You've seen in Wednesday's lecture and in your programming assignment Drawsvg that we use alpha channel to represent transparency. But have you ever wondered how people came up with premultiplied alpha, or even the idea of the alpha channel? In today's mini-hw, you will have a chance to learn about where it all began!
Read the article Alpha and the History of Digital Compositing on how the founders of Pixar, Alvy Ray Smith and Edwin Catmull, invented integral alpha, and submit your answers to the following questions to gradescope.
What is matting and how does it relate to alpha blending?
Which of Ed Catmull's other research topics inspired the invention of alpha channel and how?
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As usual, please submit your answers to gradescope before next Monday 10:30AM.