research-article

Interactive Ray Tracing for Volume Visualization

Authors:

Michael Parker,

Peter-Pike Sloan,

Charles Hansen,

Peter ShirleyAuthors Info & Claims

IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics, Volume 5, Issue 3

Pages 238 - 250

https://doi.org/10.1109/2945.795215

Published: 01 July 1999 Publication History

Abstract

We present a brute-force ray tracing system for interactive volume visualization. The system runs on a conventional (distributed) shared-memory multiprocessor machine. For each pixel we trace a ray through a volume to compute the color for that pixel. Although this method has high intrinsic computational cost, its simplicity and scalability make it ideal for large datasets on current high-end parallel systems. To gain efficiency several optimizations are used including a volume bricking scheme and a shallow data hierarchy. These optimizations are used in three separate visualization algorithms: isosurfacing of rectilinear data, isosurfacing of unstructured data, and maximum-intensity projection on rectilinear data. The system runs interactively (i.e., several frames per second) on an SGI Reality Monster. The graphics capabilities of the Reality Monster are used only for display of the final color image.

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Cited By

Šmajdek ULesar ŽMarolt MBohak C(2024)Combined volume and surface rendering with global illumination cachingThe Visual Computer: International Journal of Computer Graphics10.1007/s00371-023-02932-940:4(2491-2503)Online publication date: 1-Apr-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/s00371-023-02932-9
Frisken SPerry RRockwood AJones T(2023)Adaptively Sampled Distance Fields: A General Representation of Shape forComputer GraphicsSeminal Graphics Papers: Pushing the Boundaries, Volume 210.1145/3596711.3596732(173-178)Online publication date: 1-Aug-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3596711.3596732
Money JSterbentz MMorrical NSzewczyk TWoolley LSanielevici S(2018)GPGPU Enabled Ray Directed Adaptive Volume Visualization for High Density ScansProceedings of the Practice and Experience on Advanced Research Computing: Seamless Creativity10.1145/3219104.3219105(1-7)Online publication date: 22-Jul-2018
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3219104.3219105
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Index Terms

Interactive Ray Tracing for Volume Visualization
1. Computing methodologies
  1. Artificial intelligence
    1. Computer vision
      1. Computer vision problems
        Image segmentation
        Video segmentation
  2. Computer graphics
    1. Image manipulation
    2. Rendering
      1. Ray tracing

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cover image IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics

IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics Volume 5, Issue 3

July 1999

84 pages

ISSN:1077-2626

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Copyright © Copyright © 1999 IEEE. All Rights Reserved.

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IEEE Educational Activities Department

United States

Publication History

Published: 01 July 1999

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Cited By

Šmajdek ULesar ŽMarolt MBohak C(2024)Combined volume and surface rendering with global illumination cachingThe Visual Computer: International Journal of Computer Graphics10.1007/s00371-023-02932-940:4(2491-2503)Online publication date: 1-Apr-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/s00371-023-02932-9
Frisken SPerry RRockwood AJones T(2023)Adaptively Sampled Distance Fields: A General Representation of Shape forComputer GraphicsSeminal Graphics Papers: Pushing the Boundaries, Volume 210.1145/3596711.3596732(173-178)Online publication date: 1-Aug-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3596711.3596732
Money JSterbentz MMorrical NSzewczyk TWoolley LSanielevici S(2018)GPGPU Enabled Ray Directed Adaptive Volume Visualization for High Density ScansProceedings of the Practice and Experience on Advanced Research Computing: Seamless Creativity10.1145/3219104.3219105(1-7)Online publication date: 22-Jul-2018
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3219104.3219105
Vierjahn TSchnorr AWeyers BDenker DWald IGarth CKuhlen THentschel BCucchietti FTelea ABennett J(2017)Interactive exploration of dissipation element geometryProceedings of the 17th Eurographics Symposium on Parallel Graphics and Visualization10.2312/pgv.20171093(53-62)Online publication date: 12-Jun-2017
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.2312/pgv.20171093
Usher WAmstutz JBrownlee CKnoll AWald ICucchietti FTelea ABennett J(2017)Progressive CPU volume rendering with sample accumulationProceedings of the 17th Eurographics Symposium on Parallel Graphics and Visualization10.2312/pgv.20171090(21-30)Online publication date: 12-Jun-2017
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.2312/pgv.20171090
Brownlee CIze THansen CLópez MMarton FMoreland K(2013)Image-parallel ray tracing using OpenGL interceptionProceedings of the 13th Eurographics Symposium on Parallel Graphics and Visualization10.5555/2602119.2602131(65-72)Online publication date: 4-May-2013
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.5555/2602119.2602131
Zhou BXiao KChen DHu X(2013)GPU-optimized volume ray tracing for massive numbers of rays in radiotherapyACM Transactions on Embedded Computing Systems10.1145/2539036.253903813:3(1-17)Online publication date: 24-Dec-2013
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/2539036.2539038
Hughes DLim IJones MKnoll ASpencer B(2013)InK-CompactComputer Graphics Forum10.1111/cgf.1208332:6(178-188)Online publication date: 1-Sep-2013
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1111/cgf.12083
Al-Saidi AWalker DRana O(2012)On-demand transmission model for remote visualization using image-based renderingConcurrency and Computation: Practice & Experience10.1002/cpe.282024:18(2328-2345)Online publication date: 1-Dec-2012
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1002/cpe.2820
Agrawal AKohout JClapworthy GMcfarlane NDong FViceconti MTaddei FTesti D(2010)Enabling the interactive display of large medical volume datasets by multiresolution brickingThe Journal of Supercomputing10.1007/s11227-009-0289-251:1(3-19)Online publication date: 1-Jan-2010
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/s11227-009-0289-2
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