Abstract
In exploratory scientific visualization, isosurfaces are typically created with an explicit polygonal representation for the surface using a technique such as Marching Cubes. For even moderate data sets, Marching Cubes can generate an extraordinary number of polygons, which take time to construct and to render. To address the rendering bottleneck, we have developed a multipipe strategy for parallel rendering using a combination of CPUs and parallel graphics adaptors. The multipipe system uses multiple graphics adapters in parallel, the so called SGI Onyx2 Reality Monster. In this paper, we discuss the issues of using the multiple pipes in a Sort-Last fashion which out performs a single graphics adaptor for a surprisingly low number of polygons.
Contact Person for this paper
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Kurt Akeley. RealityEngine graphics. Computer Graphics, 27:109–116, August 1993. ACM Siggraph ‘83 Conference Proceedings.
Kurt Akeley and Tom Jermoluk. High-performance polygon rendering. Computer Graphics, 22(4):239–246, August 1988. ACM Siggraph ‘88 Conference Proceedings.
David A. Ellsworth. A new algorithm for interactive graphics on multicomputers. IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications, 14(4), July 1994.
Kwan-Lui Ma et al. Parallel volume renderer using binary-swap image composition. IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications, 14(4), July 1994.
Steve Molnar et al. A sorting classification of parallel rendering. IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications, 14(4), July 1994.
C. Hansen and P. Hinker. Massively parallel isosurface extraction. In Proceedings of Visualization ‘82, pages 77–83, October 1992.
C. Hansen, M. Krogh, and W. White. Massively parallel visualization: Parallel rendering. In Proceedings of SIAM Parallel Computation Conference, February 1995.
William E. Lorensen and Harvey E. Cline. Marching cubes: A high resolution 3d surface. construction algorithm. Computer Graphics, 21(4):163–169, July 1987. ACM Siggraph ‘87 Conference Proceedings.
Steven Molnar, John Eyles, and John Poulton. Pixelflow: High-speed rendering using image composition. Computer Graphics, 26(2):231–240, July 1992. ACM Siggraph ‘82 Conference Proceedings.
John Montrym, Daniel Baum, David Dignam, and Christopher Migdal Infinitereality: A real-time graphics system. Computer Graphics, 26:293–302, August 1997. ACM Siggraph ‘87 Conference Proceedings.
F. Ortega, C. Hansen, and J. Ahrens. Fast data parallel polygon rendering. In Proceedings of Supercomputing ‘83, pages 709–718, November 1993.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1999 Springer-Verlag/Wien
About this paper
Cite this paper
Udeshi, T., Hansen, C.D. (1999). Parallel Multipipe Rendering for Very Large Isosurface Visualization. In: Gröller, E., Löffelmann, H., Ribarsky, W. (eds) Data Visualization ’99. Eurographics. Springer, Vienna. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-7091-6803-5_10
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-7091-6803-5_10
Publisher Name: Springer, Vienna
Print ISBN: 978-3-211-83344-5
Online ISBN: 978-3-7091-6803-5
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive