CubeCover- Parameterization of 3D Volumes

• Published in: Computer graphics forum Vol. 30; no. 5; pp. 1397 - 1406
• Main Authors: Nieser, M., Reitebuch, U., Polthier, K.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Oxford, UK Blackwell Publishing Ltd 01.08.2011
• Subjects: 3-D graphics; Algorithms; Alignment; and object representations-Computational Geometry and Object Modeling; Boundaries; Computer graphics; Cubes; Frames; I.3.5 [Computer Graphics]: Curve; I.3.5 [Computer Graphics]: Curve, surface, solid, and object representations—Computational Geometry and Object Modeling; Parametrization; solid; Studies; surface; Three dimensional; Two dimensional
• ISSN: 0167-7055; 1467-8659
• DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8659.2011.02014.x

Despite the success of quad‐based 2D surface parameterization methods, effective parameterization algorithms for 3D volumes with cubes, i.e. hexahedral elements, are still missing. CubeCover is a first approach for generating a hexahedral tessellation of a given volume with boundary aligned cubes which are guided by a frame field. The input of CubeCover is a tetrahedral volume mesh. First, a frame field is designed with manual input from the designer. It guides the interior and boundary layout of the parameterization. Then, the parameterization and the hexahedral mesh are computed so as to align with the given frame field. CubeCover has similarities to the QuadCover algorithm and extends it from 2D surfaces to 3D volumes. The paper also provides theoretical results for 3D hexahedral parameterizations and analyses topological properties of the appropriate function space.