加速的QTA地形可视化算法

四叉树图集光线跟踪算法（QTA）是一种高效的平面地形可视化算法,在地形渲染相关的许多应用中（如矢量数据、谷地检测、等高线绘制等）都可以增加系统渲染速率。在QTA基础上,通过简化其中CRC算法的分支判断,引入新的屏幕误差控制策略,提出了一种新的光线投射地形可视化算法,同时对QTA中光栅化部分也进行了优化。该算法易于实现,且突破了原QTA算法只适用于平面地形的限制,算法实现了球形地形的可视化。实验结果验证了这一点,同时实验还显示,算法在不损失精度的情况下,具有更高的渲染速率。     

Stochastic Volume Rendering of Multi‐Phase SPH Data

In this paper, we present a novel method for the direct volume rendering of large smoothed‐particle hydrodynamics (SPH) simulation data without transforming the unstructured data to an intermediate representation. By directly visualizing the unstructured particle data, we avoid long preprocessing times and large storage requirements. This enables the visualization of large, time‐dependent, and multivariate data both as a post‐process and in situ. To address the computational complexity, we introduce stochastic volume rendering that considers only a subset of particles at each step during ray marching. The sample probabilities for selecting this subset at each step are thereby determined both in a view‐dependent manner and based on the spatial complexity of the data. Our stochastic volume rendering enables us to scale continuously from a fast, interactive preview to a more accurate volume rendering at higher cost. Lastly, we discuss the visualization of free‐surface and multi‐phase flows by including a multi‐material model with volumetric and surface shading into the stochastic volume rendering.     

State‐of‐the‐Art in Compressed GPU‐Based Direct Volume Rendering

Great advancements in commodity graphics hardware have favoured graphics processing unit (GPU)‐based volume rendering as the main adopted solution for interactive exploration of rectilinear scalar volumes on commodity platforms. Nevertheless, long data transfer times and GPU memory size limitations are often the main limiting factors, especially for massive, time‐varying or multi‐volume visualization, as well as for networked visualization on the emerging mobile devices. To address this issue, a variety of level‐of‐detail (LOD) data representations and compression techniques have been introduced. In order to improve capabilities and performance over the entire storage, distribution and rendering pipeline, the encoding/decoding process is typically highly asymmetric, and systems should ideally compress at data production time and decompress on demand at rendering time. Compression and LOD pre‐computation does not have to adhere to real‐time constraints and can be performed off‐line for high‐quality results. In contrast, adaptive real‐time rendering from compressed representations requires fast, transient and spatially independent decompression. In this report, we review the existing compressed GPU volume rendering approaches, covering sampling grid layouts, compact representation models, compression techniques, GPU rendering architectures and fast decoding techniques.     

GPU Tessellation全球地形可视化方法

目的 目前全球大规模地形可视化问题基本都衍生于分块LOD(level of detail)方法,该方法在快速地表漫游中依然存在GPU-CPU的数据传输瓶颈,其基于裙边的缝隙修复方法既需要额外资源,还存在依然无法完全消除的痕迹。为解决这些问题,提出了一种GPU网格生成的地形可视化方法。方法 结合GPU Tessellation方法、基于视点与屏幕空间误差的LOD方法、局部坐标系渲染等算法,使得全球地形可视化的生成效率有明显提高。结果 实现了一个全球地形可视化系统GTVS,提供全球高精度地形数据与多分辨率高清卫星影像数据的调度与渲染等。论文对该系统进行了详实的实验和数据分析,相比传统基于GPU的分块LOD方法,FPS(frames per second)提升100%以上,很好地解决了系统瓶颈问题。结论 结果表明所提方法实用、鲁棒、扩展性好,可广泛地适用于大规模的全球渲染系统中。     

Time‐Warped Foveated Rendering for Virtual Reality Headsets

Rendering in real time for virtual reality headsets with high user immersion is challenging due to strict framerate constraints as well as due to a low tolerance for artefacts. Eye tracking‐based foveated rendering presents an opportunity to strongly increase performance without loss of perceived visual quality. To this end, we propose a novel foveated rendering method for virtual reality headsets with integrated eye tracking hardware. Our method comprises recycling pixels in the periphery by spatio‐temporally reprojecting them from previous frames. Artefacts and disocclusions caused by this reprojection are detected and re‐evaluated according to a confidence value that is determined by a newly introduced formalized perception‐based metric, referred to as confidence function. The foveal region, as well as areas with low confidence values, are redrawn efficiently, as the confidence value allows for the delicate regulation of hierarchical geometry and pixel culling. Hence, the average primitive processing and shading costs are lowered dramatically. Evaluated against regular rendering as well as established foveated rendering methods, our approach shows increased performance in both cases. Furthermore, our method is not restricted to static scenes and provides an acceleration structure for post‐processing passes.     

Pixel History Linear Models for Real‐Time Temporal Filtering

We propose a new real‐time temporal filtering and antialiasing (AA) method for rasterization graphics pipelines. Our method is based on Pixel History Linear Models (PHLM), a new concept for modeling the history of pixel shading values over time using linear models. Based on PHLM, our method can predict per‐pixel variations of the shading function between consecutive frames. This combines temporal reprojection with per‐pixel shading predictions in order to provide temporally coherent shading, even in the presence of very noisy input images. Our method can address both spatial and temporal aliasing problems under a unique filtering framework that minimizes filtering error through a recursive least squares algorithm. We demonstrate our method working with a commercial deferred shading engine for rasterization and with our own OpenGL deferred shading renderer. We have implemented our method in GPU and it has shown significant reduction of temporal flicker in very challenging scenarios including foliage rendering, complex non‐linear camera motions, dynamic lighting, reflections, shadows and fine geometric details. Our approach, based on PHLM, avoids the creation of visible ghosting artifacts and it reduces the filtering overblur characteristic of temporal deflickering methods. At the same time, the results are comparable to state‐of‐the‐art real‐time filters in terms of temporal coherence.     

GPU‐Based Spherical Light Field Rendering with Per‐Fragment Depth Correction

Image‐based rendering techniques are a powerful alternative to traditional polygon‐based computer graphics. This paper presents a novel light field rendering technique which performs per‐pixel depth correction of rays for high‐quality reconstruction. Our technique stores combined RGB and depth values in a parabolic 2D texture for every light field sample acquired at discrete positions on a uniform spherical setup. Image synthesis is implemented on the GPU as a fragment program which extracts the correct image information from adjacent cameras for each fragment by applying per‐pixel depth correction of rays. We show that the presented image‐based rendering technique provides a significant improvement compared to previous approaches. We explain two different rendering implementations which make use of a uniform parametrisation to minimise disparity problems and ensure full six degrees of freedom for virtual view synthesis. While one rendering algorithm implements an iterative refinement approach for rendering light fields with per pixel depth correction, the other approach employs a raycaster, which provides superior rendering quality at moderate frame rates. GPU based per‐fragment depth correction of rays, used in both implementations, helps reducing ghosting artifacts to a non‐noticeable amount and provides a rendering technique that performs without exhaustive pre‐processing for 3D object reconstruction and without real‐time ray‐object intersection calculations at rendering time.     

Sparse GPU Voxelization of Yarn‐Level Cloth

Most popular methods in cloth rendering rely on volumetric data in order to model complex optical phenomena such as sub‐surface scattering. These approaches are able to produce very realistic illumination results, but their volumetric representations are costly to compute and render, forfeiting any interactive feedback. In this paper, we introduce a method based on the Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) for voxelization and visualization, suitable for both interactive and offline rendering. Recent features in the OpenGL model, like the ability to dynamically address arbitrary buffers and allocate bindless textures, are combined into our pipeline to interactively voxelize millions of polygons into a set of large three‐dimensional (3D) textures (>10⁹ elements), generating a volume with sub‐voxel accuracy, which is suitable even for high‐density woven cloth such as linen.     

基于矢量线强化的增强型2维流场实时绘制

在流场绘制中,合理地结合矢量场的多种属性有助于矢量场的特征分析,据此提出了一种基于矢量线强化的增强型2维流场实时绘制算法。通过对流场的一些标量属性如大小、角度和曲率进行色彩映射,该算法不仅可以清晰显示流场运动方向,而且能显示矢量场的多种属性,有助于了解流场矢量特征分布和主要拓扑结构。该算法采用了一种矢量线强化策略,即通过对卷积纹理在垂直矢量方向上进行1维高通滤波,增加了矢量线间的对比,改善了图像质量。利用现代图形卡的可编程能力,该算法可以在微机上达到实时绘制性能。     

基于纹理的增强型3D流场绘制

提出一种基于纹理的增强型3D矢量场可视化算法,可显著地改善传统纹理法的绘制质量.首先通过对3D纹理的线性卷积运算生成具有空间相关性的卷积纹理;然后对卷积纹理进行高通滤波,以增加流面内流线之间强度的对比;最后通过体绘制方式展示3D卷积纹理.借助权重区域,该算法可以显示用户感兴趣区域或特征区域,避免卷积数据过多引起的紊乱及相互遮挡.     

Dynamic Terrain Visualization Based on ROAM and OGRE

Terrain Visualization is an important part of visualization systems of battlefield, and the visualization of dynamic terrain is also important for dynamic battle environment. In this paper, special attention has been paid on real-time optimally adapting meshes （ROAM） algorithm, which is a candidate for dynamic terrain, and its mesh representation, mesh continuity algorithm and error metrics are discussed. The DEXTER-ROAM algorithm is discussed and analyzed. By revising the mesh representation of ROAM, a dynamic ROAM algorithm based on partial-regular grid is established. By introducing transition region, mesh discontinuity of dynamic partial-regular grid is resolved. Error metric blocks are removed for computation complexity and culling blocks are introduced to accelerate view frustum culling. The algorithm is implemented in a 3D rendering engine called OGRE. In the end, an example of dynamic crater is given to examine the dynamic ROAM algorithm.     

Visualization of Large‐Scale Urban Models through Multi‐Level Relief Impostors

In this paper, we present an efficient approach for the interactive rendering of large‐scale urban models, which can be integrated seamlessly with virtual globe applications. Our scheme fills the gap between standard approaches for distant views of digital terrains and the polygonal models required for close‐up views. Our work is oriented towards city models with real photographic textures of the building facades. At the heart of our approach is a multi‐resolution tree of the scene defining multi‐level relief impostors. Key ingredients of our approach include the pre‐computation of a small set of zenithal and oblique relief maps that capture the geometry and appearance of the buildings inside each node, a rendering algorithm combining relief mapping with projective texture mapping which uses only a small subset of the pre‐computed relief maps, and the use of wavelet compression to simulate two additional levels of the tree. Our scheme runs considerably faster than polygonal‐based approaches while producing images with higher quality than competing relief‐mapping techniques. We show both analytically and empirically that multi‐level relief impostors are suitable for interactive navigation through large urban models.     

Re‐Weighting Firefly Samples for Improved Finite‐Sample Monte Carlo Estimates

Samples with high contribution but low probability density, often called fireflies, occur in all practical Monte Carlo estimators and are part of computing unbiased estimates. For finite‐sample estimates, however, they can lead to excessive variance. Rejecting all samples classified as outliers, as suggested in previous work, leads to estimates that are too low and can cause undesirable artefacts. In this paper, we show how samples can be re‐weighted depending on their contribution and sampling frequency such that the finite‐sample estimate gets closer to the correct expected value and the variance can be controlled. For this, we first derive a theory for how samples should ideally be re‐weighted and that this would require the probability density function of the optimal sampling strategy. As this probability density function is generally unknown, we show how the discrepancy between the optimal and the actual sampling strategy can be estimated and used for re‐weighting in practice. We describe an efficient algorithm that allows for the necessary analysis of per‐pixel sample distributions in the context of Monte Carlo rendering without storing any individual samples, with only minimal changes to the rendering algorithm. It causes negligible runtime overhead, works in constant memory and is well suited for parallel and progressive rendering. The re‐weighting runs as a fast post‐process, can be controlled interactively and our approach is non‐destructive in that the unbiased result can be reconstructed at any time.     

一种全球尺度三维大气数据可视化系统

气象数据具有时变、多源、多维度、数据量大和多尺度等特征,常规的气象数据可视化方法难以满足气象预报与气象研究中的需求.描述了一个新的全球尺度三维大气数据可视化系统——AVIS.系统实现了面向各类密度场、向量场、张量场和非空间数据的可视化方法,设计了适用于大气数据的球面体绘制和混合绘制方法.系统还实现了一套跨平台并行可视化及分析构架,支持在浏览器中或其他显示和交互设备上使用,并利用后端计算集群加速数据的计算与绘制过程.案例分析表明,该系统可以全方位地展现气象数据中的信息,帮助用户综合多种气象信息进行分析.     

Spatio‐Temporal Filtering of Indirect Lighting for Interactive Global Illumination

We introduce a screen‐space statistical filtering method for real‐time rendering with global illumination. It is inspired by statistical filtering proposed by Meyer et al. to reduce the noise in global illumination over a period of time by estimating the principal components from all rendered frames. Our work extends their method to achieve nearly real‐time performance on modern GPUs. More specifically, our method employs the candid covariance‐free incremental PCA to overcome several limitations of the original algorithm by Meyer et al., such as its high computational cost and memory usage that hinders its implementation on GPUs. By combining the reprojection and per‐pixel weighting techniques, our method handles the view changes and object movement in dynamic scenes as well.     

复杂战场环境中动态地形的表示及可视化技术研究

多分辨率建模作为解决大面积静态地形实时动态显示的手段,近年来在国内外得到普遍的重视和研究。目前,关于复杂战场环境中动态地形的表示及动态地形多分辨率实时可视化问题的研究在国内外还极不成熟。基于高逼真度虚拟战场环境仿真的要求和前人在这方面的有关研究,论文对动态地形的表示及可视化技术做了初步研究。     

LOCALIS: Locally-adaptive Line Simplification for GPU-based Geographic Vector Data Visualization

Visualization of large vector line data is a core task in geographic and cartographic systems. Vector maps are often displayed at different cartographic generalization levels, traditionally by using several discrete levels-of-detail (LODs). This limits the generalization levels to a fixed and predefined set of LODs, and generally does not support smooth LOD transitions. However, fast GPUs and novel line rendering techniques can be exploited to integrate dynamic vector map LOD management into GPU-based algorithms for locally-adaptive line simplification and real-time rendering. We propose a new technique that interactively visualizes large line vector datasets at variable LODs. It is based on the Douglas-Peucker line simplification principle, generating an exhaustive set of line segments whose specific subsets represent the lines at any variable LOD. At run time, an appropriate and view-dependent error metric supports screen-space adaptive LOD levels and the display of the correct subset of line segments accordingly. Our implementation shows that we can simplify and display large line datasets interactively. We can successfully apply line style patterns, dynamic LOD selection lenses, and anti-aliasing techniques to our line rendering.     

Topographic Map Visualization from Adaptively Compressed Textures

Raster‐based topographic maps are commonly used in geoinformation systems to overlay geographic entities on top of digital terrain models. Using compressed texture formats for encoding topographic maps allows reducing latency times while visualizing large geographic datasets. Topographic maps encompass high‐frequency content with large uniform regions, making current compressed texture formats inappropriate for encoding them. In this paper we present a method for locally‐adaptive compression of topographic maps. Key elements include a Hilbert scan to maximize spatial coherence, efficient encoding of homogeneous image regions through arbitrarily‐sized texel runs, a cumulative run‐length encoding supporting fast random‐access, and a compression algorithm supporting lossless and lossy compression. Our scheme can be easily implemented on current programmable graphics hardware allowing real‐time GPU decompression and rendering of bilinear‐filtered topographic maps.     

Computer aided generation of stylized maps

Geographic maps have existed from early stages of human civilization. Various styles of visualizing the geographic information have evolved depending on the nature of information and the technology available for visualization. This has led to innumerable map styles. In this work we develop a technique to create maps by combining two‐dimensional and three‐dimensional information such that the resulting maps are both functional and aesthetically appealing. Our technique requires geographical information in vector form and aerial images as inputs. We use computer vision based approaches and user defined inputs to augment the vector data with information that is required to create stylized maps. We define procedural graphics methods to generate a range of geographic elements that can be composed together into a stylized map. We demonstrate our technique by generating example maps of a region in Las Vegas. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Projected Field Similarity for Comparative Visualization of Multi‐Run Multi‐Field Time‐Varying Spatial Data

The purpose of multi‐run simulations is often to capture the variability of the output with respect to different initial settings. Comparative analysis of multi‐run spatio‐temporal simulation data requires us to investigate the differences in the dynamics of the simulations' changes over time. To capture the changes and differences, aggregated statistical information may often be insufficient, and it is desirable to capture the local differences between spatial data fields at different times and between different runs. To calculate the pairwise similarity between data fields, we generalize the concept of isosurface similarity from individual surfaces to entire fields and propose efficient computation strategies. The described approach can be applied considering a single scalar field for all simulation runs or can be generalized to a similarity measure capturing all data fields of a multi‐field data set simultaneously. Given the field similarity, we use multi‐dimensional scaling approaches to visualize the similarity in two‐dimensional or three‐dimensional projected views as well as plotting one‐dimensional similarity projections over time. Each simulation run is depicted as a polyline within the similarity maps. The overall visual analysis concept can be applied using our proposed field similarity or any other existing measure for field similarity. We evaluate our measure in comparison to popular existing measures for different configurations and discuss their advantages and limitations. We apply them to generate similarity maps for real‐world data sets within the overall concept for comparative visualization of multi‐run spatio‐temporal data and discuss the results.