Multi-layer Volume Ray Casting on GPU

Li, Wei

Multi-layer Volume Ray Casting on GPU

Files

005-012.pdf (336.14 KB)

multi_layer.wmv (20.06 MB)

Date

2010

Authors

Li, Wei

Publisher

The Eurographics Association

Abstract

We present multi-layer volume ray casting that integrates various volume rendering enhancements into a unified framework, including empty-space skipping, volume clipping, embedding opaque and semi-transparent objects, volume editing through constructional solid geometry (CSG) operations, etc. The central idea is to consider all these objects as volume-of-interests(VOIs). Each VOI is assigned a priority number to determine how the overlapped regions are handled. All the information of the VOIs are encoded into a ray-layer buffer through depth peeling combined with layer simplification. Each pixel of a ray-layer buffer contains the information of a set of ray segments, including the starting locations and the material IDs. The multi-layer ray caster then renders (or skips) each ray segment with the proper viewing parameters depending on the material IDs. The ray-layer buffer is also used to estimate the gradients of surfaces between the layers to improve shading.

        @inproceedings{:10.2312/VG/VG10/005-012
,
booktitle = {IEEE/ EG Symposium on Volume Graphics
},
editor = {Ruediger Westermann and Gordon Kindlmann
},
title = {{Multi-layer Volume Ray Casting on GPU
}},
author = {Li, Wei
},
year = {2010
},
publisher = {The Eurographics Association
},
ISSN = {1727-8376
},
ISBN = {978-3-905674-23-1
},
DOI = {/10.2312/VG/VG10/005-012
}
}