CAREER: Applications of Surface Correspondence in Computer Graphics

最近的三项技术进步--Web的出现、数字媒体的革命和PC性能的显著提高--为许多新的3D计算机图形应用程序打开了大门。 对这项技术的访问，以及非技术人员对图形的兴趣不断扩大，推动了对新方法的需求不断增长，以目录，查看，修改和保护3D模型。 提供这些工具的几个挑战在于可用数据和操纵这些数据的人群的不断增长的规模和异质性。该项目研究了与3Dsurfaces相关的四个应用领域：（1）用于3D表面的基于内容的查询方法，以便在大型数据库中找到3D模型--这项技术将使人们能够在网上找到3D模型，并将加强未来数字图书馆的目录搜索;（2）用于表面内插的算法，以便可视化等值面的时间演变或等值面从低到高阈值的动画--这项技术将有助于理解3D数据集，例如来自医学扫描或天体物理模拟的数据集;（3）基于手绘手势和与其他模型的交互来重塑3D模型的控件-这些控件允许3D动画师以自然的方式重塑模型，它们允许2Danimator将复杂的纹理应用到手绘图形上;以及（4）一种用于在3D表面中插入和检测不可见数字水印的方法--水印技术解决了对专有模型的版权保护的关注，并将因此刺激新模型在Web上的扩散。将这些项目结合在一起的一个因素是它们依赖于两种共同的底层技术。 这些项目共享一个共同的基础技术--多分辨率分析--一种在不同细节层次上表示和操作数据的工具。 在更高的层次上，它们有一个共同的问题-表面对应问题-它着眼于如何将一个表面最佳地映射到另一个表面上。 这一问题的解决办法直接适用于上述四个项目。

Three recent advances in technology -- the advent of the Web, the revolution of digital media, and the dramatic performance improvement of PCs -- have opened the door for a host of new 3D computer graphics applications. Access to this technology, as well as broadening interest in graphics among non-technical people, drives a growing demand for new ways to catalogue, view, modify, and protect 3D models. Several challenges to providing these tools lie in the growing size and heterogeneity of both the data available and the groups of people manipulating these data.This project investigates four application areas pertinent to 3Dsurfaces: (1) a content-based query method for 3D surfaces in order to find 3D models in a large database -- this technique will enable people to find 3D models on the Web and will enhance catalogue searching for the digital library of the future; (2) algorithms for surface interpolation in order to visualize either the time-evolution of an isosurface or an animation of the isosurface from low to high threshold values -- this technology will aid understanding of 3D data sets such as those resulting from medical scans or astrophysical simulations; (3) controls for reshaping a 3D model based on hand-drawn gestures and interactions with other models -- these controls permit 3D animators to reshape models in a natural way, and they allow 2Danimators to apply complex textures to hand-drawn figures; and (4) a method for insertion and detection of an invisible digital watermark in a 3D surface -- watermarking technology addresses concerns about copyright protection of proprietary models, and will thereby spur the proliferation of new models on the Web.A factor that binds these projects together is that they rely on two common underlying technologies. The projects share a commonfundamental technology -- multiresolution analysis -- a tool forrepresenting and manipulating data at different levels of detail. At a higher level, they share a common problem -- the surface correspondence problem -- which looks at how to map one surface onto another optimally. Solutions to this problem have direct application in the four projects highlighted above.