3d realtime fluid animation by navier-stokes equations

Abstract

This is a method for physically-based modeling of three dimensional (3D) general fluid animation in computer graphics. By solving the two dimensional (2D) Navier-Stokes equations using a Computational Fluid Dynamics method, we map it into 3D using the corresponding pressures in the fluid flow field. The method achieves realistic real-time fluid animation by solving the physical governing laws of fluids but avoiding the extensive 3D fluid dynamics computation. Unlike previous computer graphics fluid models, our approach can model many different fluid behaviors by changing the internal or external boundary conditions. It can also model different kinds of fluids by varying the Reynolds number. In addition, we have generated several ways to view the animation of fluid flow field, the streakline of the flow field and the blending of fluids of different colors. Our model can serve as a testbed to simulate many more fluid phenomena which have never been successfully modeled.