We present an algorithm for fast computation of discretized 3D distance fields using graphics hardware. Given a set of primitives and a distance metric, our algorithm computes the distance field for each slice of a uniform spatial grid by rasterizing the distance functions of the primitives. We compute bounds on the spatial extent of the Voronoi region of each primitive and use them cull away many distance functions for each slice. Moreover, we exploit spatial coherence between adjacent slices and perform incremental computations to speed up the computation. The combination of culling and clamping techniques results in rendering relatively few distance functions for each slice and reduces the load on the graphics pipeline. Our algorithm is applicable to all geometric models and does not make any assumptions about connectivity or a manifold representation. We have used our algorithm to compute distance fields of large models composed of tens of thousands of primitives on high resolution grids. Moreover, we demonstrate its application to medial axis evaluation and proximity computations. As compared to earlier approaches, we are able to achieve an order of magnitude improvement in the running time.
Presentation Presented at ACM
SIGGRAPH 2003 Course #11 Interactive Geometric and Scientific
Computations Using Graphics Hardware
Videos/ Contains Videos demonstrating fast
distance field computation and application to Simplified Medial Axis Computation on GPU.
Efficient Computation of a Simplified Medial Axis