Abstract
This paper presents a visualization method called the deformed cube for visualizing 3D velocity vector field. Based on the decomposition of the tensor which describes the changes of the velocity, it provides a technique for visualizing local flow. A deformed cube, a cube transformed by a tensor in a local coordinate frame, shows the local stretch, shear and rigid body rotation of the local flow corresponding to the decomposed component of the tensor. Users can interactively view the local deformation or any component of the changes. The animation of the deformed cube moving along a streamline achieves a more global impression of the flow field. This method is intended as a complement to global visualization methods.
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This work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China and the State Key Lab of Scientific and Engineering Computing.
Liang Xundong is a Ph.D candidate at Institute of Computing Technology (ICT), Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). His research interests focus on computer graphics and scientific visualization. He received his B.S. and M.S. in Computer Engineering from Shandong Polytechnique University in 1982 and 1989, respectively.
Li Bin is a Ph.D candidate at ICT, CAS. His research interests focus on computer graphics and scientific visualization. He received his B.S. and M.S. in Computer Science from Nanjing University in 1988 and 1991, respectively.
Liu Shenquan is a Professor in ICT, CAS. His research interests focus on computer graphics, CAD, scientific visualization and computer animation. He received his Ph.D. degree on physics-mathematical science in Moscow in 1962.
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Liang, X., Li, B. & Liu, S. Three-dimensional vector field visualization based on tensor decomposition. J. of Comput. Sci. & Technol. 11, 452–460 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02947212
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02947212