Solving Computer Graphics Problems through Boolean Combinations of Polygons

Abstract

Several important computer graphics problems can be solved by formulating the problem as a boolean combination of sets of coplanar polygons. We describe an implementation of an efficient plane sweep algorithm, which solves these problems by triangulating the polygonal regions defined by boolean combinations of sets of polygons. Example applications include, but are not limited to, triangulating a concave polygon with holes, computing complex clipping operations, detecting modelling errors, transforming a tiling into a planar subdivision and even the hidden surface problem. We present new techniques to handle the difficulties encountered with real world input, which are typically omitted in presentations of geometric algorithms in the computational geometry literature. Finally, we describe how the above applications may be cast as boolean combinations and solved with our algorithm. (kr)

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Aug 01, 1989
Accession Number
ADA214788

Entities

People

  • John M. Airey

Organizations

  • University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Air Platforms

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Algorithms
  • Boundaries
  • Computer Graphics
  • Computer Science
  • Computers
  • Decomposition
  • Geometry
  • Graphics
  • Image Processing
  • Lists (Data Structures)
  • Motion Planning
  • Numbers
  • Polygons
  • Square Roots
  • Technology Transfer
  • Triangles
  • Triangulation

Fields of Study

  • Computer science

Readers

  • Computational Modeling and Simulation
  • Graph Algorithms and Convex Optimization.