping them from passing through the small hole at the end of the control grid structure.
A smaller negative voltage on the control grid simply decreases the number of electrons passing
through.
Since the amount of light emitted by the phosphor coating depends on the number of electrons
striking the screen, we control the brightness of a display by varying the voltage on the control
grid.
Working
Spots of light are produced on the screen by the transfer of the CRT beam energy
to the phosphor.
When the electrons in the beam collide with phosphor coating, they are stopped
and then kinetic energy is absorbed by the phosphor.
Part of the beam energy is converted by friction into heat energy, and the
remainder causes electrons in the phosphor atoms to move up to higher quantum
energy levels.
After a short time excited phosphor electrons begin dropping back to their stable
ground state, giving up their extra energy as small quantum of light energy.
What we see on the screen is the combined effect of all the electron light
emission : a glowing spot that quickly fades after all the excited phosphor
electrons have returned to their ground energy level.
Important Terms in Graphics
Persistence
The time it takes the emitted light from the screen to decay to one-tenth of its original intensity.
Resolution
The maximum number of points that can be displayed without overlap on a CRT is referred to as
the resolution.
Resolution is the number of points per centimeter that can be plotted horizontally and vertically
Aspect Ratio
This number gives the ratio of vertical points to horizontal points necessary to produce equal-
length lines in both directions on the screen.
Sometimes aspect ratio is stated in terms of the ratio of horizontal to vertical points.
An aspect ratio of 3/4 means that a vertical line plotted with three points has the same length as
a horizontal line plotted with four points
Important Terms Related to Display
Frame Buffer
Picture definition is stored in a memory area called the refresh buffer or frame
buffer.
This memory area holds the set of intensity values for all the screen points. Stored
intensity values are then retrieved from the refresh buffer and "painted" on the
screen one row (scan line) at a time.
It is accessed by the video controller to refresh the image after a point of time.
The size of frame buffer-Resolution X Bits per Pixel
Pixel
Each screen point is referred to as a pixel or pel (shortened forms of picture element).
Important Terms Related to Display
Bitmap:
On a black-and-white system with one bit per pixel, the frame buffer is commonly called a
Bitmap.
Pixmap:
Systems with multiple bits per pixel, the frame buffer are often referred to as a Pixmap.
For a bit level system
A bit value of 1 indicates that the electron beam is to be turn ON at that position.
A bit value of 0 indicates that the beam intensity is to be turn OFF.
Additional bits are needed when color and intensity variations can be displayed.
Up to 24 bits per pixel are included in high-quality systems, which can require several
megabytes of storage for the frame buffer, depending on the resolution of the system.
A system with 24 bits per pixel and a screen resolution of 1024 bv 1024 requires 3 Mega Bytes
of storage for the frame buffer.
Important Terms Related to Display
Horizontal Retrace: The return to the left of the screen, after refreshing each
scan line, is called the horizontal retrace of the electron beam.
Vertical Retrace: At the end of each frame (displayed in 1/80th to 1/60th of a
second), the electron beam returns (vertical retrace) to the top left comer of
the screen to begin the next frame.
Techniques for Producing Images
There are two techniques used for producing images on the
CRT screen:-
Random Scan Display/Vector Scan
Raster Scan Display
Raster Scan Display- Introduction
The most common type of
graphics monitor employing
a CRT is the raster-scan
display, based on television
technology.
In a raster-scan system,
electron beam is swept
across the screen, one row
at a time from top to
. As the electron
beam moves across each
row, the beam intensity is
turned on and off to create a
pattern of illuminated spots
as shown:
Raster Scan Display- Architecture
Adjacent figure shows the
architecture of Raster display.
It consists of display controller,
CPU, video controller, refresh
buffer, keyboard, mouse and
CRT.
The display image is stored in
the form of 1 and 0 in the
refresh buffer.
The video controller reads this
refresh buffer and produces the
actual image on screen.
Raster Scan Display- Working
It will scan one line at a time from top to
bottom & then back to the top.
In this method the horizontal and vertical
deflection signals are generated to move the
beam all over the screen in a pattern shown in
the adjacent figure.
Vertical
Here beam is swept back & forth from left to Retrace Horizontal
the right. OFF ON
Retrace
When beam is moved from left to right it is ON.
When beam is moved from right to left it is OFF
and process of moving beam from right to left
after completion of row is known as Horizontal
Retrace.
When beam is reach at the bottom of the screen.
It is made OFF and rapidly retraced back to the
top left to start again and process of moving
back to top is known as Vertical Retrace.
Raster Scan Display- Refreshing Screen
The screen image is maintained by
repeatedly scanning the same image. This
process is known as Refreshing of Screen.
In a computer display, to refresh is to
redraw information from memory. Vertical
Computer or television display have to be Retrace Horizontal
refreshed because they have the Retrace
OFF ON
capacity to hold a stable image as the
intensity of a spot lowers down with time.
Refreshing on Raster Scan is carried out
at the rate of 60 to 80 frames per second,
although some systems are designed for
higher refresh rates.
Refresh rates are described in units of
cycles per second, or Hertz(Hz), where a
cycle corresponds to one frame.
Random Scan Display / Vector Scan Display -
Introduction
In a random-scan display unit, a CRT
has electron beam directed only
to the parts of the screen where a
picture is to be .
Random scan monitors draw a picture
one line at a time and for this reason
are also referred to as vector
displays (or stroke-writing or
calligraphic displays).
The component lines of a picture can
be drawn and refreshed by a random-
scan system in any specified order as
shown in Figure. A pen plotter
operates in a similar way and is an
example of a random-scan, hard-copy
device.
Random Scan Display / Vector Scan Display -
Architecture
Figure shows architecture of vector display.
It consists of display controller, CPU,
display buffer memory and CRT.
Display controller is connected as an I/O
peripheral to the CPU.
Display buffer stores computer produced
display list or display program.
The Program contains point & line plotting
commands with end point co-ordinates as well
as character plotting commands.
Display controller interprets command and
sends digital and point co-ordinates to a
vector generator.
Random Scan Display / Vector Scan Display -
Working
Vector scan display directly traces out only the
desired lines on CRT.
If we want line between point p1 & p2 then we
directly drive the beam deflection circuitry which
focus beam directly from point p1 to p2.
If we do not want to display line from p1 to p2 and
just move then we can blank the beam as we move it.
To move the beam across the CRT, the information
about both magnitude and direction is required. This
information is generated with the help of vector
graphics generator.
Vector generator then converts the digital co-
ordinate value to analog voltages for beam
deflection circuits that displace an electron beam
which points on the screen.
In this technique beam is deflected from end point
to end point hence this techniques is also called
random scan.
Random scan system are designed for line drawing
applications and cannont display realistic shaded
scenes.
Difference between Raster & Random
Display
Base of Raster Scan Random Scan
Difference
Electron Beam The electron beam is swept across the screen, The electron beam is directed only to the parts
one row at a time, from top to bottom. of screen where a picture is to be drawn.
Its resolution is poor because raster system in Its resolution is good because this system
Resolution contrast produces zigzag lines that are plotted as produces smooth lines drawings because CRT
discrete point sets. beam directly follows the line path.
Picture definition is stored as a set of intensity
Picture Picture definition is stored as a set of line
Definition values for all screen points, called pixels in a
drawing instructions in a display file.
refresh buffer area.
The capability of this system to store intensity
Realistic Display values for pixel makes it well suited for the These systems are designed for line- drawing
realistic display of scenes contain shadow and
color pattern.
Draw an Image Mathematical functions are used to draw an
Screen points/pixels are used to draw an image.
image.