Broad Area Colloquium For AI-Geometry-Graphics-Robotics-Vision
(CS 528)

Modeling with Point Samples

Markus Gross
Computer Graphics Laboratory
ETH Zurich

December 4, 2006, 4:15PM
TCSeq 200
http://graphics.stanford.edu/ba-colloquium/

Abstract

In recent years, point primitives have received a growing attention in graphics and modeling. There are two main reasons for this new interest in points: On one hand, we have witnessed a dramatic increase in the polygonal complexity of computer graphics models. The overhead of managing, processing, and manipulating very large polygonal meshes has led researchers to question the future utility of polygons as a fundamental modeling primitive. On the other hand, modern 3D digital photography and 3D scanning systems facilitate the ready acquisition of complex, real-world objects. These techniques generate huge volumes of point samples and create the need for advanced digital processing of points. In this talk I will discuss the usefulness of sample-based representations for geometric and physically-based modeling. The first part of the talk is devoted to the general utility of points for geometric and graphics modeling. I will present an overview of the main research results in this area. Concepts for the representation of point sampled shapes will be addressed, as well as methods for the interactive modeling of point clouds. In addition, I will focus on data filtering algorithms as well as on digital geometry processing and compression of point data. In the second part of the talk I will address the more general issue of utilizing physically-based simulation in the interactive modeling process in order to create more intuitive modeling metaphors. I will use sample-based and meshless representations as an example and demonstrate their potential to simulate a wide range of real-world materials at interactive rates. The presented methods include real-time volumetric deformations as well as thin shells and approaches based on geometric shape matching. The talk will end with a critical discussion of the pros and cons of point sampled representations and the interplay of physical simulation and geometry processing.

About the Speaker

Dr. Gross is a professor of computer science, chair of the institute of computational science, and director of the Computer Graphics Laboratory of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zürich. He received a Master of Science in electrical and computer engineering and a PhD in computer graphics and image analysis, both from the University of Saarbrucken, Germany. From 1990 to 1994, Gross worked for the Computer Graphics Center in Darmstadt, where he established and directed the Visual Computing Group. His research interests include point-based graphics, physically-based modeling, multiresolution analysis, and virtual reality. He has published more than 130 scientific papers on computer graphics and scientific visualization, and he authored the book "Visual Computing", Springer, 1994. He holds various patents on core graphics and visualization technologies. Gross has taught courses at major graphics conferences including ACM SIGGRAPH, IEEE Visualization, and Eurographics. He serves as a member of international program committees of many graphics conferences and on the editorial board of various scientific journals. Gross was a papers co-chair of the IEEE Visualization '99, the Eurographics 2000, and the IEEE Visualization 2002 conferences. He was chair of the papers committee of ACM SIGGRAPH 2005. Dr. Gross is a senior member of IEEE, a member of the IEEE Computer Society, a member of ACM and ACM Siggraph, and a fellow of the Eurographics Association. From 2002-2006 he was a member of the ETH research commission. Dr. Gross serves in board positions of a number of international research institutes, societies and government organizations. He is chair of the software technical advisory committee of Ageia Corporation. Gross co-founded Cyfex, Novodex, and LiberoVision.

Contact: bac-coordinators@cs.stanford.edu

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