This API talks to an extensible graphics pipeline that processes drawing operations. It shipped as a separate development kit for both Mac and Windows in March. QD3D supports an immediate mode and a retained mode. The immediate mode is identical to OpenGL's in that it's up to the application to supply drawing commands to the renderer. The retained mode makes it easier to read and write objects, and it enables data structures to be cached for fast display or hardware acceleration.
Programmers can opt to use one image mode exclusively, or both as the situation demands it.
Where QD3D differs radically from OpenGL is that it is an object-oriented graphics system. A new instance of an object can inherit characteristics from its class, including the geometry, size, orientation, color, texture-maps, and lighting, which makes for rapid construction of a scene's objects. This also simplifies the maintenance of each object's information for manipulation and display. High-level API commands let you creat e, rotate, edit, illuminate, and apply transformations to objects. This format saves not only each object's geometry, but also its lighting and texture-maps.