as topic
This question doesn’t belong in Advanced.
To answer your questions:
No (sometimes), yes, I don’t know.
Most games for Windows use DirectX, I believe. But there are plenty of games that use OpenGL. OpenGL is all about real-time rendering (although it can be used for offline rendering as well). I know nothing of 3DSMax, but I suspect it uses OpenGL for setup and does it’s own thing for final rendering.
Can I beleive that if I use OpenGL for off line Rendering,I can’t count on it will give me a very good movie
As I recall, you can configure max to use OpenGL, DirectX or their own software renderer. Only for viewports though, not renders.
When you mention a tool like 3D Max it has two rendering modes (at least, typically more with preview, render options etc), one mode is for a human to model & create content in the tool and another for rendering. Usually the former is hardware accelerated and the latter runs in software although the situation is changing rapidly. Typically OpenGL is used for the interactive 3D stuff in the tool and 3D studio max is actually part of the industry standard benchmark used by folks measure the performance of OpenGL graphics implementations (and systems). MAX supports both OpenGL & D3D.
http://www.specbench.org/gpc/apc.static/max6info.html
Although final rendering has been done in software almost exclusively until now, NVIDIA has created a product that can produce final frame rendering in hardware. I don’t know for sure if it uses OpenGL, but it almost certainly does at some level but that’s not how they’re marketing it and it’s really besides the point.
They’re not the first to try. OpenGL has generally not been used for final frame rendering until now, but has been used for games and content creation for movies and in all sorts of 3D applications. Maya for example calls OpenGL for 3D rendering in the tool and for hardware preview but not for final render. The situation is changing though as more precision and programmability in hardware allows hardware & software that exploits it to accelerate more generic rendering.
OpenGL is limited by the hardware it is implemented on and hardware is improving. It is a generic 3D interface that is extensible, the use you put it to is limited by your imagination. It has been used for real-time rendering, tools, applications, games and now final rendering (thanks to programmable shading & floating point support).
OpenGL final quality render links:
http://graphics.stanford.edu/projects/shading/
http://film.nvidia.com/page/gelato.html
SGI deserves a mention as a near miss, the original vision for this would have been software on SGI systems that would basically have been what gelato is on NVIDIA systems, although NVIDIA hardware today is much better at making this possible:
http://www.sgi.com/software/shader/
OpenGL Real-Time Graphics:
http://www.sgi.com/software/performer/
http://www.aechelon.com/products/cnova.html
OpenGL Games:
http://www.doom3.com/
http://games.sierra.com/games/half-life/multimedia.html
http://www.serioussam.com/
http://www.idsoftware.com/games/quake/quake3-arena/
OpenGL Medical & scientific:
http://www.sgi.com/software/volumizer/
OpenGL CAD:
http://www-1.ibm.com/solutions/plm/doc/content/casestudy/757631113.html
OpenGL Content Creation Tools:
http://www.alias.com/
- hardware render?
http://www.alias.com/eng/press/press_releases/20030407_nvidia.shtml
OpenGL film & video + hardware accelerated effects:
http://www4.discreet.com/flame/flame.php?id=181
http://www.apple.com/shake/specs.html
etc. etc. etc.
Yup this is off topic, sorry.