Towards a 3-D Graphics Workstation

A voxel-map based architecture which lays the foundations for a 3-D graphics workstation, called the CUBE Workstation, is presented. The architecture is centered around a large cubic frame-buffer of voxels, operated on by three processors: a 9-D Geometry Processor which scan-converts geometric objects into their voxel representation, a 9-D Frame-Buffer Processor which manipulates the voxel-based images and controls interaction, and a 9-D Viewing Processor which projects the images on a 2-D monitor. Two other supporting processors, the 2-D Frame-Buffer Processor which manipulates the 2-D images and the Color Transform Processor which handles color transformations, are also introduced.