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Visualization of level-of-detail meshes on the GPU

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Abstract

Extensive research has been carried out in multiresolution models for many decades. The tendency in recent years has been to harness the potential of GPUs to perform the level-of-detail extraction on graphics hardware. The aim of this work is to present a new level-of-detail scheme based on triangles which is both simple and efficient. In this approach, the extraction process updates vertices instead of indices, thus providing a perfect framework for adapting the algorithms to work completely on GPU shaders. One of the key aspects of our proposal is the need for just a single rendering pass in order to obtain the desired geometry. Moreover, coherence among the different approximations is maximized by means of a symmetric extraction algorithm, which performs the same process when refining and coarsening the mesh. Lastly, we also introduce different uses of the scheme to offer continuous and view-dependent resolution.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Inst. Universitari d’Automàtica i Informática Industrial, Universitat Politècnica de València, Camino de Vera s/n, València, Spain

    Oscar Ripolles

  2. Institute of New Imaging Technologies, Universitat Jaume I, Av. Vicent Sos Baynat s/n, Castellon, Spain

    Miguel Chover & Francisco Ramos

Authors
  1. Oscar Ripolles
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  2. Miguel Chover
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  3. Francisco Ramos
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Correspondence to Oscar Ripolles.

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Ripolles, O., Chover, M. & Ramos, F. Visualization of level-of-detail meshes on the GPU. Vis Comput 27, 793–809 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00371-011-0554-2

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