Italian Chapter Conference 2006

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https://diglib.eg.org/handle/10.2312/910

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Use of Shader Technology for Realistic Presentation of Train Prototypes in Virtual Reality
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Gironimo, G. Di; Papa, S.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
The aim of the paper is to make up a virtual showroom and work-through of a train model in order to allow railway companies showing new trains prototypes, in phase of concept, and present their new design in more exhaustive way than simply technical documentation. The possibility of applying Virtual Reality (VR) methodologies to make a scene more realistic as possible is a great advantage for the effectiveness of the presentation, in order to increase their competitivity. Shader technology allows the programmers to have control over shape, appearance (such as colour, lighting, reflection) and animation of objects, in order to make very realistic real-time rendering. In the paper the authors describe the use of shader technology in Virtual Design 2 (VD2) for realistic presentation of train prototypes in VR. The software VD2 is an extensive tool that allows following many phases of product development, from the creation of showroom for realistic presentations supporting shader technology to the assembly simulation or ergonomics analysis. Moreover, the possibility of interfacing with a wide range of input/output devices and the possibility to access to the API made this software to be chosen for Virtual Reality applications in the VR laboratory of the Competence Center for the Qualification of Transportation Systems founded by Campania Region (www.centrodicompetenzatrasporti.unina.it).
A Natural and Effective Calibration of the CyberGlove
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Partipilo, S.; Felice, F. De; Renna, F.; Attolico, G.; Distante, A.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
This work addresses the calibration of the CyberGlove, a device which provides information about the position and attitude in space of all the components of the user hand in a haptic system for the fruition of digital 3D contents by blind people. A realistic haptic interaction requires a reliable detection of user movements and a good calibration of the device to account for size and articulation capability of the specific hand. At the same time the application of interest calls for a calibration procedure that should be executable in a natural and straightforward way by every user. The two methods provided by the CyberGlove software are not suitable for these purposes: one is very simple and fast but produces quite imprecise results while the other is effective and accurate but involves a complex and cumbersome trial-and-error process not suited for general users. The proposed method aims to reach satisfactory results using a intuitive and simple approach. The user is asked to assume with his hand several pre-defined poses, each supplying the sensors output associated to known joints angles. Combining these data with the constraints derived by the anatomical structure of the hand it is possible to evaluate the values of the two parameters, gain and offset, that drive the digitalization of the sensor output. This process, in spite of its simplicity, has provided satisfactory results in several experimental sessions, enabling a realistic and reliable mirroring of user movements in the virtual space.
Unambiguous Analysis of Woman Breast Shape for Plastic Surgery Outcome Evaluation
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Farinella, G. M.; Impoco, G.; Gallo, G.; Spoto, S.; Catanuto, G.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
This paper reports a multidisciplinary research between computer science and plastic and reconstructive surgery. In particular, a new method is proposed to unambiguously define a geometric partitioning of a large thoracic area including the breast mound. The new technique uses only well-defined anatomical points, defined and selected by surgeons. A simple sequence of geometric operations is performed to partition the breast surface into four anatomic subunits, according to clinically derived breast meridian and equator lines. Using this breast shape partition, useful measurement can be extrapolated on 3D model data set. Our method has been validated on a number of breast 3D models acquired by means of a commercial scanner on real clinical cases collected by Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori in Milan (INT).
Sub-part correspondence using structure and geometry
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Biasotti, S.; Marini, S.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
The paper describes a method for recognizing similar sub-parts of objects described by 3D polygonal meshes. The innovation of our method is the coupling of structure and geometry in the matching process. First of all, the structure of the shape is coded in a graph where each node is associated to a sub-part of the shape. Then, the matching between two shapes is approached using a graph-matching technique relying upon a geometric description of each sub-part.
Real-time Cataract Surgery Simulation for Training
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Agus, M.; Gobbetti, E.; Pintore, G.; Zanetti, G.; Zorcolo, A.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
Cataract is a clouding of the eye's natural lens, normally due to natural aging changes, and involving at least half of the population over 65 years. Cataract extraction is the only solution for restoring a clear vision, and nowadays is probably the most frequently practiced surgical procedure. This paper describes a novel virtual reality simulation system for cataract surgery training, involving the capsulorhexis and phacoemulsification tasks. The simulator runs on a multiprocessing PC platform and provides realistic physically-based visual simulations of tools interactions. The current setup employs SensAble PHANToM for simulating the interaction devices, and a binocular display for presenting images to the user.
A Message-Based Annotation System for Collaborative Design Review
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Witzel, M.; Conti, G.; Amicis, R. De; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
The paper illustrates a shared annotation mechanism developed within a collaborative virtual environment for design review. This represents one of the first prototypes being developed within the European Project IMPROVE and it has been designed to be used within two distinct industrial scenarios: automotive and architectural design. The key feature of the system is that its functionalities (modelling, rendering, tracking) are distributed across a network of computers performing specific tasks and that the communication among these takes place through a standardised data message exchange. This paper shows the effectiveness of this approach by focusing on the implementation of the distributed annotation feature.
Hand Made 3d Modelling for the Reconstructive Study of Temple C in Selinunte : Preliminary Results
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Gabellone, F.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
This paper illustrates the preliminary results of the virtual reconstruction of temple C in Selinunte. The reconstruction was undertaken as part of the Land-Lab Project launched by the University of Lecce in 2003 for the promotion and appropriate exploitation of the cultural, historic, artistic and archaeological heritage of two Italian regions, Puglia and Sicily, using advanced technologies. The reconstruction of temple C was launched with the help of numerous experts in the field of surveying and representation, as well as art historians, archaeologists and architects, following a fully multidisciplinary approach. The reconstructive study was conducted in a 3D environment mainly using NURBS modelling, Subdivision Surfaces and sub-polygonal displacement. Our reconstructive approach, which might be defined numerical, makes it possible to recompose, at least in the initial phases of the work, all the surveyed architectural elements in accordance with a procedure based on digital anastylosis. The reconstruction of the monument represents a contribution to the study of Doric architecture in southern Italy conducted with the help of modern technologies.
Easy Access to Huge 3D Models ofWorks of Art
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Callieri, M.; Ponchio, F.; Cignoni, P.; Scopigno, R.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
Automatic shape acquisition technologies evolved rapidly in recent years, and huge mass of 3D data can be easily produced. The high accuracy of range scanning technology makes the Cultural Heritage domain one of the ideal fields of use of these devices. Given this particular application domain, two issues arise: how to visualize at interactive rates these complex data on commodity computers (both locally and on web), and how to improve the ease of use of the visualization tools (as potential users are often not expert with interactive graphics). We present a new visualization system designed to support easy implementation of multimedia kiosk for museums or expositions, which has also been extended to web-based usage. The system allows naive users to inspect a large complex 3D model at interactive frame rates on off-the-shelf PC s, presenting the 3D model and all the multimedia data that has been linked to selected points of its surface. A main goal in the design of the system was to provide the user with a very easy and natural interaction approach, based on a straightforward "point and click" metaphor. Visualization efficiency is obtained by adopting a continuous level-of-detail (LOD) representation, where on-line automatic selection of the best-fit level of detail (according to the current view frustum) is coupled with visibility culling and ready-to-render representation of the geometry.
A Survey of Digital Mosaic Techniques
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Battiato, S.; Blasi, G. Di; Farinella, G.M.; Gallo, G.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
Art often provides valuable hints for technological innovations especially in the field of Image Processing and Computer Graphics. In this paper we survey in an unified framework several methods to transform a raster input image into good quality mosaics. The common and different ideas among the methods are reported and described. Finally we try to address the evaluation problem of an NPR algorithm.
Implementing Mesh-Based Approaches for Deformable Objects on GPU
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Ranzuglia, G.; Cignoni, P.; Ganovelli, F.; Scopigno, R.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
These latest years witnessed an impressive improvement of graphics hardware both in terms of features and in terms of computational power. This improvement can be easily observed in computer games, where effects which, until few years ago, could only be achieved with expensive CPU computation are now shown interactively. Although the GPU has been designed for implementing graphics effects, it is still it basically a processing unit with its own memory, and, being specialized for algebraic tasks, supplies a number of floating point operations per second which is orders of magnitude greater than the CPU. This suggested to the graphics community that the GPU could also be used for general purpose computation and a number of papers have been published on how to hack the GPU to this target. Following this trend we propose a framework for using GPU for implementing techniques for deformable objects represented as generic meshes. The framework only assumes than the global computation is the union of local computations, which is true for all the explicit methods.
3D Input devices integration in CAD environment
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Bruno, F.; Caruso, G.; Muzzupappa, M.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
Virtual Reality (VR) technologies are becoming commonly used tools in the product development process, starting from the styling review in the conceptual design phase, until to the Digital Mock-up (DMU) validation in the advanced stages of the design process. What has not yet been sufficiently investigated is the possibility to interact with the DMU directly inside the CAD environment using 3D input devices. Although few CAD systems, like CATIA V5, have an additional module to support VR devices, in most cases it is still necessary to customize the application to obtain the functionalities desired by the user. The present paper discusses difficulties and advantages related to the integration of VR techniques and 3D input devices in CAD systems. The work has been conducted analyzing and testing the potentialities of the Unigraphics NX3 CAD environment and implementing a software plug-in that allows the user to perform such interaction tasks employing 3D input devices.
Compressed SVG Representation of Raster Images Vectorized by DDT Triangulation
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Battiato, S.; Greco, F.; Nicotra, S.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
This paper presents a portable compression algorithm applied to raster data images properly triangulated by using DDT (Data Dependent Triangulation). In particular the input source data are encoded to be rendered by standard SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) engine. The proposed compression strategy works reducing the overall entropy implementing some heuristic strategies to properly re-code the redundancy inside the mesh representation. The compressed data are enclosed into an SVG player able to both decompress and show the original image. Results show the effectiveness of the approach.
GPU based direct illuminance values computation for interactive lighting CAD
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Selmo, D.; Musante, F.; Rossi, M.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
In this work we focus our attention on real-time direct illuminance values computation using dedicated 3D graphics hardware compatible with OpenGL 2 standard. Our method works with real light intensity distribution measured for lighting fixtures by enconding it in a texture for GPU data comunication. Illuminance values are reprensented in real-time by using a perceptual based colour scale. Illuminance computation is limited to direct light. This is not a severe limitation for exterior and road lighting design, and nevertheless it is a useful project parameter for interior lighting design too.
3D CT Segmentation for Clinical Evaluation of Knee Prosthesis Operations
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Battiato, S.; Bosco, C.; Farinella, G. M.; Impoco, G.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
In surgical knee replacement, the damaged knee joint is replaced with artificial prostheses. An accurate clinical evaluation must be carried out before applying knee prostheses to ensure optimal outcome from surgical operations and to reduce the probability of having long-term problems. Useful information can be inferred from CT scans of the knee area, that can be used to estimate the stress that will be acting on the prosthesis being implanted. This information can be exploited to tailor the prothesis to the patient s anatomy. We present some ideas for a system intended to help surgeons in evaluating the post-operative outcome of knee prosthesis implantation. We also show some preliminary results about the 3D segmentation of CT data, that is the main activity of our lab in the project.
VTK4AR: An Object Oriented Framework for Scientific Visualization of CAE Data in Augmented Reality
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Bruno, F.; Caruso, F.; Ferrise, F.; Muzzupappa, M.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
In the last ten years many Augmented Reality (AR) applications for Scientific Visualization have been developed, attesting the effectiveness of this technique for data visualization and interaction. In all these applications, a software framework for scientific visualization was used to process data to be visualized, while an AR system was employed to display these data within an AR context. Hence, everyone who intended to approach the development of such applications should become necessarily familiar with the scientific visualization framework and the augmented reality one. This is of course an hurdle for the applications development, and the idea behind this work is exactly to provide a software framework that simplifies the development of such applications. With this in mind, we extended an existing and powerful open source library for scientific visualization (VTK) with few but useful classes for the interfacing with an existing AR library (ARToolKit) to easily handle the video see-through and the video-tracking functionalities. The resulting software tool, called VTK4AR, can be considered as an all in one software framework specific for scientific visualization in AR. Moreover, since it is built on top of VTK, it will be possible to employ a wide range of visualization techniques in many application fields. In particular, it has been tested in two AR applications: one for displaying data relative to a CFD simulation of a flow past a helmet, and another for displaying the forming error obtained prototyping an ankle support with the incremental forming technique.
Solutions to 3D Building Reconstruction from Photographs
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Farinella, G. M.; Mattiolo, G.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
The 3D model reconstruction of buildings from uncalibrated photographs allows new useful Computer Graphics and Computer Vision applications. In this paper we survey some solutions proposed in literature and in commerce. The common and different methodology are reported and described. Finally we try to address the 3D reconstruction problem of architectural scenes presenting our solution: BolBol. We demonstrate our reconstruction process and some results obtained applying BolBol to the modeling of real buildings.
Shape Comparison and Deformation Analysis in Biomedical Applications
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Colantonio, S.; Moroni, D.; Salvetti, O.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
In this paper, we present a method for comparing shapes and analyzing deformations of 3D image objects. This method is based on the definition of an object model based on multi-source 3D images. Elective application cases of the proposed method consist of the analysis of deformable anatomical structures, useful to support medical diagnosis in routine clinical practice. In particular, preliminary aspects are discussed of a study case regarding heart dynamics.
Shape Reconstruction with Uncertainty
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Papaleo, L.; Puppo, E.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
This paper presents a general Surface Reconstruction framework which encapsulates the uncertainty of the sampled data, making no assumption on the shape of the surface to be reconstructed. Starting from the input points (either points clouds or multiple range images), an Estimated Existence Function (EEF) is built which models the space in which the desired surface could exist and, by the extraction of EEF critical points, the surface is reconstructed. The final goal is the development of a generic framework able to adapt the result to different kinds of additional information coming from multiple sensors.
A study on textures and their perceptual visual dimensions as application for flexible and effective scientific visualization
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Taponecco, F.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
The use of textures is fundamental in several areas of Computer Graphics, Computer Vision and Image Processing. In this work, we focus on their main relevant attributes, in order to define and design textures as effective visual representations for use in scientific visualization. We concentrate on the problem of visualizing complex multivariate and multi-dimensional datasets as well as in synthesizing multi-fields and temporal evolution of vectorial datasets visualization. Textures features, such as directionality, color and shape are particularly suited for use in a synthesis algorithm, and they serve as effective seed primitives, which can incorporate many visual dimensions for intuitive and flexible data mapping and encoding. As special application, we propose a level-based visualization approach, with a special focus on systematic layering of information for scientific datasets.
Designing a Virtual Reality Game for the CAVE
(The Eurographics Association, 2006) Livatino, S.; Agerbech, V.; Johansen, A.; Johansen, B.; S. Battiato and G. Gallo and F. Stanco
Virtual Reality has for many years been a technology which has stagnated in application and software development for games. The applications available for VR environments have increased but they mostly remain related to scientific purposes while computer games in VR are still being developed and only show a part of their actual potential. The game industry has begun to see the possibilities of VR games in a near future with the implementation of some popular games to a CAVE system. However, a full immersion VR solution still remains uncommon and expensive. This paper aims to demonstrate the potential of VR games, and in particular games for the CAVE, now that affordable solutions are close to reach as more powerful hardware is available at low price. The focus is also on the methodology to be pursued while designing a VR game. Results were encouraging and tests performed on a first prototype demonstrates system feasibility.

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