Volume 26 (2007)

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A Survey of Haptic Rendering Techniques
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Laycock, S.D.; Day, A.M.
Computer Graphics technologies have developed considerably over the past decades. Realistic virtual environments can be produced incorporating complex geometry for graphical objects and utilising hardware acceleration for per pixel effects. To enhance these environments, in terms of the immersive experience perceived by users, the human s sense of touch, or haptic system, can be exploited. To this end haptic feedback devices capable of exerting forces on the user are incorporated. The process of determining a reaction force for a given position of the haptic device is known as haptic rendering. For over a decade users have been able to interact with a virtual environment with a haptic device. This paper focuses on the haptic rendering algorithms which have been developed to compute forces as users manipulate the haptic device in the virtual environment.
ShaderX by Wolfgang Engel
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Callieri, M.
Editorial
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Duke, David; Scopigno, Roberto
Siggraph 2006 Boston, Massachusetts, 30th July-3rd August 2006
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Laycock, R.G.; Laycock, S.D.; Ryder, G.; Day, A.M.
Young Researcher Award 2007
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Botsch, Mario
Teaching, Exploring, Learning-Developing Tutorials for In-Class Teaching and Self-Learning
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Beckhaus, S.; Blom, K. J.
This paper presents an experience report on a novel approach for a course on intermediate and advanced computer graphics topics. The approach uses Teachlet Tutorials, a combination of traditional seminar-type teaching with interactive exploration of the content by the audience, plus development of self-contained tutorials on the topic. In addition to a presentation, an interactive software tool is developed by the students to assist the audience in learning and exploring the topic s details. This process is guided through set tasks. The resulting course material is developed for two different contexts: (a) for classroom presentation and (b) as an interactive, self-contained, self-learning tutorial. The overall approach results in a more thorough understanding of the topic both for the student teachers as well as for the class participants. In addition to detailing the Teachlet Tutorial approach, this paper presents our experiences implementing the approach in our Advanced Computer Graphics course and presents the resultant projects. Most of the final Teachlet Tutorials were surprisingly good and we had excellent feedback from the students on the approach and course.
A Method for Constructing Interpolatory Subdivision Schemes and Blending Subdivisions
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Li, G.; Ma, W.
This paper presents a universal method for constructing interpolatory subdivision schemes from known approximatory subdivisions. The method establishes geometric rules of the associated interpolatory subdivision through addition of further weighted averaging operations to the approximatory subdivision. The paper thus provides a novel approach for designing new interpolatory subdivision schemes. In addition, a family of subdivision surfaces varying from the given approximatory scheme to its associated interpolatory scheme, namely the blending subdivisions, can also be established. Based on the proposed method, variants of several known interpolatory subdivision schemes are constructed. A new interpolatory subdivision scheme is also developed using the same technique. Brief analysis of a family of blending subdivisions associated with the Loop subdivision scheme demonstrates that this particular family of subdivisions are globally C1 continuous while maintaining bounded curvature for regular meshes. As a further extension of the blending subdivisions, a volume-preserving subdivision strategy is also proposed in the paper.
On Exact Error Bounds for View-Dependent Simplification
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Eisemann, E.; Decoret, X.
In this article we present an analytical closed-form expression to ensure exact error bounds for view-dependent simplification which is of importance for several algorithms. The present work contains proofs and solutions for the general 2D case and particular 3D cases.Most preceding works rely on coarse heuristics, that might fail and/or restrict movements or object representations. We introduce the notion of validity regions as the complete set of possible simplifications respecting a given error bound between the object and its simplification. The approach handles arbitrary polygonal viewcells which allow for free movement in the interior. We show how to compute these regions for mesh points and faces. Since the validity region of a face accounts for all its points, properties like silhouette preservation and textures are gracefully handled. This is not the case if the error is controlled only at the face s vertices or edges.
Boundary Constrained Swept Surfaces for Modelling and Animation
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) You, L. H.; Yang, X. S.; Pachulski, M.; Zhang, Jian J.
Due to their simplicity and intuitiveness, swept surfaces are widely used in many surface modelling applications. In this paper, we present a versatile swept surface technique called the boundary constrained swept surfaces. The most distinct feature is its ability to satisfy boundary constraints, including the shape and tangent conditions at the boundaries of a swept surface. This permits significantly varying surfaces to be both modelled and smoothly assembled, leading to the construction of complex objects. The representation, similar to an ordinary swept surface, is analytical in nature and thus it is light in storage cost and numerically very stable to compute. We also introduce a number of useful shape manipulation tools, such as sculpting forces, to deform a surface both locally and globally. In addition to being a complementary method to the mainstream surface modelling and deformation techniques, we have found it very effective in automatically rebuilding existing complex models. Model reconstruction is arguably one of the most laborious and expensive tasks in modelling complex animated characters. We demonstrate how our technique can be used to automate this process.
What can Computer Graphics expect from 3D Computer Vision?
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Sara, Radim
Computer Vision is a discipline whose ultimate goal is to interpret optical images of real scenes. It is well understood that such a problem is cursed by ambiguity of interpretation and uncertainty of evidence. Despite imperfectness of results due to the scenes never following our prior models exactly, Computer Vision has achieved a significant progress in the past two decades.This talk will outline the quest of 3D Computer Vision by describing a processing pipeline that receives a heap of unorganized images from unknown cameras and produces a consistent 3D geometric model together with camera calibrations. We will see how new algorithms allow the standard conception of the pipeline as a series of independent processing steps gradually transform to a single complex, yet efficient vision task. We will identify some points where linking Computer Vision and Computer Graphics would bring significant progress.
On-the-fly Curve-skeleton Computation for 3D Shapes
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Sharf, Andrei; Lewiner, Thomas; Shamir, Ariel; Kobbelt, Leif
The curve-skeleton of a 3D object is an abstract geometrical and topological representation of its 3D shape. It maps the spatial relation of geometrically meaningful parts to a graph structure. Each arc of this graph represents a part of the object with roughly constant diameter or thickness, and approximates its centerline. This makes the curve-skeleton suitable to describe and handle articulated objects such as characters for animation. We present an algorithm to extract such a skeleton on-the-fly, both from point clouds and polygonal meshes. The algorithm is based on a deformable model evolution that captures the object s volumetric shape. The deformable model involves multiple competing fronts which evolve inside the object in a coarse-to-fine manner. We first track these fronts centers, and then merge and filter the resulting arcs to obtain a curve-skeleton of the object. The process inherits the robustness of the reconstruction technique, being able to cope with noisy input, intricate geometry and complex topology. It creates a natural segmentation of the object and computes a center curve for each segment while maintaining a full correspondence between the skeleton and the boundary of the object.
Texturing Internal Surfaces from a Few Cross Sections
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Pietroni, Nico; Otaduy, Miguel A.; Bickel, Bernd; Ganovelli, Fabio; Gross, Markus
We introduce a new appearance-modeling paradigm for synthesizing the internal structure of a 3D model from photographs of a few cross-sections of a real object. When the internal surfaces of the 3D model are revealed as it is cut, carved, or simply clipped, we synthesize their texture from the input photographs. Our texture synthesis algorithm is best classified as a morphing technique, which efficiently outputs the texture attributes of each surface point on demand. For determining source points and their weights in the morphing algorithm, we propose an interpolation domain based on BSP trees that naturally resembles planar splitting of real objects. In the context of the interpolation domain, we define efficient warping and morphing operations that allow for real-time synthesis of textures. Overall, our modeling paradigm, together with its realization through our texture morphing algorithm, allow users to author 3D models that reveal highly realistic internal surfaces in a variety of artistic flavors.
Crowds by Example
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Lerner, Alon; Chrysanthou, Yiorgos; Lischinski, Dani
We present an example-based crowd simulation technique. Most crowd simulation techniques assume that the behavior exhibited by each person in the crowd can be defined by a restricted set of rules. This assumption limits the behavioral complexity of the simulated agents. By learning from real-world examples, our autonomous agents display complex natural behaviors that are often missing in crowd simulations. Examples are created from tracked video segments of real pedestrian crowds. During a simulation, autonomous agents search for examples that closely match the situation that they are facing. Trajectories taken by real people in similar situations, are copied to the simulated agents, resulting in seemingly natural behaviors.
Efficient Reflectance and Visibility Approximations for Environment Map Rendering
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Green, Paul; Kautz, Jan; Durand, Fredo
We present a technique for approximating isotropic BRDFs and precomputed self-occlusion that enables accurate and efficient prefiltered environment map rendering. Our approach uses a nonlinear approximation of the BRDF as a weighted sum of isotropic Gaussian functions. Our representation requires a minimal amount of storage, can accurately represent BRDFs of arbitrary sharpness, and is above all, efficient to render. We precompute visibility due to self-occlusion and store a low-frequency approximation suitable for glossy reflections. We demonstrate our method by fitting our representation to measured BRDF data, yielding high visual quality at real-time frame rates.
Manipulating, Deforming and Animating Sampled Object Representations
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Chen, M.; Correa, C.; Islam, S.; Jones, M. W.; Shen, P.-Y.; Silver, D.; Walton, S. J. and Willis, P. J.
A sampled object representation (SOR) defines a graphical model using data obtained from a sampling process, which takes a collection of samples at discrete positions in space in order to capture certain geometrical and physical properties of one or more objects of interest. Examples of SORs include images, videos, volume datasets and point datasets. Unlike many commonly used data representations in computer graphics, SORs lack in geometrical, topological and semantic information, which is much needed for controlling deformation and animation. Hence it poses a significant scientific and technical challenge to develop deformation and animation methods that operate upon SORs. Such methods can enable computer graphics and computer animation to benefit enormously from the advances of digital imaging technology.In this state of the art report, we survey a wide range of techniques that have been developed for manipulating, deforming and animating SORs. We consider a collection of elementary operations for manipulating SORs, which can serve as building blocks of deformation and animation techniques. We examine a collection of techniques that are designed to transform the geometry shape of deformable objects in sampled representations and pay particular attention to their deployment in surgical simulation. We review a collection of techniques for animating digital characters in SORs, focusing on recent developments in volume animation.
Eurographics Honorary Fellowship
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007)
Skeleton-based Variational Mesh Deformations
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Yoshizawa, Shin; Belyaev, Alexander; Seidel, Hans-Peter
In this paper, a new free-form shape deformation approach is proposed. We combine a skeleton-based mesh deformation technique with discrete differential coordinates in order to create natural-looking global shape deformations. Given a triangle mesh, we first extract a skeletal mesh, a two-sided Voronoibased approximation of the medial axis. Next the skeletal mesh is modified by free-form deformations. Then a desired global shape deformation is obtained by reconstructing the shape corresponding to the deformed skeletal mesh. The reconstruction is based on using discrete differential coordinates. Our method preserves fine geometric details and original shape thickness because of using discrete differential coordinates and skeleton-based deformations. We also develop a new mesh evolution technique which allow us to eliminate possible global and local self-intersections of the deformed mesh while preserving fine geometric details. Finally, we present a multi-resolution version of our approach in order to simplify and accelerate the deformation process. In addition, interesting links between the proposed free-form shape deformation technique and classical and modern results in the differential geometry of sphere congruences are established and discussed.
Ray-Casted BlockMaps for Large Urban Models Visualization
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Cignoni, P.; Di Benedetto, M.; Ganovelli, F.; Gobbetti, E.; Marton, F.; Scopigno, R.
We introduce a GPU-friendly technique that efficiently exploits the highly structured nature of urban environments to ensure rendering quality and interactive performance of city exploration tasks. Central to our approach is a novel discrete representation, called BlockMap, for the efficient encoding and rendering of a small set of textured buildings far from the viewer. A BlockMap compactly represents a set of textured vertical prisms with a bounded on-screen footprint. BlockMaps are stored into small fixed size texture chunks and efficiently rendered through GPU raycasting. Blockmaps can be seamlessly integrated into hierarchical data structures for interactive rendering of large textured urban models. We illustrate an efficient output-sensitive framework in which a visibility-aware traversal of the hierarchy renders components close to the viewer with textured polygons and employs BlockMaps for far away geometry. Our approach provides a bounded size far distance representation of cities, naturally scales with the improving shader technology, and outperforms current state of the art approaches. Its efficiency and generality is demonstrated with the interactive exploration of a large textured model of the city of Paris on a commodity graphics platform.
Online Motion Capture Marker Labeling for Multiple Interacting Articulated Targets
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Yu, Qian; Li, Qing; Deng, Zhigang
In this paper, we propose an online motion capture marker labeling approach for multiple interacting articulated targets. Given hundreds of unlabeled motion capture markers from multiple articulated targets that are interacting each other, our approach automatically labels these markers frame by frame, by fitting rigid bodies and exploiting trained structure and motion models. Advantages of our approach include: 1) our method is an online algorithm, which requires no user interaction once the algorithm starts. 2) Our method is more robust than traditional the closest point-based approaches by automatically imposing the structure and motion models. 3) Due to the use of the structure model which encodes the rigidity of each articulated body of captured targets, our method can recover missing markers robustly. Our approach is efficient and particularly suited for online computer animation and video game applications.
Accelerating Refractive Rendering of Transparent Objects
(The Eurographics Association and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2007) Hui, K. C.; Lee, A. H. C.; Lai, Y. H.
In this paper, a technique is proposed for the rendering of transparent objects interactively using the method of refractive rendering. In the proposed technique, the refractive rendering algorithm is performed in two stages, namely the pre-computation stage and the shading stage. In the pre-computation stage, ray-traced information, including directions and positions of rays, are generated by a ray tracing process and are stored in a set of ray lists. In the shading stage, these data are retrieved from the ray lists for computing the shading of an object. Using the proposed technique, photorealistic image of transparent objects and gemstones with various cuttings, material properties, lighting and background can be rendered interactively. By combining the refractive rendering technique with conventional shading techniques, jewelry and crystal designs can be rendered at a much higher speed comparing with conventional ray tracing techniques.

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