Illustration and photography inspired visualization of flows and volumes

Understanding and analyzing complex volumetrically varying data is a difficult problem. Many computational visualization techniques have had only limited success in succinctly portraying the structure of three-dimensional turbulent flow. Motivated by both the extensive history and success of illustration and photographic flow visualization techniques, we have developed a new interactive volume rendering and visualization system for flows and volumes that simulates and enhances traditional illustration, experimental advection, and photographic flow visualization techniques. Our system uses a combination of varying focal and contextual illustrative styles, new advanced two-dimensional transfer functions, enhanced Schlieren and shadowgraphy shaders, and novel oriented structure enhancement techniques to allow interactive visualization, exploration, and comparative analysis of scalar, vector, and time-varying volume datasets. Both traditional illustration techniques and photographic flow visualization techniques effectively reduce visual clutter by using compact oriented structure information to convey three-dimensional structures. Therefore, a key to the effectiveness of our system is using one-dimensional (Schlieren and shadowgraphy) and two-dimensional (silhouette) oriented structural information to reduce visual clutter, while still providing enough three-dimensional structural information for the user´s visual system to understand complex three-dimensional flow data. By combining these oriented feature visualization techniques with flexible transfer function controls, we can visualize scalar and vector data, allow comparative visualization of flow properties in a succinct, informative manner, and provide continuity for visualizing time-varying datasets.