Vector graphics or geometric modeling is the use of geometrical primitives such as points, lines, curves, and polygons to represent images in computer graphics. It is used by contrast to the term raster graphics, which is the representation of images as a collection of pixels (dots). The human eye works as a bitmap picture: it catches the image in a mosaic raster of photon recipient nerves, a pixel image. But the brain—according to recent studies—handles it as a vector image. Perhaps because — like in computers— this is easier to store. It explains why humans can recognize simple drawings like cartoons with just outlines because this is so close to what the human brain makes of the visual world anyway. It also serves as an explanation for the fact that logos and signs with easy and geometric shapes are more easily remembered and recognized.

Overview

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All modern current computer video displays translate vector representations of an image to a raster format. The raster image, containing a value for every pixel on the screen, is stored in memory and the entire screen is repainted 30 or more times per second.

Starting in the earliest days of computing in the 1950s and into the 1980s, a different type of display, the vector graphics system, was used. In these systems the electron beam of the CRT display monitor was steered directly to trace out the shapes required, line segment by line segment, with the rest of the screen remaining black. This process was repeated many times a second to achieve a flicker-free or near flicker-free picture. These systems allowed very high-resolution line art and moving images to be displayed without the (for that time) unthinkably huge amounts of memory that an equivalent-resolution raster system would have needed. These vector-based monitors were also known as X-Y displays.

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