Abstract
Nowadays huge digital models are becoming increasingly available
for a number of different applications ranging from CAD, industrial
design to medicine and natural sciences. Particularly, in the field of
medicine, data acquisition devices such as MRI or CT scanners
routinely produce huge volumetric datasets. Currently, these datasets can
easily reach dimensions of 1024^3 voxels and datasets larger than that
are not uncommon.
This thesis focuses on efficient methods for the interactive exploration
of such large volumes using direct volume visualization techniques on
commodity platforms. To reach this goal specialized multi-resolution structures
and algorithms, which are able to directly render volumes of potentially unlimited
size are introduced. The developed techniques are output sensitive and their
rendering costs depend only on the complexity of the generated images and not
on the complexity of the input datasets. The advanced characteristics of modern
GPGPU architectures are exploited and combined with an out-of-core framework
in order to provide a more flexible, scalable and efficient implementation of
these algorithms and data structures on single GPUs and GPU clusters.
To improve visual perception and understanding, the use of novel 3D display technology
based on a light-field approach is introduced. This kind of device allows multiple naked-eye
users to perceive virtual objects floating inside the display workspace, exploiting the stereo
and horizontal parallax. A set of specialized and interactive illustrative techniques capable
of providing different contextual information in different areas of the display, as well as an
out-of-core CUDA based ray-casting engine with a number of improvements over current GPU volume
ray-casters are both reported. The possibilities of the system are demonstrated by the multi-user
interactive exploration of 64-GVoxel datasets on a 35-MPixel light-field display driven by a
cluster of PCs.
Keywords: Computer Graphics, Scientific Visualization, Medical Imaging, Volume Rendering,
Ray-casting, Illustrative Rendering, Level-of-detail, Light-field Displays.
BibTeX
Download BibTeX-Entry
@phdthesis\{iglesias-2011-RGO,
title = "Real-time GPU-accelerated Out-of-Core Rendering and Light-field Display Visualization for
Improved Massive Volume Understanding",
author = "Jos\'{e} A. Iglesias Guiti\'{a}n",
year = "2008",
abstract = "Nowadays huge digital models are becoming increasingly available
for a number of different applications ranging from CAD, industrial
design to medicine and natural sciences. Particularly, in the field of
medicine, data acquisition devices such as MRI or CT scanners
routinely produce huge volumetric datasets. Currently, these datasets can
easily reach dimensions of 1 gigavoxel and datasets larger than that
are not uncommon.
This thesis focuses on efficient methods for the interactive exploration
of such large volumes using direct volume visualization techniques on
commodity platforms. To reach this goal specialized multi-resolution
structures and algorithms, which are able to directly render volumes of
potentially unlimited size are introduced. The developed techniques are
output sensitive and their rendering costs depend only on the complexity
of the generated images and not on the complexity of the input datasets.
The advanced characteristics of modern GPGPU architectures are exploited
and combined with an out-of-core framework in order to provide a more flexible,
scalable and efficient implementation of these algorithms and data structures
on single GPUs and GPU clusters.
To improve visual perception and understanding, the use of novel 3D display
technology based on a light-field approach is introduced. This kind of
device allows multiple naked-eye users to perceive virtual objects floating
inside the display workspace, exploiting the stereo and horizontal parallax.
A set of specialized and interactive illustrative techniques capable of providing
different contextual information in different areas of the display, as well
as an out-of-core CUDA based ray-casting engine with a number of improvements
over current GPU volume ray-casters are both reported.
The possibilities of the system are demonstrated by the multi-user interactive
exploration of 64-GVoxel datasets on a 35-MPixel light-field display driven
by a cluster of PCs.",
school = "Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, University of Cagliari",
month = 3,
keywords = "computer graphics, scientific visualization, medical imaging, volume rendering,
ray-casting, illustrative rendering, level-of-detail, light-field displays",
url = "http://www.crs4.it/vic/cgi-bin/bib-page.cgi?id=%27Iglesias:2011:RGO%27",
}
Read Full Ph.D. Thesis
GPU-accelerated DVR on a Light-field Display