Technology Trends

I’ve recently discovered AutoStitch, an automatic 2D image stitcher, thanks to a reader of Fred Langa’s newsletter (read his review). AutoStitch, developed at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, is truly amazing. This has been years since I’ve been that impressed by a piece of software. It works very simply: you select a collection of pictures and AutoStich analyses their contents and returns you one (or several) panoramic images. You can download AutoStitch for free from this page containing lots of graphics (780 KB) and try it yourself. Once you play with it (no Linux/Mac version yet!), you’ll be hooked. Read more…

Before going further, let’s see a real example. I took several photos of the Louvre Pyramid in Paris last Sunday. Below are these small pictures.

After starting AutoStich, I selected these pictures. And below is what I obtained in less than a minute.

Here is a link to a larger version (1,880 x 557 pixels, 142 KB).

I don’t know what you think, but I’m extremely impressed. However, I would like to add a warning. If you want to generate the largest possible panorama (Go to the Options panel, and choose to scale to 100%), be prepared to wait, until you got plenty of memory!

For more information, the research work has been published in the Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Computer Vision (ICCV2003) under the name “Recognising Panoramas” (PDF format, 8 pages, 820 KB).

If you decide to use AutoStich and are happy with the panoramic photographs it generates for you, please post a comment below with a pointer to your nicest images.

Sources: Various websites

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Traditional Oriental ink painting is more easily done with real brushes than with a computer program because you need to model how the ink is flowing into an absorbent surface such as paper. In this brief article, Technology Research News writes that “researchers from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology have developed a brush-and-ink-style paint program, dubbed MoXi, that uses a model of pigment particles in water flowing into paper.” These virtual Chinese brushes simulate in real time the ink dispersion and could be available on your PC within two years. Read more…

Here is some general information about MoXi provided by Technology Research News.

The software models the gritty details of paper absorbing water and pigment moving through water, including the way pigment concentrates at ink boundaries as water evaporates from drying ink. The technique promises to make computer paint programs with more realistic and could also be used in computer animation packages, according to the researchers.

The simulation is based on mathematics — the lattice Boltzmann equation — that physicists use to model the complex behaviors of fluids. The model simulates more complex effects than previous work, and is also fast enough to deliver ink dispersion simulations in real-time on a reasonably large canvas, according to the researchers.

Below are two images generated with MoXi, the first one being called “Lotus leaves” and the second one “Planet” (Credit: Hong Kong University of Science & Technology)

Here are two links to larger versions of these images, the “Lotus leaves” (1.30 MB) and the “Planet” (1.47 MB).

The researchers behind the MoXi project are Chiew-Lan Tai, Associate Professor at the Department of Computer Science, and Nelson Siu-Hang Chu, her Research Assistant.

For more information about their projects, you can read these two pages about the Virtual Chinese Brush and about MoXi. On this page, you’ll have access to several videos and images. The two pictures above come from this page.

The MoXi project will be presented at SIGGRAPH 2005 under the name “MoXi: Real-Time Ink Dispersion in Absorbent Paper.” Here is a link to the paper submitted by the researchers (PDF format, 1 page, 145 KB). Here are an excerpt from the introduction.

Our paint system, MoXi, allows users to paint in the spontaneous style of Eastern ink painting, on a computer. The simulations of both brush and ink are essential for a successful extension of this traditional art into the digital domain. For real-time performance, we have implemented our ink flow model entirely on the GPU, leaving the CPU for the brush simulation.

According to the researchers, this technique “could be used practically in one or two years.” But is this possible that this technology can be sold under the name MoXi? There already is a Digeo service named Moxi which offers High Definition TV (HDTV). And Digeo claims in its press releases (check this one for example) that Moxi is one of its registered trademarks.

However, it’s not so clear. I visited the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) to know more. And for more information about this trademark, you can either click on the “Status” button in the Trademarks section, and enter the serial number 76279215 on the next screen, or go directly here. Here is the status of this trademark application as of April 25, 2005.

A non-final action has been mailed. This is a letter from the examining attorney requesting additional information and/or making an initial refusal. However, no final determination as to the registrability of the mark has been made.

If I correctly understand English, this means that Moxi IS NOT a registered trademark. But at the same time, Digeo writes it is registered. Who is right?

If one of the readers of this note is familiar with the USPTO procedures, please post an explanation below. Thanks.

Sources: Technology Research News, June 29/July 6, 2005; and various web sites

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A European Union program has helped several European partners to develop the Virtual Planet (or V-Planet) software, which will enable its users to browse and interact in three dimensions with any part of our planet, according to IST Results. “Using Vplanet Explorer, anyone can set off on a journey to discover new regions in 3D, rather than staring at a flat map and trying to picture its scenery,” says Eric Martin, coordinator of the IST project. The software can also be used for technical simulations and has already been used by both Airbus and Boeing. It should be available this summer for about 10,000 euros (about $12K). Read more…

But first, how does this new software work?

The project’s software merges data from different sources into a single 3D database, using techniques such as filtering, correlation and specially developed 3D algorithms. The partners concentrated their work on surface areas and sub-metric resolution, taking advantage of improvements in pixel resolution in today’s satellite data.

“The challenge is handling large volumes of geographic data on a standard computer,” says Martin. By working on a PC with a standard graphics cards, it is possible to significantly reduce the cost of working with complex Geographic Information Systems (GIS). He adds: “Our project offers users a transition from GIS to 3D, especially as our software’s open architecture enables interfacing with other software.”

Below are three pictures coming from the CRS4 Image Gallery (Credit: Enrico Gobbetti and Fabio Marton).

This one shows a “real-time inspection of a complex scene containing the St. Matthew 0.25mm dataset (373M triangles), the LLNL Richtmyer-Meshkov simulation isosurface (472M triangles), and full Boeing 777 CAD model (350M triangles). The image is approximated using 4M voxels and 595K triangles.” It will be presented at SIGGRAPH 2005 in August.

This one shows a “real-time inspection of the full Boeing 777 CAD model (350M triangles). The image is approximated using 1M voxels and 3.4M triangles.” It also will be presented at SIGGRAPH 2005 in August.

This one shows a “exploration of the whole planet Mars (2G triangles) reconstructed from Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter 128 samples/degree data.” This image, which has been published in August 2004, is the collective work of Paolo Cignoni, Fabio Ganovelli, Enrico Gobbetti, Fabio Marton, Federico Ponchio, and Roberto Scopigno.

As you can see, this software can be used for a large variety of applications. And, in addition to customers such as Airbus or Boeing, Vplanet Explorer was used on the inauguration day of the Viaduc de Millau in France, the world’s highest bridge, for a public presentation, which combined a digital model of the terrain with data from the Spot 5 satellite and modeling of the bridge itself.

“Local people had resisted the bridge’s construction, claming it would ruin the scenery,” adds Martin. “Had they seen our presentation earlier, showing the bridge is not a visual disaster, they might have accepted the new edifice without hesitation.”

For more information about this software, you can visit the V-Planet project page or this IST project fact sheet. The images above were extracted from these documents.

The complete project package, which includes separate modules for software installation or training, will go on sale this summer for a price of about 10,000 euros, which means it’s not intended for personal use.

Sources: IST Results, June 17, 2005; and various web sites

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How long does it take to create an accurate 3D model of a city on a computer? If you’re familiar with virtual reality modeling, you know it can take weeks. But according to New Scientist, engineers from the University of California at Berkeley have found a speedier way to capture a city. Using a concept dubbed “virtualized reality,” which mixes inputs from lasers to measure distances and digital cameras to scan a city, they can now build a 3D model of a whole city in about an hour. Obviously, the first applications will be military, but sooner or later, you’ll be able to drive your car in an unknown city using this 3D technology. Read more…

Here is how New Scientist describes this concept of “virtualized reality.”

The concept is similar to building a virtual reality model, but the process is very different. To produce a VR model, a programmer manually combines distance measurements and 2D pictures to make a 3D model. The new technique, dubbed “virtualised reality” by creator Avideh Zakhor, is automated and much faster.

“Right now, a detailed urban model can take many months to create,” says Bruce Deal, vice-president of the Virginia engineering firm SET Associates, which is helping to adapt the technology for the US military.

“With the new model, we’re talking about an hour or so.” Virtualised reality scans the urban landscape using lasers and digital cameras mounted on a truck or plane. A laser measures distances to objects such as lamp posts and building facades, while the digital camera takes 2D photos. Another laser calculates the movement of the truck and checks its position against data collected from the aerial laser aboard the plane.

Below are two examples coming from the UC Berkeley Video and Image Processing Lab and in particular from this page about Fast 3D City Model Generation.

The above link contains other images and — pretty huge — VRML files you can download.

The research work has been published by several scientific journals. If you’re interested in this subject, you should read “An Automated Method for Large-Scale, Ground-Based City Model Acquisition,” published by the International Journal of Computer Vision (Vol. 60, No. 1, October 2004, pp. 5 - 24).

Here is a link to the abstract which starts like this.

In this paper, we describe an automated method for fast, ground-based acquisition of large-scale 3D city models. Our experimental set up consists of a truck equipped with one camera and two fast, inexpensive 2D laser scanners, being driven on city streets under normal traffic conditions. One scanner is mounted vertically to capture building facades, and the other one is mounted horizontally. Successive horizontal scans are matched with each other in order to determine an estimate of the vehicle’s motion, and relative motion estimates are concatenated to form an initial path.

The scientists also add that it’s pretty fast to scan a city like Berkeley.

A fairly accurate, textured 3D cof the downtown Berkeley area has been acquired in a matter of minutes, limited only by traffic conditions during the data acquisition phase. Subsequent automated processing time to accurately localize the acquisition vehicle is 235 minutes for a 37 minutes or 10.2 km drive, i.e. 23 minutes per kilometer.

And for even more information, here is a link to the full paper (PDF format, 20 pages, 1.4 MB).

Sources: Emily Singer, New Scientist Print Edition, May 5, 2005; and various websites

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The ‘real’ booth of the Fraunhofer Institute at the upcoming CeBIT 2005 will feature a brand new and unusual ‘virtual’ reality system. Instead of being surrounded by images, you’ll play with the VR Object Display, a two meters tall cylindrical column with a diameter of 1.6 meters, which has been specifically designed for advertising, trade shows and presentations. The system includes eight off-the-shelf projectors and four mirrors in the lower portion of the column, and is controlled by 5 PCs using a special calibration software. The semitransparent viewing surface for the pictures is wrapped around the upper section of the column. You’ll be able to interact with cars or buildings that don’t exist yet like if they were holograms. It really looks as an impressive step in virtual reality technology. But read more…

Let’s start with one quote from Ivo Haulsen, a scientist at the Fraunhofer Institute for Computer Architecture and Software Technology FIRST.

“We have brought technology out of the darkness of the projection room. When modeling virtual objects, designers, architects and engineers will no longer be surrounded by three-dimensional images as before — they can now install a true-to-life simulation in the display column, walk around it and work on it. This gives the impression that the object they are working on is a hologram,” said Haulsen.

Here is how the system works.

The new high-tech column is two meters tall, with a diameter of 1.6 meters. Examples of what the versatile virtual showcase can do include displaying cars that do not exist yet at trade fairs, showing movie trailers or sets from a stage production in cinema and theater foyers, or reproducing an antique vase for an exhibition. Moving images in luminescent colors grab the attention of passers-by, inviting them to immerse themselves in a world of color — but not by vanishing through a hidden door in the display column, à la Orson Welles in the film classic “The Third Man.”

The innards of the column comprise a combination of proven technology elements: eight off-the-shelf projectors and four mirrors are installed in the lower portion of the column to provide the rear-projection image. The semitransparent viewing surface for the pictures is wrapped around the upper section of the column. The column is controlled by five standard computers using sophisticated calibration software.

Finally, here are some quotes about the past and the future of virtual reality.

“We have now succeeded in projecting the image all the way around the entire column. Original three-dimensional Cave presentations were composed of projections on flat surfaces — in this case, the light is projected onto the walls of the walk-through high-tech cube. In the next step, we were able to cast distortion-free images onto curved surfaces.”

“Projecting onto semicircular screens, for example, produces skewed images, which we straighten back into shape using special software,” says Haulsen, describing the development timeline. An automatic calibration system calculates and corrects distortions in the 360-degree projection, and quickly and precisely puts the pictures back together. Irregular coloring, brightness, unwanted overlaps and tedious fine adjustments are also things of the past.

The Fraunhofer scientists are continuing to develop the technology for multipurpose projection screens in different shapes. It seems there are no limits to what customers can ask for.

I would like to conclude this post with three observations.

In ‘traditional’ — read ‘cubic’ — virtual reality environments, the problems associated with coloring and calibration are hard to solve. If the researchers at FIRST have found solutions for such a new environment, it’s really a breakthrough.

And if they want to invite me to the next CeBIT, which will be held from March 10 to 16 in Hannover, Germany, I’ll be glad to accept.

Finally, if you want more information, here is the VR Object Display page describing the project, its roots and its future.

Sources: Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft news release, February 24, 2005; and various pages at the Fraunhofer Institute

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Today, your computer has at least two processors, the main unit or CPU, and the GPU, dedicated to graphics. But it’s a little-known secret that the GPU is now much more powerful that the CPU. The GPU has some drawbacks, such as a small memory, a difficult programming model or an almost general lack of floating-point precision. However, it’s tempting to harness the GPU power to help the main CPU to do the general computation. In “Supernova collapse simulated on a GPU,” EE Times describes how computer scientists from Los Alamos National Laboratory have developed the Scout project to do this. With the use of an Nvidia Quadro 3400 card, “Scout has achieved improved computational rates that are roughly 20 times faster than a 3-GHz Intel Xeon EM64T processor without the use of streaming SIMD extensions, and approximately four times faster than SIMD-enabled, fully optimized code.” Impressive, isn’t? Now, they want to go further and operate hundreds of GPUs in parallel. Read more about this exciting development…

Over the last several years-driven primarily by the entertainment industry-commodity graphics hardware has seen rapid enhancements in terms of both performance and programmability. The performance improvements have been significant enough that the graphics processor (GPU) now has roughly an order of magnitude more computing power and memory bandwidth than the CPU. This has led to our study of techniques that leverage the power of the GPU for improving the performance of visualization applications as well as for general-purpose computation.

As part of the Scout project toward a hardware-accelerated system for quantitatively driven visualization and analysis, we have devised a software environment and programming language that lets scientists write simple, expressive data-parallel programs to enable the computation of derived values and direct control of the mapping from data values to the pixels of a final rendered image.

Does this work? Yes, and pretty well!

This is all accomplished within an integrated development environment that provides on-the-fly compilation of code and the interactive exploration of the rendered results. Scout has achieved improved computational rates that are roughly 20 times faster than a 3-GHz Intel Xeon EM64T processor without the use of streaming SIMD extensions, and approximately four times faster than SIMD-enabled, fully optimized code.

Below are two examples of their results.

Here are more details about the above image.

The first entropy range was partially clipped away to reveal the turbulent structure of the supernova’s core, and the second (more transparent) entropy range isolated the details of the shock front.

Both ranges of entropy values were colored by the corresponding velocity magnitude values within the simulation. The entropy and velocity magnitude values, which are stored on a 256 x 256 x 256 computational grid, were computed in approximately 0.22 second using an Nvidia Quadro 3400 card.

Even if these results are very promising, there are still some major challenges before using successfully a GPU as a general-purpose computational resource: transfers between the GPU and the CPU are slow; developing software for the GPU is difficult; there is almost no support today for floating-point precision; and graphics cards don’t incorporate large memories. Still, the researchers are optimistic these challenges can be solved. Here is what they are dreaming about.

We believe that the performance numbers, the rapid rate of innovations from the graphics hardware vendors and the recent announcement of support for multiple GPUs in a single desktop system show that the study of the GPU’s impact on general-purpose computing is a viable area for continued research.

In addition, the GPU can provide scientists with a substantial resource for their desktop systems that can be leveraged to provide interactive data exploration and analysis. We are actively exploring the use of hundreds of GPUs in parallel, within a cluster-based environment, to address the memory limitations and explore the scalability of such systems.

The last paper about this project has been published in the Proceedings of IEEE Visualization 2004 (pages 171-178, October 2004). Here is a link to the full paper named “Scout: A Hardware-Accelerated System for Quantitatively Driven Visualization and Analysis” (PDF format, 8 pages, 498 KB). The above illustrations, including some Scout sample codes were extracted from this paper.

And for even more information, you can read the EE Times for a special report about “the graphics chip as supercomputer.” It contains links to five more articles, including one on “programming GPUs for general computing.”

Sources: Patrick McCormick, for EE Times, December 13, 2004; and various other websites

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