Volume 33 (2014)

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Recurring Part Arrangements in Shape Collections
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Zheng, Youyi; Cohen-Or, Daniel; Averkiou, Melinos; Mitra, Niloy J.; B. Levy and J. Kautz
Extracting semantically related parts across models remains challenging, especially without supervision. The common approach is to co-analyze a model collection, while assuming the existence of descriptive geometric features that can directly identify related parts. In the presence of large shape variations, common geometric features, however, are no longer sufficiently descriptive. In this paper, we explore an indirect top-down approach, where instead of part geometry, part arrangements extracted from each model are compared. The key observation is that while a direct comparison of part geometry can be ambiguous, part arrangements, being higher level structures, remain consistent, and hence can be used to discover latent commonalities among semantically related shapes. We show that our indirect analysis leads to the detection of recurring arrangements of parts, which are otherwise difficult to discover in a direct unsupervised setting. We evaluate our algorithm on ground truth datasets and report advantages over geometric similarity-based bottom-up co-segmentation algorithms.
Sky Based Light Metering for High Dynamic Range Images
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Gryaditskya, Yulia; Pouli, Tania; Reinhard, Erik; Seidel, Hans-Peter; J. Keyser, Y. J. Kim, and P. Wonka
Image calibration requires both linearization of pixel values and scaling so that values in the image correspond to real-world luminances. In this paper we focus on the latter and rather than rely on camera characterization, we calibrate images by analysing their content and metadata, obviating the need for expensive measuring devices or modeling of lens and camera combinations. Our analysis correlates sky pixel values to luminances that would be expected based on geographical metadata. Combined with high dynamic range (HDR) imaging, which gives us linear pixel data, our algorithm allows us to find absolute luminance values for each pixel-effectively turning digital cameras into absolute light meters. To validate our algorithm we have collected and annotated a calibrated set of HDR images and compared our estimation with several other approaches, showing that our approach is able to more accurately recover absolute luminance. We discuss various applications and demonstrate the utility of our method in the context of calibrated color appearance reproduction and lighting design.
Crack-free Rendering of Dynamically Tesselated B-Rep Models
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Claux, Frédéric; Barthe, Loïc; Vanderhaeghe, David; Jessel, Jean-Pierre; Paulin, Mathias; B. Levy and J. Kautz
We propose a versatile pipeline to render B-Rep models interactively, precisely and without rendering-related artifacts such as cracks. Our rendering method is based on dynamic surface evaluation using both tesselation and ray-casting, and direct GPU surface trimming. An initial rendering of the scene is performed using dynamic tesselation. The algorithm we propose reliably detects then fills up cracks in the rendered image. Crack detection works in image space, using depth information, while crack-filling is either achieved in image space using a simple classification process, or performed in object space through selective ray-casting. The crack filling method can be dynamically changed at runtime. Our image space crack filling approach has a limited runtime cost and enables high quality, real-time navigation. Our higher quality, object space approach results in a rendering of similar quality than full-scene ray-casting, but is 2 to 6 times faster, can be used during navigation and provides accurate, reliable rendering. Integration of our work with existing tesselation-based rendering engines is straightforward.
Light Montage for Perceptual Image Enhancement
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Hosu, Vlad; Ha, Mai Lan; Sim, Terence; B. Levy and J. Kautz
Recent photography techniques such as sculpting with light show great potential in compositing beautiful images from fixed-viewpoint photos under multiple illuminations. The process relies heavily on the artists experience and skills using the available tools. An apparent trend in recent works is to facilitate the interaction making it less timeconsuming and addressable not only to experts, but also novices. We propose a method that automatically creates enhanced light montages that are comparable to those produced by artists. It detects and emphasizes cues that are important for perception by introducing a technique to extract depth and shape edges from an unconstrained light stack. Studies show that these cues are associated with silhouettes and suggestive contours which artists use to sketch and construct the layout of paintings. Textures, due to perspective distortion, offer essential cues that depict shape and surface slant. We balance the emphasis between depth edges and reflectance textures to enhance the sense of both shape and reflectance properties. Our light montage technique works perfectly with a few to hundreds of illuminations for each scene. Experiments show great results for static scenes making it practical for small objects, interiors and small-scale outdoor scenes. Dynamic scenes may be captured using spatially distributed light setups such as light domes. The approach could also be applied to time-lapse photos, with the sun as the main light source.
Glyphs for Exploring Crowd-sourced Subjective Survey Classification
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Kachkaev, Alex; Wood, Jo; Dykes, Jason; H. Carr, P. Rheingans, and H. Schumann
The findings drawn from opinion survey responses are usually made by producing summary charts or conducting statistical analysis. Both involve data aggregation and filtering as exploring the unaggregated data has traditionally been impractical or error-prone for large numbers of responses. We propose the use of glyphs with parallel coordinate plots to show all survey responses in a single view and design an interactive visual analytics tool around the representation to explore the data. We use this software for a 'photo content assessment' survey, where 359 participants classify 900 images by seven criteria. The proposed approach allows all 8,434 responses (49,285 answers to questions in total) to be represented in a single view and helps analysts to both clean the data and understand the nature of the survey responses. We describe the construction of the survey response glyphs and the interface to the interactive visual analytics software and generalise the design principles that arise from the approach. We apply the tool to two other datasets to evaluate the technique and to confirm its wider applicability for surveys with Likert scale responses.
Inherent Noise-Aware Insect Swarm Simulation
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Wang, Xinjie; Jin, Xiaogang; Deng, Zhigang; Zhou, Linling; Oliver Deussen and Hao (Richard) Zhang
Collective behaviour of winged insects is a wondrous and familiar phenomenon in the real world. In this paper, we introduce a highly efficient field-based approach to simulate various insect swarms. Its core idea is to construct a smooth yet noise-aware governing velocity field that can be further decomposed into two sub-fields: (i) a divergence-free curl-noise field to model noise-induced movements of individual insects in a swarm, and (ii) an enhanced global velocity field to control navigational paths in a complex environment along which all the insects in a swarm fly. Through simulation experiments and comparisons with existing crowd simulation approaches, we demonstrate that our approach is effective to simulate various insect swarm behaviours including aggregation, positive phototaxis, sedation, mass-migrating, and so on. Besides its high efficiency, our approach is very friendly to parallel implementation on GPUs (e.g. the speedup achieved through GPU acceleration is higher than 50 if the number of simulated insects is more than 10 000 on an off-the-shelf computer). Our approach is the first multi-agent modelling system that introduces curl-noise into agents' velocity field and uses its non-scattering nature to maintain non-colliding movements in 3D crowd simulation.Collective behavior of winged insects is a wondrous and familiar phenomenon in the real world. In this paper, we introduce a highly efficient field-based approach to simulate various insect swarms. Its core idea is to construct a smooth yet noise-aware governing velocity field that can be further decomposed into two sub-fields: (i) a divergence-free curl noise field to model noise-induced movements of individual insects in a swarm, and (ii) an enhanced global velocity field to control navigational paths in a complex environment along which all the insects in a swarm fly.
Designing Large-Scale Interactive Traffic Animations for Urban Modeling
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Garcia-Dorado, Ignacio; Aliaga, Daniel G.; Ukkusuri, Satish V.; B. Levy and J. Kautz
Designing and optimizing traffic behavior and animation is a challenging problem of interest to virtual environment content generation and to urban planning and design. While some traffic simulation methods have appeared in computer graphics, most related systems focus on the design of buildings, roads, or cities but without explicitly considering urban traffic. To our knowledge, our work provides the first interactive approach which enables a designer to specify a desired vehicular traffic behavior (e.g., road occupancy, travel time, emissions, etc.) and the system will automatically compute what realistic 3D urban model (e.g., an interconnected network of roads, parcels, and buildings) yields the specified behavior. Our system both altered and improved traffic behavior in novel procedurally-generated cities and in road networks of existing cities. Our urban models contain up to 360 km of roads, 300,000 vehicles, and typically cover four hours of simulated peak traffic time. The typical editing session time to "paint" a new traffic pattern and to compute the new/changed urban model is two to five minutes.
Mandatory Critical Points of 2D Uncertain Scalar Fields
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Günther, David; Salmon, Joseph; Tierny, Julien; H. Carr, P. Rheingans, and H. Schumann
This paper introduces a novel, non-local characterization of critical points and their global relation in 2D uncertain scalar fields. The characterization is based on the analysis of the support of the probability density functions (PDF) of the input data. Given two scalar fields representing reliable estimations of the bounds of this support, our strategy identifies mandatory critical points: spatial regions and function ranges where critical points have to occur in any realization of the input. The algorithm provides a global pairing scheme for mandatory critical points which is used to construct mandatory join and split trees. These trees enable a visual exploration of the common topological structure of all possible realizations of the uncertain data. To allow multi-scale visualization, we introduce a simplification scheme for mandatory critical point pairs revealing the most dominant features. Our technique is purely combinatorial and handles parametric distribution models and ensemble data. It does not depend on any computational parameter and does not suffer from numerical inaccuracy or global inconsistency. The algorithm exploits ideas of the established join/split tree computation. It is therefore simple to implement, and its complexity is output-sensitive. We illustrate, evaluate, and verify our method on synthetic and real-world data.
Controlled Metamorphosis Between Skeleton‐Driven Animated Polyhedral Meshes of Arbitrary Topologies
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Kravtsov, Denis; Fryazinov, Oleg; Adzhiev, Valery; Pasko, Alexander; Comninos, Peter; Holly Rushmeier and Oliver Deussen
Enabling animators to smoothly transform between animated meshes of differing topologies is a long‐standing problem in geometric modelling and computer animation. In this paper, we propose a new hybrid approach built upon the advantages of scalar field‐based models (often called implicit surfaces) which can easily change their topology by changing their defining scalar field. Given two meshes, animated by their rigging‐skeletons, we associate each mesh with its own approximating implicit surface. This implicit surface moves synchronously with the mesh. The shape‐metamorphosis process is performed in several steps: first, we collapse the two meshes to their corresponding approximating implicit surfaces, then we transform between the two implicit surfaces and finally we inverse transition from the resulting metamorphosed implicit surface to the target mesh. The examples presented in this paper demonstrating the results of the proposed technique were implemented using an in‐house plug‐in for Maya™.Enabling animators to smoothly transform between animated meshes of differing topologies is a long‐standing problem in geometric modelling and computer animation. In this paper, we propose a new hybrid approach built upon the advantages of scalar field‐based models (often called implicit surfaces) which can easily change their topology by changing their defining scalar field. Given two meshes, animated by their rigging‐skeletons, we associate each mesh with its own approximating implicit surface. This implicit surface moves synchronously with the mesh. The shape‐metamorphosis process is performed in several steps: first, we collapse the two meshes to their corresponding approximating implicit surfaces, then we transform between the two implicit surfaces.
Projection Mapping on Arbitrary Cubic Cell Complexes
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Apaza‐Agüero, K.; Silva, L.; Bellon, O. R. P. ; Holly Rushmeier and Oliver Deussen
This work presents a new representation used as a rendering primitive of surfaces. Our representation is defined by an arbitrary cubic cell complex: a projection‐based parameterization domain for surfaces where geometry and appearance information are stored as tile textures. This representation is used by our ray casting rendering algorithm called projection mapping, which can be used for rendering geometry and appearance details of surfaces from arbitrary viewpoints. The projection mapping algorithm uses a fragment shader based on linear and binary searches of the relief mapping algorithm. Instead of traditionally rendering the surface, only front faces of our rendering primitive (our arbitrary cubic cell complex) are drawn, and geometry and appearance details of the surface are rendered back by using projection mapping. Alternatively, another method is proposed for mapping appearance information on complex surfaces using our arbitrary cubic cell complexes. In this case, instead of reconstructing the geometry as in projection mapping, the original mesh of a surface is directly passed to the rendering algorithm. This algorithm is applied in the texture mapping of cultural heritage sculptures.This work presents a new representation used as a rendering primitive of surfaces. Our representation is defined by an arbitrary cubic cell complex: a projection‐based parameterization domain for surfaces where geometry and appearance information are stored as tile textures. This representation is used by our ray casting rendering algorithm called projection mapping, which can be used for rendering geometry and appearance details of surfaces from arbitrary viewpoints. Alternatively, another method is proposed for mapping appearance information on complex surfaces using our arbitrary cubic cell complexes. In this case, instead of reconstructing the geometry as in projection mapping, the original mesh of a surface is directly passed to the rendering algorithm.
Approximate Symmetry Detection in Partial 3D Meshes
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Sipiran, Ivan; Gregor, Robert; Schreck, Tobias; J. Keyser, Y. J. Kim, and P. Wonka
Symmetry is a common characteristic in natural and man-made objects. Its ubiquitous nature can be exploited to facilitate the analysis and processing of computational representations of real objects. In particular, in computer graphics, the detection of symmetries in 3D geometry has enabled a number of applications in modeling and reconstruction. However, the problem of symmetry detection in incomplete geometry remains a challenging task. In this paper, we propose a vote-based approach to detect symmetry in 3D shapes, with special interest in models with large missing parts. Our algorithm generates a set of candidate symmetries by matching local maxima of a surface function based on the heat diffusion in local domains, which guarantee robustness to missing data. In order to deal with local perturbations, we propose a multi-scale surface function that is useful to select a set of distinctive points over which the approximate symmetries are defined. In addition, we introduce a vote-based scheme that is aware of the partiality, and therefore reduces the number of false positive votes for the candidate symmetries. We show the effectiveness of our method in a varied set of 3D shapes and different levels of partiality. Furthermore, we show the applicability of our algorithm in the repair and completion of challenging reassembled objects in the context of cultural heritage.
Using Physically Based Rendering to Benchmark Structured Light Scanners
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Medeiros, Esdras; Doraiswamy, Harish; Berger, Matthew; Silva, Claudio T.; J. Keyser, Y. J. Kim, and P. Wonka
Structured light scanning is ubiquituous in 3D acquisition. It is capable of capturing high geometric detail at a low cost under a variety of challenging scene conditions. Recent methods have demonstrated robustness in the presence of artifacts due to global illumination, such as inter-reflections and sub-surface scattering, as well as imperfections caused by projector defocus. For comparing approaches, however, the quantitative evaluation of structured lighting schemes is hindered by the challenges in obtaining ground truth data, resulting in a poor understanding for these methods across a wide range of shapes, materials, and lighting configurations. In this paper, we present a benchmark to study the performance of structured lighting algorithms in the presence of errors caused due to the above properties of the scene. In order to do this, we construct a synthetic structured lighting scanner that uses advanced physically based rendering techniques to simulate the point cloud acquisition process. We show that, under conditions similar to that of a real scanner, our synthetic scanner replicates the same artifacts found in the output of a real scanner. Using this synthetic scanner, we perform a quantitative evaluation of four different structured lighting techniques - gray-code patterns, micro-phase shifting, ensemble codes, and unstructured light scanning. The evaluation, performed on a variety of scenes,demonstrate that no one method is capable of adequately handling all sources of error - each method is appropriate for addressing distinct sources of error.
Interactive Diffraction from Biological Nanostructures
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Dhillon, D. S.; Teyssier, J.; Single, M.; Gaponenko, I.; Milinkovitch, M. C.; Zwicker, M.; Oliver Deussen and Hao (Richard) Zhang
We describe a technique for interactive rendering of diffraction effects produced by biological nanostructures, such as snake skin surface gratings. Our approach uses imagery from atomic force microscopy that accurately captures the geometry of the nanostructures responsible for structural colouration, that is, colouration due to wave interference, in a variety of animals. We develop a rendering technique that constructs bidirectional reflection distribution functions (BRDFs) directly from the measured data and leverages pre‐computation to achieve interactive performance. We demonstrate results of our approach using various shapes of the surface grating nanostructures. Finally, we evaluate the accuracy of our pre‐computation‐based technique and compare to a reference BRDF construction techniqueWe describe a technique for interactive rendering of diffraction effects produced by biological nanostructures, such as snake skin surface gratings. Our approach directly uses imagery from atomic force microscopy that accurately captures the geometry of the nanostructures responsible for structural colouration, that is, colouration due to wave interference, in a variety of animals.
Managing Spatial Selections With Contextual Snapshots
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Mindek, P.; Gröller, M. E.; Bruckner, S.; Oliver Deussen and Hao (Richard) Zhang
Spatial selections are a ubiquitous concept in visualization. By localizing particular features, they can be analysed and compared in different views. However, the semantics of such selections often depend on specific parameter settings and it can be difficult to reconstruct them without additional information. In this paper, we present the concept of contextual snapshots as an effective means for managing spatial selections in visualized data. The selections are automatically associated with the context in which they have been created. Contextual snapshots can also be used as the basis for interactive integrated and linked views, which enable in‐place investigation and comparison of multiple visual representations of data. Our approach is implemented as a flexible toolkit with well‐defined interfaces for integration into existing systems. We demonstrate the power and generality of our techniques by applying them to several distinct scenarios such as the visualization of simulation data, the analysis of historical documents and the display of anatomical data.Spatial selections are a ubiquitous concept in visualization. By localizing particular features, they can be analyzed and compared in different views. However, the semantics of such selections often depend on specific parameter settings and it can be difficult to reconstruct them without additional information. In this paper, we present the concept of contextual snapshots as an effective means for managing spatial selections in visualized data. The selections are automatically associated with the context in which they have been created. Contextual snapshots can also be used as the basis for interactive integrated and linked views, which enable in‐place investigation and comparison of multiple visual representations of data.
Procedural Modelling of Urban Road Networks
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Bene , Jan; Wilkie, Alexander; Krivánek, Jaroslav; Oliver Deussen and Hao (Richard) Zhang
We present a model for growing procedural road networks in and close to cities. The main idea of our paper is that a city cannot be meaningfully simulated without taking its neighbourhood into account. A simple traffic simulation that considers this neighbourhood is then used to grow new major roads and to influence the locations of minor road growth. Waterways are introduced and used to help position the city nuclei on the map. The resulting cities are formed by allowing several smaller settlements to grow together and to form a rich road structure, much like in real world, and require only minimal per-city input, allowing for batch generation.We present a model for growing procedural road networks in and close to cities. The main idea of our paper is that a city cannot be meaningfully simulated without taking its neighbourhood into account. A simple traffic simulation that considers this neighbourhood is then used to grow new major roads and to influence the locations of minor road growth. Waterways are introduced and used to help position the city nuclei on the map. The resulting cities are formed by allowing several smaller settlements to grow together and to form a rich road structure, much like in real world, and require only minimal per-city input, allowing for batch generation.
Robust Detection and Segmentation for Diagnosis of Vertebral Diseases Using Routine MR Images
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Zukic, D enan; Vlasák, Ale; Egger, Jan; Horínek, Daniel; Nimsky, Christopher; Kolb, Andreas; Oliver Deussen and Hao (Richard) Zhang
The diagnosis of certain spine pathologies, such as scoliosis, spondylolisthesis and vertebral fractures, is part of the daily clinical routine. Very frequently, magnetic resonance image data are used to diagnose these kinds of pathologies in order to avoid exposing patients to harmful radiation, like X-ray. We present a method which detects and segments all acquired vertebral bodies, with minimal user intervention. This allows an automatic diagnosis to detect scoliosis, spondylolisthesis and crushed vertebrae. Our approach consists of three major steps. First, vertebral centres are detected using a Viola Jones like method, and then the vertebrae are segmented in a parallel manner, and finally, geometric diagnostic features are deduced in order to diagnose the three diseases. Our method was evaluated on 26 lumbar datasets containing 234 reference vertebrae. Vertebra detection has 7.1% false negatives and 1.3% false positives. The average Dice coefficient to manual reference is 79.3% and mean distance error is 1.76 mm. No severe case of the three illnesses was missed, and false alarms occurred rarely 0% for scoliosis, 3.9% for spondylolisthesis and 2.6% for vertebral fractures. The main advantages of our method are high speed, robust handling of a large variety of routine clinical images, and simple and minimal user interaction.The diagnosis of certain spine pathologies, such as scoliosis, spondylolisthesis and vertebral fractures, are part of the daily clinical routine. Very frequently, MRI data are used to diagnose these kinds of pathologies in order to avoid exposing patients to harmful radiation, like X-ray. We present a method which detects and segments all acquired vertebral bodies, with minimal user intervention. This allows an automatic diagnosis to detect scoliosis, spondylolisthesis and crushed vertebrae.
A Gaze-enabled Graph Visualization to Improve Graph Reading Tasks
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Okoe, Mershack; Alam, Sayeed Safayet; Jianu, Radu; H. Carr, P. Rheingans, and H. Schumann
Performing typical network tasks such as node scanning and path tracing can be difficult in large and dense graphs. To alleviate this problem we use eye-tracking as an interactive input to detect tasks that users intend to perform and then produce unobtrusive visual changes that support these tasks. First, we introduce a novel fovea based filtering that dims out edges with endpoints far removed from a user's view focus. Second, we highlight edges that are being traced at any given moment or have been the focus of recent attention. Third, we track recently viewed nodes and increase the saliency of their neighborhoods. All visual responses are unobtrusive and easily ignored to avoid unintentional distraction and to account for the imprecise and low-resolution nature of eyetracking. We also introduce a novel gaze-correction approach that relies on knowledge about the network layout to reduce eye-tracking error. Finally, we present results from a controlled user study showing that our methods led to a statistically significant accuracy improvement in one of two network tasks and that our gaze-correction algorithm enables more accurate eye-tracking interaction.
Automatic Generation of Tourist Brochures
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Birsak, Michael; Musialski, Przemyslaw; Wonka, Peter; Wimmer, Michael; B. Levy and J. Kautz
We present a novel framework for the automatic generation of tourist brochures that include routing instructions and additional information presented in the form of so-called detail lenses. The first contribution of this paper is the automatic creation of layouts for the brochures. Our approach is based on the minimization of an energy function that combines multiple goals: positioning of the lenses as close as possible to the corresponding region shown in an overview map, keeping the number of lenses low, and an efficient numbering of the lenses. The second contribution is a route-aware simplification of the graph of streets used for traveling between the points of interest (POIs). This is done by reducing the graph consisting of all shortest paths through the minimization of an energy function. The output is a subset of street segments that enable traveling between all the POIs without considerable detours, while at the same time guaranteeing a clutter-free visualization.
2D-3D Lifting for Shape Reconstruction
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Nan, Liangliang; Sharf, Andrei; Chen, Baoquan; J. Keyser, Y. J. Kim, and P. Wonka
We present an algorithm for shape reconstruction from incomplete 3D scans by fusing together two acquisition modes: 2D photographs and 3D scans. The two modes exhibit complementary characteristics: scans have depth information, but are often sparse and incomplete; photographs, on the other hand, are dense and have high resolution, but lack important depth information. In this work we fuse the two modes, taking advantage of their complementary information, to enhance 3D shape reconstruction from an incomplete scan with a 2D photograph. We compute geometrical and topological shape properties in 2D photographs and use them to reconstruct a shape from an incomplete 3D scan in a principled manner. Our key observation is that shape properties such as boundaries, smooth patches and local connectivity, can be inferred with high confidence from 2D photographs. Thus, we register the 3D scan with the 2D photograph and use scanned points as 3D depth cues for lifting 2D shape structures into 3D. Our contribution is an algorithm which significantly regularizes and enhances the problem of 3D reconstruction from partial scans by lifting 2D shape structures into 3D. We evaluate our algorithm on various shapes which are loosely scanned and photographed from different views, and compare them with state-of-the-art reconstruction methods.
ConVis: A Visual Text Analytic System for Exploring Blog Conversations
(The Eurographics Association and John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2014) Hoque, Enamul; Carenini, Giuseppe; H. Carr, P. Rheingans, and H. Schumann
Today it is quite common for people to exchange hundreds of comments in online conversations (e.g., blogs). Often, it can be very difficult to analyze and gain insights from such long conversations. To address this problem, we present a visual text analytic system that tightly integrates interactive visualization with novel text mining and summarization techniques to fulfill information needs of users in exploring conversations. At first, we perform a user requirement analysis for the domain of blog conversations to derive a set of design principles. Following these principles, we present an interface that visualizes a combination of various metadata and textual analysis results, supporting the user to interactively explore the blog conversations. We conclude with an informal user evaluation, which provides anecdotal evidence about the effectiveness of our system and directions for further design.

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