Understanding Urban Environments Through the Use of Elements of Urban Legibility

Google Tech Talks
December 13, 2006

ABSTRACT

For 3D global visualization systems, it is important to be able to render city-sized collections of relatively simple building models at fast speeds without losing spatial coherence. Since traditional mesh simplification algorithms are not designed for collections of simple models, we introduce a method of simplification through merging of similar objects. We incorporate the concept of "urban legibility" from architecture and city-planning as a guideline for simplifying city models. Our algorithm can be broken down into five steps. Hierarchical clustering, cluster merging, polyline simplification, and hierarchical texturing are performed during pre-processing, while at runtime, the levels-of-detail process selects the appropriate models to render.

In this talk, I will present this work as well as the future trends of our research, including extending the current simplification algorithm to include 3D models, using urban legibility elements to analyze and quantify urban models, and applying information visualization techniques to visualizing urban forms.

http://www.viscenter.uncc.edu/~rchang

Google engEDU
Speaker: Remco Chang