Augmenting computer graphics with haptics for the visualization of vessel networks

Current visualization methods of volume angiograms are limited in their ability to display vessel connectivity and depth information readily available in the data set. In this paper, we introduce a hybrid graphic-haptic display technique that allows visualizing vessel connectivity as well as provides user assistance in tracing vessel branches. Most importantly, our display provides three-dimensional shape cues in both visual and haptic domains that eliminate the need for a rotational display for 3D perception. Issues related to haptic rendering, implementation, and experimental validation of the developed system are reported. This proposed multimodal visualization approach is independent of the devices used and can be applied to current visualization platforms for angiograms due to the small computational load it requires.