CS 5610/6610 - Spring 2026 - Interactive Computer Graphics

Project 1 - Hello World

This first project is about setting up the environment for using OpenGL. We will create an OpenGL window and color it using basic OpenGL functions.

Requirements

• Use C/C++.
• Use GLUT, FreeGLUT, GLFW, or another UI library of your choosing to create an OpenGL window.
• The OpenGL viewport size must be explicitly specified.
• Set the background color of the window using OpenGL calls.
• The "Esc" key must close the window.
• All OpenGL-related headers must be placed under the GL directory of an include path and included using forward slash. If you use GLFW, it can be in its default header location.
  

  #include <GL/freeglut.h>
  #include <GLFW/glfw3.h>
  

Additional Requirements for CS 6610 Students

• Automatically animate the background color.

Notes

If you are using GLUT or FreeGLUT, pay attention to GLUT functions like the following:

• glutInit
• glutInitDisplayMode
• glutInitWindowSize
• glutCreateWindow
• glutMainLoop
• glutLeaveMainLoop
• glutPostRedisplay
• glutSwapBuffers
• glutDisplayFunc
• glutKeyboardFunc
• glutIdleFunc

If you are on Mac OS, you should consider using GLFW, as FreeGLUT requires X11, which has not been included since 10.7. An alternative is installing XQuartz. However, as of 12/31/2025, there have been issues for Mac OS Tahoe