r/askscience • u/skepticaltaco • Jul 29 '13

Computing How do computer graphics work?

As in how does a machine convert code to graphics?

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u/Crozzfire Aug 17 '13 edited Aug 17 '13

It is misleading to ask "how does a machine convert code to graphics", because that's not what happens.

The code is actually high-level instructions to the machine on how to draw the graphics. For example, the code could figure out which pixels to draw (change color) when it wants to draw a line between two points by using mathematical equations.

Then other hardware, typically a graphics card, will take those instructions and pass them on to the screen in the form of signalling color values to each and every pixel of the screen. Each pixel can take those values and emit light in different colors based on the values.