Phong Shading
Phong Shading is a computer graphics technique for rendering realistic lighting effects on 3D surfaces by interpolating surface normals across polygons and applying the Phong reflection model at each pixel. It calculates specular highlights, diffuse reflection, and ambient lighting to simulate how light interacts with materials, producing smooth shading that reduces the faceted appearance of polygonal models. This method is widely used in real-time and offline rendering to enhance visual realism.
Developers should learn Phong Shading when working on 3D graphics applications, such as video games, simulations, or visualization tools, to achieve more realistic lighting without excessive computational cost. It is particularly useful for rendering smooth surfaces like metals or plastics where specular highlights are important, as it provides better visual quality than simpler methods like Gouraud shading while being more efficient than physically-based rendering in many cases.