How can I render to a cubemap?

Question

I am trying to render to a cubemap, and I found instructions here: http://www.opengl.org/wiki/GL_EXT_framebuffer_object#Quick_example.2C_render_to_texture_.28Cubemap.29

 glGenTextures(1, &color_tex);
 glBindTexture(GL_TEXTURE_CUBE_MAP, color_tex);
 glTexParameteri(GL_TEXTURE_CUBE_MAP, GL_TEXTURE_WRAP_S, GL_CLAMP_TO_EDGE);
 glTexParameteri(GL_TEXTURE_CUBE_MAP, GL_TEXTURE_WRAP_T, GL_CLAMP_TO_EDGE);
 glTexParameteri(GL_TEXTURE_CUBE_MAP, GL_TEXTURE_WRAP_R, GL_CLAMP_TO_EDGE);
 glTexParameteri(GL_TEXTURE_CUBE_MAP, GL_TEXTURE_MIN_FILTER, GL_NEAREST);
 glTexParameteri(GL_TEXTURE_CUBE_MAP, GL_TEXTURE_MAG_FILTER, GL_NEAREST);
 //NULL means reserve texture memory, but texels are undefined
 glTexImage2D(GL_TEXTURE_CUBE_MAP_POSITIVE_X+0, 0, GL_RGBA8, 256, 256, 0, GL_BGRA, GL_UNSIGNED_BYTE, NULL);
 glTexImage2D(GL_TEXTURE_CUBE_MAP_POSITIVE_X+1, 0, GL_RGBA8, 256, 256, 0, GL_BGRA, GL_UNSIGNED_BYTE, NULL);
 glTexImage2D(GL_TEXTURE_CUBE_MAP_POSITIVE_X+2, 0, GL_RGBA8, 256, 256, 0, GL_BGRA, GL_UNSIGNED_BYTE, NULL);
 glTexImage2D(GL_TEXTURE_CUBE_MAP_POSITIVE_X+3, 0, GL_RGBA8, 256, 256, 0, GL_BGRA, GL_UNSIGNED_BYTE, NULL);
 glTexImage2D(GL_TEXTURE_CUBE_MAP_POSITIVE_X+4, 0, GL_RGBA8, 256, 256, 0, GL_BGRA, GL_UNSIGNED_BYTE, NULL);
 glTexImage2D(GL_TEXTURE_CUBE_MAP_POSITIVE_X+5, 0, GL_RGBA8, 256, 256, 0, GL_BGRA, GL_UNSIGNED_BYTE, NULL);
 //-------------------------
 glGenFramebuffersEXT(1, &fb);
 glBindFramebufferEXT(GL_FRAMEBUFFER_EXT, fb);
 //Attach one of the faces of the Cubemap texture to this FBO
 glFramebufferTexture2DEXT(GL_FRAMEBUFFER_EXT, GL_COLOR_ATTACHMENT0_EXT, GL_TEXTURE_CUBE_MAP_POSITIVE_X, color_tex, 0);
 //-------------------------
 glGenRenderbuffersEXT(1, &depth_rb);
 glBindRenderbufferEXT(GL_RENDERBUFFER_EXT, depth_rb);
 glRenderbufferStorageEXT(GL_RENDERBUFFER_EXT, GL_DEPTH_COMPONENT24, 256, 256);
 //-------------------------
 //Attach depth buffer to FBO
 glFramebufferRenderbufferEXT(GL_FRAMEBUFFER_EXT, GL_DEPTH_ATTACHMENT_EXT, GL_RENDERBUFFER_EXT, depth_rb);

I follow the way above to bind a face of a cubemap to a fbo, but got a error GL_FRAMEBUFFER_UNSUPPORTED_EXT. I am wondering if this is because my graphic card doesn't support this feature or there's some bugs in my code?

And is it possible that I render to 6 separate 2d fbo textures and create a cubemap using these textures?

Thanks

Answer 1

This page defines the function isExtensionSupported() which you could use. It is (very) good practice to test at run-time for the existance of all extensions your code depends on.

Just because it built, i.e. your headers defined the extensions needed, doesn't mean the binary doesn't end up on a system with a different set of supported extensions.

It's a good idea to pick a well-known tested function to test for extensions, or else spend the time needed to understand the subtle issues that can arise if the testing is not coded properly. This mainly has to do with substrings and not generating false prefix hits.