TITLE:

NEW VISUALIZATION TRICKS FROM THE BAG (No. 21)

DATE:

Friday, November 7th, 2003

TIME:

3:30 PM

LOCATION:

GMCS 214

SPEAKER:

Mike Bailey, Director of Visualization, San Diego Supercomputer Center

ABSTRACT:

One of the great pleasures about working in the field of scientific and engineering visualization is that there are no rules. Anything that turns data into information-rich understanding is fair game.Thus, visualization has become a big bag of tricks. As such, much of the effectiveness of visualization comes in matching the right trick to the right dataset.

This talk will discuss three tricks from the bag, and the types of data that they allow us to better understand:

1. Desktop interactive volume rendering

SDSC’s Volume Explorer program (vx) allows interactive direct volume manipulation on the desktop. It can do this with datasets as large as 1 billion voxels. This has allowed us to visualize many 3D datasets that we would otherwise not have touched. This includes new medical and fluids data, as well as a few non-traditional volumes such as mechanical systems extruded in time, geophysics, and a Confederate submarine. A stereographics version of this program has even been placed in UCSD’s on-campus charter school.

2. Color 3D models

SDSC’s 3D Visualization Hardcopy project has been going very well. There seems to be no end to the useful 3D models that can be created that act as visualization aids, especially when the models are in color. This portion of the talk will discuss some of the most recent 3D Hardcopy projects which include human body parts for doctors to experiment on, 3D ultrasounds, planets, and even a 3D model of the smoke from last week’s Southern California fires.

3. Visualization using Graphics Hardware Shaders

Graphics Hardware Shaders are one of the most exciting things to happen to computer graphics in years. Hardware Shaders allow you to write your own graphics code and have it executed on the graphics board as part of the display process. This portion of the talk will discuss what this is and what it means to futuristic visualization.

HOST:

Jose Castillo

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