The Singer Company

John B Sullivan

David R Marsh

William David Fahey

Raymond C Osofsky

David E Manners

Steven R Bryan

The terrain objects within the data base for an aircraft flight simulation system are formed by polygon faces and include certain objects formed by repetitive patterns of equally spaced identical polygon faces. More specifically, objects such as runway markings, which are a series of elongated narrow rectangles equally spaced along the length of the runway. The image data is arranged in a particular format including instruction words for identifying the type of data in the data words following each instruction word, and for controlling the flow of data through the image processor. The image data formatted and processed includes: Initialization vectors (Vo), defining the position of landmark points (i.e., the first vertex of the initial polygon of each series of faces). Delta data (shape data), defining the position of other points, (i.e., the remaining vertices of each initial face) with respect to the initial point therefor. Increment data defining the uniform spacing between adjacent identical faces of each series. Series data defining the number of identical faces in each series. The image processor translates initial position data into the aircraft coordinate system, then rotates, clips, and projects each three-dimensional position vector to form two-dimensional display vectors (Vd). Raster scanlines are generated from the display vectors Vd of each face for display on a CRT.

Repeating pattern simulation of a polygon face object system

The visual system within an aircraft flight simulation system receives flight data from a flight simulation computer, and terrain data from a gaming area data base. A computer within the visual system organizes this image data in a buffer memory according to a particular format, and forwards the image data to an image processor. The following types of data are formatted and processed: Position vectors, defining the changing position of the aircraft with respect to the origin of the terrain coordinate system. Rotational data, defining the changing attitude of the aircraft with respect to the terrain coordinate system. Initialization vectors, defining the position of the landmark points within the terrain coordinate system. The landmark points are translated into the aircraft coordinate system to form translated vectors. Delta data, defining the position of other points, lines, and faces with respect to the landmark points. CIF data, defining color, intensity, defocus, etc. of individual lines and points and the texture within each face. Transfer data, which is coded to identify the data thereafter. The image processor translates delta data into face vertex vectors, defining the position relationship between the vertices of each terrain object and the aircraft. The image processor then rotates the face vertex vectors into channel vectors and clips the data outside the field of vision. The image processor then projects each three-dimensional channel vector into a two-dimensional display vector. Finally, the image processor generates raster scanlines and a display generator receives the display vector faces, and other image data to provide analog inputs to CRT devices which provide the window displays for the simulated aircraft.

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Santa Clara, CA, United States of America

John B Sullivan