Rendering using spline normals

Sascha Spiegl

Semester Master Project

Microengineering section, EPFL

January 2012

Abstract

There are many ways to build an isosurface from a volumetric dataset. In this project, a new approach for the surface rendering has been successfully implemented and tested on a pure voxel geometry construction of the object. The innovative part of the project is the data-driven specification of normals at the voxel corners. To do so, a spline-based continuously defined model is be fitted to the data, and the normals are then determined in accordance with the model. As these normals are used by the renderer to finesse the relationship between shading and illumination, a good rendering experience has been achieved. Finally this new approach has been compared to the famous algorithm "Marching Cubes".
The following can be concluded about the new rendering approach:

Well adapted for small structures and objects
Drawbacks towards silhouette of the represented object