V-buffer

Abstract

This paper presents rendering techniques that use volumes as the basic geometric primitives. It defines data structures composed of numerous subvolumes, in excess of 100,000. Over each subvolume, a scalar field describes the variation of some physical quantity. The two rendering methods described herein assume a trilinear variation of this scalar field within each volume element, unlike voxel-based techniques that assume a constant value for each subvolume. The result is a higher order approximation of the structures within the volume. In addition, solid texture mapping, atmospheric attenuation, and transfer functions relating the dynamic range of the scalar field to color and opacity are used to isolate important data features. The result is a new method for the visualization of three-dimensional data resulting from numerical simulations and observations of natural phenomena. This method continuously covers the gap between surface-based and voxel-based techniques.