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Visualizing 3D atmospheric data with spherical volume texture on virtual globes.
- Source :
-
Computers & Geosciences . Jul2014, Vol. 68, p81-91. 11p. - Publication Year :
- 2014
-
Abstract
- Abstract: Volumetric ray-casting is a widely used algorithm in volume visualization, but implementing this algorithm to render atmospheric volume data that cover a large area on virtual globes constitutes a challenging problem. Because atmospheric data are usually georeferenced to a spherical coordinate system described by longitude, latitude and altitude, adaptations to the conventional volumetric ray-casting method are needed to accommodate spherical volume texture sampling. In this paper, we present a volumetric ray-casting framework to visualize atmospheric data that cover a broad but thin geographic area (because of the thinness of Earth׳s atmosphere). Volume texture conforming to the spherical coordinate system of a virtual globe can be created directly from the spherical volume data to avoid oversampling, undersampling or a loss of accuracy due to reprojecting and resampling such data into a Cartesian coordinate system. Considering the insignificant physical thickness of the atmosphere of the Earth, the ray-casting method presented in this paper also allows for real-time vertical scaling (exaggeration of the altitudinal range) without the need to re-process the volume texture, enabling convenient visual observation of the altitudinal variations. The spherical volume ray-casting method is implemented in a deferred rendering framework to integrate the volume effects into a virtual globe composed of a variety of background geospatial data objects, such as terrain, imagery, vector shapes and 3D geometric models. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 00983004
- Volume :
- 68
- Database :
- Academic Search Index
- Journal :
- Computers & Geosciences
- Publication Type :
- Academic Journal
- Accession number :
- 96026861
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cageo.2014.03.015