Toric ideals, real toric varieties, and the algebraic moment map

This is a tutorial on some aspects of toric varieties related to their potential use in geometric modeling. We discuss projective toric varieties and their ideals, as well as real toric varieties and the algebraic moment map. In particular, we explain the relation between linear precision and the algebraic moment map. This builds on the introduction to toric varieties by David Cox: What is a Toric Variety? at http://www.cs.amherst.edu/~dac/lectures/tutorial.ps