Because the appearance of an object depends largely on the exterior of the object, boundary representations are common in computer graphics.
Two dimensional surfaces are a good analogy for the objects used in graphics, though quite often these objects are non-manifold.
Since surfaces are not finite, a discrete di approximation is required: polygonal meshes (and to a lesser extent subdivision surfaces) are by far the most common representation although point-based representations have been gaining some popularity in recent years. Level sets are a useful representation for deforming surfaces which undergo many topological changes such as fluids