abstract: Tessellation and Screen-Space Ambient Occlusion are algorithms which have been widely-used in real-time rendering in the past decade. They aim to enhance the details of the mesh, cast better shadow effects and improve the quality of the rendered images in real time. WebGL is a web-based graphics library derived from OpenGL ES used for rendering in web applications. It is relatively new and has been rapidly evolving, this has resulted in it supporting a subset of rendering features normally supported by desktop applications. In this thesis, the research is focusing on evaluating Curved PN-Triangles tessellation with Screen Space Ambient Occlusion (SSAO), Horizon-Based Ambient Occlusion (HBAO) and Horizon-Based Ambient Occlusion Plus (HBAO+) in WebGL-based real-time application and comparing its performance to desktop based application and to discuss the capabilities, limitations and bottlenecks of WebGL 1.0. / Dissertation/Thesis / WebGL Program / OpenGL Program / Masters Thesis Computer Science 2017

<p>Ultrasound (US) volume data is noisy, so traditional methods for direct volume rendering (DVR) are less appropriate. Improved methods or new techniques are required. There are furthermore a high performance requirement and limited pre-processing to be considered in order for it to be used interactively, since the volume data might be time-varying.</p><p>There exist numerous techniques for improving visual perception of volume rendering, and while some perform well and produce a visually enhanced result, many are designed and compared for use with medical data that has a high signal-to-noise ratio. This master thesis describe and compare recent methods for DVR illumination, in the form of ambient occlusion or direct/indirect lighting from an external light source. New designs and modifications are introduced for efficiently and effectively enhancing the visual quality of DVR with US data. Furthermore, this thesis addresses the issue of how clipping is performed during rendering and for the different illumination techniques, which is commonly used in ultrasound visualization.</p><p>This diploma work was conducted at Siemens Corporate Research in Princeton, NJ where the partially open source framework XIP is developed. The framework was extended further to include modern methods for DVR illumination that are described in detail within this thesis. Finally, presented results show that several methods can be used to visually enhance the visualization within highly interactive frame-rates.</p>

Ultrasound (US) volume data is noisy, so traditional methods for direct volume rendering (DVR) are less appropriate. Improved methods or new techniques are required. There are furthermore a high performance requirement and limited pre-processing to be considered in order for it to be used interactively, since the volume data might be time-varying. There exist numerous techniques for improving visual perception of volume rendering, and while some perform well and produce a visually enhanced result, many are designed and compared for use with medical data that has a high signal-to-noise ratio. This master thesis describe and compare recent methods for DVR illumination, in the form of ambient occlusion or direct/indirect lighting from an external light source. New designs and modifications are introduced for efficiently and effectively enhancing the visual quality of DVR with US data. Furthermore, this thesis addresses the issue of how clipping is performed during rendering and for the different illumination techniques, which is commonly used in ultrasound visualization. This diploma work was conducted at Siemens Corporate Research in Princeton, NJ where the partially open source framework XIP is developed. The framework was extended further to include modern methods for DVR illumination that are described in detail within this thesis. Finally, presented results show that several methods can be used to visually enhance the visualization within highly interactive frame-rates.

<p>Ambient Occlusion är en teknik för ambient ljussättning i digitala tredimensionella scener. Sådana scener ljussätts vanligtvis med en konstant mängd ambient ljus på samtliga ytor oberoende av ytornas vinkel och position gentemot olika ljuskällor i scenen. Detta ger ett platt och kalt intryck och utan vidare ljussättningstekniker är det ytterst svårt att urskönja detaljer i scenen. Ambient Occlusion åthjälper detta genom att reducera mängden ambient ljus i vissa delar av scenen. Ambient ljus är en enkel approximation av det reflekterade diffusa ljuset som antas nå nästan överallt i scenen. Genom att sänka det ambienta ljuset på punkter i scenen med tät eller täckande geometri så ger Ambient Occlusion ett intryck av att det sekundära diffusa ljuset ej når dessa platser. Pappret undersöker en äldre variant av Ambient Occlusion där mängden ambient ljus beräknas statiskt för en scen och sparas i texturer. Vidare undersöks nyare metoder där mängden ambient ljus beräknas dynamiskt på den renderade scenen i Pixel Shaders. Det senare tillvägagångssättet kallas Image Based Ambient Occlusion eller Screen Space Ambient Occlusion. Detta nya tillvägagångssätt jämförs mot den traditionella angreppsvinkeln med förberäknade texturer. Teknikerna utvärderas och jämförs mot varandra i avseende på tids- och minneskomplexitet, enkelhet och visuellt resultat utöver specifika egenskaper för de enskilda teknikerna. Arbetets resultat beskrivs i slutet av rapporten. I resultatet presenteras hur shaderteknikerna pga sina brister inte är applicerbara i alla scener.</p>

Ambient Occlusion är en teknik för ambient ljussättning i digitala tredimensionella scener. Sådana scener ljussätts vanligtvis med en konstant mängd ambient ljus på samtliga ytor oberoende av ytornas vinkel och position gentemot olika ljuskällor i scenen. Detta ger ett platt och kalt intryck och utan vidare ljussättningstekniker är det ytterst svårt att urskönja detaljer i scenen. Ambient Occlusion åthjälper detta genom att reducera mängden ambient ljus i vissa delar av scenen. Ambient ljus är en enkel approximation av det reflekterade diffusa ljuset som antas nå nästan överallt i scenen. Genom att sänka det ambienta ljuset på punkter i scenen med tät eller täckande geometri så ger Ambient Occlusion ett intryck av att det sekundära diffusa ljuset ej når dessa platser. Pappret undersöker en äldre variant av Ambient Occlusion där mängden ambient ljus beräknas statiskt för en scen och sparas i texturer. Vidare undersöks nyare metoder där mängden ambient ljus beräknas dynamiskt på den renderade scenen i Pixel Shaders. Det senare tillvägagångssättet kallas Image Based Ambient Occlusion eller Screen Space Ambient Occlusion. Detta nya tillvägagångssätt jämförs mot den traditionella angreppsvinkeln med förberäknade texturer. Teknikerna utvärderas och jämförs mot varandra i avseende på tids- och minneskomplexitet, enkelhet och visuellt resultat utöver specifika egenskaper för de enskilda teknikerna. Arbetets resultat beskrivs i slutet av rapporten. I resultatet presenteras hur shaderteknikerna pga sina brister inte är applicerbara i alla scener.

In computer graphics, lighting is an important area. To simulate shadows from area light sources, indirect lighting and shadows from indirect light, a class of algorithms commonly known as global illumination algorithms can be used. Ambient occlusion is an approximation to global illumination that can emulate shadows from area light sources and shadows from indirect light, giving very soft shadows. For real-time applications, ambient occlusion can be precomputed and stored in maps or per vertex. However, that can only be done with good results if the geometry is static. Therefore, a number of methods that can handle more or less dynamic scenes have been introduced in the recent years. In this thesis, a collection of ambient occlusion methods for dynamic objects and procedural environments will be described. The main contribution is the introduction of a novel method that handles ambient occlusion for procedural environments. Another contribution is a description of an implementation of Screen Space Ambient Occlusion (SSAO). SSAO is an algorithm that calculates approximate ambient occlusion in real-time by using the depths of surrounding pixels. It handles completely dynamic scenes with good performance. The method for procedural environments handles the scenario where a number of building blocks are procedurally assembled at run-time. The idea is to precompute an ambient occlusion map for each building block where the self-occlusion is stored. In addition, an ambient occlusion grid is precomputed for each block to accommodate the inter-block occlusion. At run-time, after the building blocks have been assembled, the ambient occlusion from the grids is blended with the ambient occlusion from the maps to generate new maps, valid for the procedural environment. Following that, the environment can be rendered with high quality ambient occlusion at almost no cost, in the same fashion as for a static environment where the ambient occlusion maps can be completely precomputed.

[pt] Oclusão ambiente é uma técnica barata de simular a iluminação ambiente indireta de forma realista. Nesta dissertação, propõe-se elaborar um método de oclusão ambiente produzindo resultados de boa qualidade em tempo real. Através da utilização de um eficiente método de voxelização, cria-se uma descrição volumétrica da geometria em uma grade regular. Durante a renderização da cena, o hemisfério em torno de cada ponto visível é amostrado por diversos cones, cada um equivalendo ao lançamento de múltiplos raios. O volume de cada cone é amostrado por uma série de esferas e estas são utilizadas para determinar o volume do cone obstruído pela geometria da cena. Ao acumular os resultados de cada esfera em cada cone, e de cada cone no hemisfério, a oclusão ambiente causada pela geometria em cada ponto visível pelo observador é estimada. Esta estratégia mostra-se adequada, pois a interseção de cada esfera com a cena voxelizada pode ser feita de forma muito eficiente. / [en] Ambient occlusion is a low-cost technique to simulate indirect ambient illumination in a realistic way. In this dissertation, we propose an ambient occlusion method that achieves good quality results in real time. Using an efficient voxelization algorithm, we create a volumetric description of the geometry in a regular grid. During the scene rendering, the hemisphere around each visible point is sampled by several cones, each one corresponding to the trace of multiple rays. The volume of each cone is sampled by a serie of spheres, which are used to compute the cone s volume obstructed by the scene geometry. The occlusion caused by the geometry at each visible point is estimated by accumulating each sphere result in the cones and each cone result in the hemisphere. We found this approach to be adequate, since the intersection of each sphere with the voxelized scene can be performed in a very efficient manner.

[pt] A interpretação tridimensional de conjuntos densos de linhas exige o uso de modelos de iluminação mais elaborados. A oclusão ambiente é uma técnica utilizada para simular, de forma realista e barata, a iluminação ambiente indireta. Este trabalho apresenta um novo algoritmo para renderização de linhas com oclusão de ambiente. O algoritmo proposto é baseado na voxelização da cena e no cálculo do volume ocupado do hemisfério associado a cada ponto do linha. Propõe-se uma adaptação no algoritmo de voxelização de cenas 3D formada por sólidos para o tratamento correto da cena formada por linhas. Assim, uma descrição volumétrica da geometria é criada em um buffer de textura. O hemisfério em torno de cada ponto visível é amostrado por diversos pontos, e para cada amostra se acessa um prisma, cujo volume ocupado é calculados a partir da voxelização. Ao acumular os resultados de cada amostra, estima-se a oclusão de ambiente causada pela geometria em cada ponto visível pelo observador. Esta estratégia mostra-se adequada, pois tem como resultado imagens com alta qualidade em tempo real para cenas com grande complexidade. / [en] The three-dimensional understanding of dense line sets requires the use of more sophisticated lighting models. Ambient occlusion is a technique used to simulate realistically and efficiently, the indirect ambient lighting. This paper presents a new algorithm for rendering lines with ambient occlusion. The proposed algorithm is based on the voxelization of the scene and on the computation of occlusionin the hemisphere associated to each visible point. It is proposed an adaptation of the voxelization algorithm of 3D scenes made up of solids to the correct treatment of the scene formed by lines. Thus, a volumetric geometry description is created in a texture buffer. The hemisphere around every visible point is sampled by several points, and for each sample is generated a prism, which occluded volume is calculated from the voxelization. By accumulating the results of each sample, the estimated ambient occlusion caused by the geometry at each point visible to the observer is computed. This strategy proved to be appropriate, resulting in high-quality images in real time for complex scenes.

The goal of this thesis was to create graphical demo in OpenGL, which would appropriately react on music, which is inseparable part of graphical demos. Work consists of two main parts, first is programming of real-time graphical engine, second is creating graphical demo which would run on graphical engine created in first part. First part focues on programming of OpenGL based application, which would render scene in real-time using techniques from computer graphics. Second part focuses mainly on graphical activity, which includes 3D modelling, texturing, creating animation and connection to music (reaction of environment and animations to changes in music)

Shader programming is important for realistic material and global illumination real-time rendering, especially in 3D industrial fields nowadays, more and more customers of Visual Components Oy, a Finnish 3D software company have been found to be no longer only content with the correct simulation result, but also the result of realistic real-time rendering. This thesis project will provide a deep research on real world material classification, property definition and global illumination techniques in industrial fields. On the other hand, the Shader program for different materials and global illumination techniques are also created according to the classification and definition in this thesis work. Moreover, an external rendering tool Redway3D is evaluated as the reference and regarded as the considerable solution in the future development work.