A feature-based method for urban landscape visualization

Urban environments present big challenges to visualization systems, because of the widely varying visibility conditions, large amounts of data and requirements of Immersion, Interaction and Imagination. This paper introduces a feature-based method for urban landscape visualization. The central concept is that of pre-classification of features, into irregular features, regular features and terrain. CAD software is used for modeling irregular features, and constructive solid geometry for modeling the regular features. The DEM and images are applied in terrain modeling. This method has been successfully applied for building a visualization system of Campus of East China Normal University, China. It is proved simple, fast and realistic, which has a broad range of applications.