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Item Ray Differentials and Multiresolution Geometry Caching for Distribution Ray Tracing in Complex Scenes(Blackwell Publishers, Inc and the Eurographics Association, 2003) Christensen, Per H.; Laur, David M.; Fong, Julian; Wooten, Wayne L.; Batali, DanaWhen rendering only directly visible objects, ray tracing a few levels of specular reflection from large, low-curvaturesurfaces, and ray tracing shadows from point-like light sources, the accessed geometry is coherentand a geometry cache performs well. But in many other cases, the accessed geometry is incoherent and a standardgeometry cache performs poorly: ray tracing of specular reflection from highly curved surfaces, tracing rays thatare many reflection levels deep, and distribution ray tracing for wide glossy reflection, global illumination, widesoft shadows, and ambient occlusion. Fortunately, less geometric accuracy is necessary in the incoherent cases.This observation can be formalized by looking at the ray differentials for different types of scattering: coherentrays have small differentials, while incoherent rays have large differentials. We utilize this observation to obtainefficient multiresolution caching of geometry and textures (including displacement maps) for classic and distributionray tracing in complex scenes. We use an existing multiresolution caching scheme (originally developed forscanline rendering) for textures and displacement maps, and introduce a multiresolution geometry caching schemefor tessellated surfaces. The multiresolution geometry caching scheme makes it possible to efficiently render scenesthat, if fully tessellated, would use 100 times more memory than the geometry cache size.Item A Fast Rendering Method for Refractive and Reflective Caustics Due to Water Surfaces(Blackwell Publishers, Inc and the Eurographics Association, 2003) Iwasaki, Kei; Dobashi, Yoshinori; Nishita, TomoyukiIn order to synthesize realistic images of scenes that include water surfaces, the rendering of optical effectscaused by waves on the water surface, such as caustics and reflection, is necessary. However, rendering causticsis quite complex and time-consuming. In recent years, the performance of graphics hardware has made significantprogress. This fact encourages researchers to study the acceleration of realistic image synthesis. We present herea method for the fast rendering of refractive and reflective caustics due to water surfaces. In the proposed method,an object is expressed by a set of texture mapped slices. We calculate the intensities of the caustics on the objectby using the slices and store the intensities as textures. This makes it possible to render caustics at interactive rateby using graphics hardware. Moreover, we render objects that are reflected and refracted due to the water surfaceby using reflection/refraction mapping of these slices.Categories and Subject Descriptors (according to ACM CCS): I.3.1 [Computer Graphics]: Hardware Architecture I.3.7 [Computer Graphics]: Three-Dimensional Graphics and RealismItem Adaptive Ray Tracing of Subdivision Surfaces(Blackwell Publishers, Inc and the Eurographics Association, 2003) Müller, Kerstin; Techmann, Torsten; Fellner, Dieter W.Subdivision Surfaces as well as (interactive) ray tracing have become an important issue in computer graphics.But ray tracing of subdivision surfaces has received only little attention. We present a new approach for raytracing of subdivision surfaces. The algorithm uses a projection of the ray onto the surface and works mainly intwo dimensions along this projection. While proceeding from patch to patch, we examine the bounding volume oftheir borders: the lower the distance between ray and subdivision surface, the more refinement steps are adaptivelyapplied to the surface but only along the projection of the ray. The adaptive refinement of a patch is controlled bycurvature, size, its membership to the silhouette, and its potential contribution to the light transport. The algorithmis simple and mainly consists of elementary geometric computations. Hence it is fast and easy to implementwithout the need for elaborate preprocessing. The algorithm is robust in the sense that it deals with all features ofsubdivision surfaces like creases and corners.Categories and Subject Descripters (according to ACM CCS): I.3.7 [Computer Graphics]: RaytracingItem Volumetric cell-and-portal generation(Blackwell Publishers, Inc and the Eurographics Association, 2003) Haumont, D.; Debeir, O.; Sillion, F.We present an algorithm to generate a cell-and-portal decomposition of general indoor scenes. The method is an adaptation of the 3D watershed transform, computed on a distance-to-geometry sampled field. The watershed is processed using a flooding analogy in the distance field space. Flooding originates from local minima, each minimum producing a region. Portals are built as needed to avoid the merging of regions during their growth. As a result, the cell-and-portal decomposition is closely linked to the structure of the models. In a building, the algorithm finds all the rooms, doors and windows. To restrict the memory load, a hierarchical implementation of the algorithm is presented. We also explain how to handle possible model degeneracies -such as cracks, holes and interpenetrating geometries- using a pre-voxelisation step. The hierarchical algorithm, preceded when necessary by the pre-voxelisation, was tested on a large range of models. We show that it is able to deal with classical architectural models, as well as cave-like environments and large mixed indoor/outdoor scenes. Thanks to the intermediate distance field representation, the algorithm can be used regardless of the way the model is represented: it deals with parametric curves, implicit surfaces, volumetric data and polygon soups in a unified way.Item Planning Collision-Free Reaching Motions for Interactive Object Manipulation and Grasping(Blackwell Publishers, Inc and the Eurographics Association, 2003) Kallmann, Marcelo; Aubel, Amaury; Abaci, Tolga; Thalmann, DanielWe present new techniques that use motion planning algorithms based on probabilistic roadmaps to control 22 degrees of freedom (DOFs) of human-like characters in interactive applications. Our main purpose is the automatic synthesis of collision-free reaching motions for both arms, with automatic column control and leg flexion. Generated motions are collision-free, in equilibrium, and respect articulation range limits. In order to deal with the high (22) dimension of our configuration space, we bias the random distribution of configurations to favor postures most useful for reaching and grasping. In addition, extensions are presented in order to interactively generate object manipulation sequences: a probabilistic inverse kinematics solver for proposing goal postures matching pre-designed grasps; dynamic update of roadmaps when obstacles change position; online planning of object location transfer; and an automatic stepping control to enlarge the character's reachable space. This is, to our knowledge, the first time probabilistic planning techniques are used to automatically generate collision-free reaching motions involving the entire body of a human-like character at interactive frame rates.Categories and Subject Descriptors (according to ACM CCS): I.3.7 [Computer Graphics]: Three-Dimensional Graphics and RealismItem Volumetric Filtering, Modeling and Visualization for Nano-Medicine(Blackwell Publishers, Inc and the Eurographics Association, 2003) Bajaj, ChandrajitThe 3D structures of individual proteins or small complexes, such as most of the Protein Data Bank entries, are still unable to yield the 'full picture' of a functional biological complex. The study of large macromolecular complexes, such as viruses, ion channels, the ribosome and other macromolecular machines of various types, offer more complete structural and functional description of the nano-machinery of life.In addition to x-ray crystallography. NMR spectroscopy, electron cryomicroscopy (cryoEM) imaging of single particles, and in-vivo molecular tomographic imaging has become indispensable at revealing the structures of large macromolecular complexes at subnanometer resolutions.In this talk, I shall describe some of the recent computational advances in filtering, modeling, analysis and visualization, that have propelled structure determination by cryoEM and tomographic imaging, to steadily increasing accuracy.Item Progressive Simplification of Tetrahedral Meshes Preserving All Isosurface Topologies(Blackwell Publishers, Inc and the Eurographics Association, 2003) Chiang, Yi-Jen; Lu, XiangIn this paper, we propose a novel technique for constructing multiple levels of a tetrahedral volume dataset whilepreserving the topologies of all isosurfaces embedded in the data. Our simplification technique has two majorphases. In the segmentation phase, we segment the volume data into topological-equivalence regions, that is, thesub-volumes within each of which all isosurfaces have the same topology. In the simplification phase, we simplifyeach topological-equivalence region independently, one by one, by collapsing edges from the smallest to the largesterrors (within the user-specified error tolerance, for a given error metrics), and ensure that we do not collapseedges that may cause an isosurface-topology change. We also avoid creating a tetrahedral cell of negative volume(i.e., avoid the fold-over problem). In this way, we guarantee to preserve all isosurface topologies in the entiresimplification process, with a controlled geometric error bound. Our method also involves several additionalnovel ideas, including using the Morse theory and the implicit fully augmented contour tree, identifying typesof edges that are not allowed to be collapsed, and developing efficient techniques to avoid many unnecessary orexpensive checkings, all in an integrated manner. The experiments show that all the resulting isosurfaces preservethe topologies, and have good accuracies in their geometric shapes. Moreover, we obtain nice data-reductionrates, with competitively fast running times.Item The Stringed Haptic Workbench: a New Haptic Workbench Solution(Blackwell Publishers, Inc and the Eurographics Association, 2003) Tarrin, N.; Coquillart, S.; Hasegawa, S.; Bouguila, L.; Sato, M.The workbench is an interesting semi-immersive configuration for interactive tasks. However, haptic feedback, i.e.force and tactile feedback, is one important cue which is missing. To the authors' knowledge, the sole proposedsolution consists in installing an arm force feedback device on one-screen workbenches. This solution, however,has several drawbacks. The arm can perturb the stereoscopic display, cross virtual objects or hide parts of thevisualization space. Furthermore, the interaction space is limited by the size of the arm, which may also damagethe screen or perturb the electromagnetic tracking system. Some of these difficulties may even be worth with a two-screenworkbench. This paper discusses an alternative solution, which consists in integrating a stringed hapticdevice on a workbench. This approach is less invasive, more flexible and well-suited to a two-screen workbench.Item ShieldTester: Cell-to-Cell Visibility Test for Surface Occluders(Blackwell Publishers, Inc and the Eurographics Association, 2003) Navazo, I.; Rossignac, J.; Jou, J.; Shariff, R.We present a novel Cell-To-Cell Visibility (C2CV) algorithm, which given two polyhedra, AandBand a connectedand oriented manifold triangle mesh, S offers a simple, fast and conservative test for detecting when A and B areoccluded from each other by S. Previously disclosed C2CV algorithms either relied on costly occlusion fusion orwere restricted to convex or "apparently convex" occluders, which makes them inappropriate for scenes wherepotential occluders are arbitrary triangulated surfaces, such as the body of a car or a portion of a terrain. Thesimplicity of our C2CV algorithm, named ShieldTester, stems from a new Occlusion Theorem, introduced herewhich permits to establish occlusion by computing the intersection of S with a single ray from a vertex ofAtoa vertex ofB. ShieldTester may be used to establish that pairs of cells in a subdivision of space are hidden fromeach other by a relatively large surface occluder, so that when the viewer is in one cell, the objects in the othercell need not be displayed.Categories and Subject Descriptors (according to ACM CCS): I.3.3 [Computer Graphics]: Computational Geometryand Object Modeling: Occlussion Culling, Visibility Test, Triangle MeshesItem Freeform Shape Representations for Efficient Geometry Processing(Blackwell Publishers, Inc and the Eurographics Association, 2003) Kobbelt, LeifThe most important concepts for the handling and storage of freeform shapes in geometry processing applications are parametric representations and volumetric representations. Both have their specific advantages and drawbacks. While the algebraic complexity of volumetric representations is independent from the shape complexity, the domain of a parametric representation usually has to have the same structure as the surface itself (which sometimes makes it necessary to update the domain when the surface is modified).On the other hand, the topology of a parametrically defined surface can be controlled explicitly while in a volumetric representation, the surface topology can change accidentally during deformation. A volumetric representation reduces distance queries or inside/outside tests to mere function evaluations but the geodesic neighborhood relation between surface points is difficult to resolve. As a consequence, it seems promising to combine parametric and volumetric representations to effectively exploit both advantages.In this talk, a number of projects are presented and discussed in which such a combination leads to efficient and numerically stable algorithms for the solution of various geometry processing tasks. Applications include global error control for mesh decimation and smoothing, topology control for level-set surfaces, and shape modeling with unstructured point clouds.