Applications use the methods of the IDirect3D3 interface to create Direct3D objects and set up the environment. This section is a reference to the methods of this interface. For a conceptual overview, see IDirect3D3 Interface.
The IDirect3D3 interface is obtained by calling the QueryInterface method from a DirectDraw object.
The methods of the IDirect3D3 interface can be organized into the following groups:
| Creation | CreateDevice |
| CreateLight | |
| CreateMaterial | |
| CreateVertexBuffer | |
| CreateViewport | |
| Enumeration | EnumDevices |
| EnumZBufferFormats | |
| FindDevice | |
| Miscellaneous | EvictManagedTextures |
The IDirect3D3 interface extends the IDirect3D2 interface by adding methods that enable applications to create vertex buffers and enumerate texture map and depth-buffer formats.
The IDirect3D3 interface, like all COM interfaces, inherits the IUnknown interface methods. The IUnknown interface supports the following three methods:
| IUnknown | AddRef |
| QueryInterface | |
| Release |
The LPDIRECT3D3, LPDIRECT3D2, and LPDIRECT3D types are defined as pointers to the IDirect3D3, IDirect3D2 and IDirect3D interfaces:
typedef struct IDirect3D *LPDIRECT3D;
typedef struct IDirect3D2 *LPDIRECT3D2;
typedef struct IDirect3D3 *LPDIRECT3D3;
Windows NT/2000: Requires Windows 2000.
Windows 95/98: Requires Windows 95 or later. Available as a redistributable for Windows 95.
Header: Declared in d3d.h.
Import Library: Use ddraw.lib.