This paper is a survey of volume visualization. It includes an introduction to volumetric data; surface rendering techniques for volume data; volume rendering techniques, including image-order, objectorder, and domain techniques; optimization methods for volume rendering; special-purpose volume rendering hardware; global illumination of volumetric data, including volumetric ray tracing and volu...

Taxonomy and Algorithms for Volume Rendering on Multicomputers

ÐIn this paper, we present a two-level approach for volume rendering, i.e., two-level volume rendering, which allows for selectively using different rendering techniques for different subsets of a 3D data set. Different structures within the data set are rendered locally on an object-by-object basis by either DVR, MIP, surface rendering, value integration (x-ray-like images), or nonphotorealist...

In this chapter, we discuss methods for hardware-accelerated rendering of rectilinear volume datasets: ray casting, texture slicing, shear-warp and shear-image rendering, and splatting. We give sufficient background to enable a novice to understand the details and tradeoffs of each algorithm. As much as possible, we refer to the literature for more information.

Volume Rendering methods employing the GPU capabilities offer high performance on off-the-shelf hardware. In this article, we discuss the various bottlenecks found in the graphics hardware when performing GPU-based Volume Rendering. The specific properties of each bottleneck and the trade-offs between them are described. Further we present a novel strategy to balance the load on the identified ...

Accurately and automatically conveying the structure of a volume model is a problem not fully solved by existing volume rendering approaches. Physics-based volume rendering approaches create images that may match the appearance of translucent materials in nature, but may not embody important structural details. Transfer function approaches allow flexible design of the volume appearance, but gen...

Volume visualization is a method of extracting meaningful information from volumetric data using interactive graphics and imaging. It is concerned with volume data representation, modeling, manipulation, and rendering [31][100][101][176]. Volume data are 3D (possibly time-varying) entities that may have information inside them, might not consist of tangible surfaces and edges, or might be too v...

Volume rendering at interactive frame rates remains a challenge, especially with today’s increasingly large datasets. We propose a framework, using concepts from Image-Based Rendering (IBR), that decreases the required framerate for the volume renderer significantly. All the volume renderer needs to supply is a set of renderings at ‘key’ view points, and the IBR renderer will interpolate the in...