TU Darmstadt / ULB / TUbiblio

Shape Spaces from Morphing

Alexa, Marc (2002)
Shape Spaces from Morphing.
Technische Universität Darmstadt
Dissertation, Erstveröffentlichung

Kurzbeschreibung (Abstract)

In computer graphics, models of three-dimensional shapes are nowadays mainly represented as meshes. A mesh contains a set of vertices describing geometric positions (and other attributes such as color, etc.) and topological information describing edges containing vertices and forming faces. Meshes are universal in the sense that they can represent every shape with arbitrary precision (assuming infinite space to store the description). In many applications one deals not only with one single mesh but with many meshes. The most prominent example are geometric animations, which is typically stored a set of meshes describing the shape over time. We like to exploit the idea of a shape space, where shapes are described as the combination of a few base shapes. Here, base shapes are meshes, and all combinations are meshes. We start exploring this idea by looking at the simple case of only two base meshes. The main idea of this work is to use morphing techniques to generate the family of shapes described as the combination of two base shapes. Morphing techniques are used to generate smooth transitions from one object to another. They have become popular and widespread in the special effects industry but have applications in many areas such as medical imaging and scientific visualization. We can say that a morph represents the family of shapes generated by two base shapes, i.e. the space is one dimensional. By adding a third base shape and morphing between an element of the family resulting from the first two base shapes we add another dimension. This process can be repeated to add any number of dimensions. Such spaces of shapes allow to represent each shape in the space with a vector of scalars not longer than the number of base objects spanning the space. Assuming the number of base shapes is relatively small with respect to the amount of information needed to describe a single shape, this is an extremely compact and meaningful way of describing a shape. Why is the representation meaningful? Imagine a set of faces (smiling, frowning, blinking, staring, etc.) comprising the base of a space. If we want to generate a particular expression we simply describe the face in terms of the features we want. The modeling process is intuitive and simple. In addition, if such a face has to be stored or communicated only the small vector is needed. The major aim of the dissertation is to build spaces of polyhedral objects and demonstrate their usefulness in practical applications. However, at the current state of science even morphing between two polyhedral objects is a difficult process. For that reason, a large part of the work is dedicated to generating morph sequences between two meshes. Potential applications discussed in detail include geometric animations and information visualization.

Typ des Eintrags: Dissertation
Erschienen: 2002
Autor(en): Alexa, Marc
Art des Eintrags: Erstveröffentlichung
Titel: Shape Spaces from Morphing
Sprache: Englisch
Referenten: Gross, Prof. Dr. Markus
Berater: Encarnação, Prof. Dr.- José L.
Publikationsjahr: 28 Mai 2002
Ort: Darmstadt
Datum der mündlichen Prüfung: 19 April 2002
URL / URN: urn:nbn:de:tuda-tuprints-2134
Kurzbeschreibung (Abstract):

In computer graphics, models of three-dimensional shapes are nowadays mainly represented as meshes. A mesh contains a set of vertices describing geometric positions (and other attributes such as color, etc.) and topological information describing edges containing vertices and forming faces. Meshes are universal in the sense that they can represent every shape with arbitrary precision (assuming infinite space to store the description). In many applications one deals not only with one single mesh but with many meshes. The most prominent example are geometric animations, which is typically stored a set of meshes describing the shape over time. We like to exploit the idea of a shape space, where shapes are described as the combination of a few base shapes. Here, base shapes are meshes, and all combinations are meshes. We start exploring this idea by looking at the simple case of only two base meshes. The main idea of this work is to use morphing techniques to generate the family of shapes described as the combination of two base shapes. Morphing techniques are used to generate smooth transitions from one object to another. They have become popular and widespread in the special effects industry but have applications in many areas such as medical imaging and scientific visualization. We can say that a morph represents the family of shapes generated by two base shapes, i.e. the space is one dimensional. By adding a third base shape and morphing between an element of the family resulting from the first two base shapes we add another dimension. This process can be repeated to add any number of dimensions. Such spaces of shapes allow to represent each shape in the space with a vector of scalars not longer than the number of base objects spanning the space. Assuming the number of base shapes is relatively small with respect to the amount of information needed to describe a single shape, this is an extremely compact and meaningful way of describing a shape. Why is the representation meaningful? Imagine a set of faces (smiling, frowning, blinking, staring, etc.) comprising the base of a space. If we want to generate a particular expression we simply describe the face in terms of the features we want. The modeling process is intuitive and simple. In addition, if such a face has to be stored or communicated only the small vector is needed. The major aim of the dissertation is to build spaces of polyhedral objects and demonstrate their usefulness in practical applications. However, at the current state of science even morphing between two polyhedral objects is a difficult process. For that reason, a large part of the work is dedicated to generating morph sequences between two meshes. Potential applications discussed in detail include geometric animations and information visualization.

Alternatives oder übersetztes Abstract:
Alternatives AbstractSprache

In dieser Arbeit werden Methoden zur Repräsentation der Gestalt oder Form von Objekten vorgestellt. Die Grundidee ist, die Form eines Objektes als Mischung anderer vorgegebener Formen zu beschreiben. Dazu wird das mathematische Konzept linearer Räume verwendet: Einige Objekte bilden die Basis eines Raumes, und deren Kombination erzeugt die Elemente dieses Raumes. Diese Art der Beschreibung hat zwei Vorteile gegenüber der weit verbreiteten absoluten Repräsentation: Sie ist kompakt, wenn die Anzahl der Basen klein im Vergleich zur geometrischen Komplexität der Objekte ist. Sie ist deskriptiv, wenn die Basisformen eine Semantik haben, da dann die Anteile an diesen Basisformen das Objekt beschreiben. Zur Darstellung der Basisformen werden hier polygonale Netze verwendet. Die Arbeit beschäftigt sich daher mit der Kombination gegebener Polygonnetze und verschiedenen Anwendungen, die bei dieser Art der graphischen Modellbeschreibung auf der Hand liegen. Die Transformation eines gegebenen Objektes in ein anderes wird in der graphischen Datenverarbeitung Morphing genannt. Das Ergebnis dieser Transformation kann in der hier verwendeten Terminologie als ein ein-dimensionaler Raum verstanden werden. Durch weitere Transformationen mit zusätzlichen Basisformen ergeben sich höher-dimensionale Räume. Zum gegenwärtigen Zeitpunkt sind Morphing-Verfahren für polygonale Netze wegen topologischen und geometrischen Problemen noch verbesserungsbedürftig, weshalb sich der erste Teil dieser Arbeit mit solchen Verfahren befasst. Diese Morphing-Verfahren werden dann so erweitert, dass sie die Kombination von mehr als zwei Netzen erlauben. Die Nützlichkeit dieser Beschreibung von Gestalt wird an Hand von zwei Szenarien demonstriert: Zur Visualisierung von Multiparameter-Informationsdaten, wobei die Parameter auf Glyphen abgebildet werden und zur effizienten Speicherung und Übermittelung von geometrischen Animationen.

Deutsch
Freie Schlagworte: Object representation, Animation, Morphing, Information visualization, Principal component analysis
Zusätzliche Informationen:

145 p.

Sachgruppe der Dewey Dezimalklassifikatin (DDC): 000 Allgemeines, Informatik, Informationswissenschaft > 004 Informatik
Fachbereich(e)/-gebiet(e): 20 Fachbereich Informatik
20 Fachbereich Informatik > Graphisch-Interaktive Systeme
Hinterlegungsdatum: 17 Okt 2008 09:21
Letzte Änderung: 21 Nov 2023 07:40
PPN:
Referenten: Gross, Prof. Dr. Markus
Datum der mündlichen Prüfung / Verteidigung / mdl. Prüfung: 19 April 2002
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