CSRI Seminar: Alyn Rockwood

Title	Direct Rendering of Non-Linear Objects
Speaker	Alyn Rockwoord Dept. of Mathematical and Computer Sciences Colorado School of Mines alynrock@mines.edu
Date	June 11, 2004
Time	10-11am (PT) 11-12am (MT)
Location	921/137 (CA) 980/95 (NM)
Abstract	The classic computer graphics pipeline is fast and sophisticated, relying on piece-wise linear representations (polygonal facets) to attain efficiency. Unfortunately, the conversion of scientific data to polygon models often loses information through linearization and assumptions about topology. Particularly vulnerable to such loss are high frequency components that are often of primary interest. Described is a point based, volume rendering method that makes no assumption about topology. Points are generated directly from the surface or volume in a fast forward scheme. These produce statistically accurate visualizations and can be used to focus on individual features such as iso-surfaces, and singular regions. Examples will be shown for high order finite elements and biomedical applications.
About the Speaker	Alyn Rockwood received a Ph.D. from the Dept. of Applied Math and Theoretical Physics at Cambridge University. He has had faculty positions at a German "Gymnasium," teaching math and physics, at BYU teaching math, and nine years at Arizona State University in computer science. He has additionally spent over 15 years in industrial research at Evans and Sutherland, Shape Data Ltd., SGI, a start-up company and Mitsubishi Electric Research Labs. Currently he is a professor and assistant head at Colorado School of Mines, Department of Math and Computer Science. Altogether he has spent over 25 years as a researcher in mathematics, computer graphics, CAD/CAM and simulation. He was recently the SIGGRAPH99 papers' chair and the SIGGRAPH conference chair for 2003.
Host	Gary Templet, gjtempl@ca.sandia.gov, 925-294-4540

This seminar series is hosted by the Computational Sciences and Mathematics Research Department at Sandia National Labs in Livermore, CA. This seminar is funded by the Computer Science Research Institute (CSRI). To schedule a time to meet with the speaker before or after the talk, please make arrangements with the host listed above.

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