The State University of New York

Baoquan Chen

Arie E Kaufman

Kevin Kreeger

Frank Dachille

Ingmar Bitter

An apparatus and method for real-time volume processing and universal three-dimensional rendering. The apparatus includes a plurality of three-dimensional (3D) memory units; at least one pixel bus for providing global horizontal communication; a plurality of rendering pipelines; at least one geometry bus; and a control unit. The apparatus includes a block processor having a circular ray integration pipeline for processing voxel data and ray data. Rays are generally processed in image order thus permitting great flexibility (e.g., perspective projection, global illumination). The block processor includes a splatting unit and a scattering unit. A method for casting shadows and performing global illumination in relation to light sources includes sweeping a two dimensional array of rays through the volume can also be implemented with the apparatus. A method for approximating a perspective projection includes using parallel projection.

Apparatus and method for real-time volume processing and universal three-dimensional rendering

Apparatus and method for volume processing and rendering

An apparatus and method for real-time volume processing and universal three-dimensional rendering. The apparatus includes a plurality of three-dimensional (3D) memory units; at least one pixel bus for providing global horizontal communication; a plurality of rendering pipelines; at least one geometry bus; and a control unit. The plurality of rendering pipelines each preferably include hardware for interpolation, shading, FIFO buffering, communication and table lookups. The apparatus of the present invention may be coupled to a geometry pipeline for mixing surfaces, images and volumes together in a single image. A method for performing volumetric ray casting of a 3D volume includes the steps of calculating a distance along a major projection axis from a predefined viewpoint; dividing the volume into a plurality of consecutive regions having exponentially increasing bounds; casting a plurality of rays from the viewpoint through the volume; either merging two or more rays or splitting one or more rays at the region boundaries; and repeating the ray casting and merging/splitting steps until the entire volume has been processed. The apparatus and methods of the present invention achieve true real-time performance for high-resolution volume rendering, mixing surfaces and volumes in a single image, and accelerating other imaging operations, including texture mapping and image-based rendering.

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Maple Grove, MN, United States of America

Baoquan Chen