Learning OpenGL

[Justin Brimm]

...but any attempt at tackling learning OpenGL leaves me stumped and in the dust. Even though I just plopped down $60 for another book, I think I'm going to have to invest in a good OpenGL book.

Are there any recommendations? Any OpenGL books which are catered to Cocoa (Obj-C)? Maybe I'm not just buckling down hard enough to learn it, but in any case, every time I start out to do a Cocoa OpenGL tutorial, there is always something wrong; usually the code and steps they give for completing the tutorial are far different from what they do in the completed file they provide, and the tutorial itself doesn't work unless you see what they changed in the completed file.

So, any books anyone wants to recommend?

[skyhawk]

never any books, always nehe. Anyways. I recommend learning simple things... like 2D opengl. learn the setup for a othrographic view... then play around with making shapes... very simple to make shapes... then play around with alpha and blending... making transparent shapes..
after that, maybe learn display list, very easy to learn ( I got them on first try) and then I suggest learning a bunch of other things, then textures as a more advanced topic to learn later

[flipflop]

I agree about the books. I purchased the "Red Book" and am still fumbling around trying to understand OpenGL. I did find luck with the nehe tutorials though. They are structured better then the book, IMHO and they get down to the point. If you are interested in 2D OpenGL as suggested by skyhawk, have a look at tutorial #21 and download the Cocoa source code. It compiles just fine in project builder. OpenGL is a beast of an API and can be very intimidating to first time users.

Here is the link to the tutorial (http://nehe.gamedev.net/data/lessons/lesson.asp?lesson=21)...

Also, don't be afraid to ask questions in the OpenGL forum. A lot of people here know OpenGL like the back of their hands and are more than willing to help.

Good luck!

[Mars_999]

These are two good books. "OpenGL Game Programming" and "OpenGL Super Bible" I have both. The Red Book is meant for people who have a understanding on OpenGL to be used for a reference guide. I still think you should have the Red Book in your collection though. I do. Just remember those two books are gonig to assume you're on a PC, but you can easily take the info out that you need. The windoze info is setting up OpenGL but you should already know how to do that on the Mac.:p

[Chris Burkhardt]

Just in case you weren't sure, the tutorials Skyhawk and jinkolai were referring to are at http://nehe.gamedev.net/

[GoodDoug]

It must just be you.