Volume Visualization

Outline

Introduction

Common Volume Visualization Steps

Approaches to Volume Visualization

Marching Cubes Algorithm

Ray-casting Algorithm

GPU based Volume Rendering

Volume Visualization - Examples

MRI Face Mask (1994)

CVH Visualization

Volume Visualization

Volumetric data are very common.

3D Volume Data (Voxels)

2D Image Plane (Pixels)

Sources of Medical Volume Data

Medical Data
CT (Computed Tomography)
MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging)
PET (Positron Emission Tomography)
Angiography Data
3D US Data
CT Angiography:

Dept. of Neuroradiology
University of Erlangen,
Germany

Other Special Volume Data

Visible Human Project

CT Human Head:

Visible Human Project,

US National Library of
Medicine, Maryland,
USA

Video Show

Volume Visualization Terms

Space/Grid/Lattice

Grid Traversal

Voxels

Cells

Geometric Primitives

Extent Planes

Grid Types

Uniform grid (voxels)

Reconstruction with
trilinear interpolation

Unstructured grid
Decomposed into
tetrahedra
Reconstruction with
linear interpolation
REAL-TIME VOLUME GRAPHICS
Daniel Weiskopf
Institute of Visualization and Interactive Systems, University of Stuttgrat, Germany

Different number can change color

Common Vol. Vis. Steps

Data Acquistion
Slice Processing
Volume Reconstruction
Volume Enhancement
Data Classification or Thresholding
Mapping to Primitives
Shading & Transforming Primitives
Displaying Primitives

Voxelization

three dimensional scan conversion

the process of converting a geometric
representation of a synthetic model into a set
of voxels that best represents that synthetic
model within the discrete voxel space.

Common Approaches to
Volume Visualization

Surface Rendering
an indirect technique used for visualizating
volume primitives by first converting them
into an intermediate surface representation and
then employing conventional computer
graphics techniques to render them to the
screen, e.g. Marching Cube Algorithm.

Common approaches ...

Direct Volume Rendering

These techniques deal directly with volume
primitives without any intermediate conversion
of the volume data to surface representation,
e.g. ray tracing of volume data, 3D texture
mapping rendering

After break

Surface Rendering Techniques

Marching Cubes Algorithm

creates triangles
floating point representation
use case table to create triangles
use general graphics hardware for rendering
can generate large number of triangles for
medical data, e.g. 0.5 million triangles for a
human skull.

Marching Cubes
Algorithm Summary
Create a cube
Classify each vertex
Build an index
Get edge list
Interpolate triangle vertices
Calculate and interpolate normals
References:
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marching_cubes
2. William E. Lorensen, Harvey E. Cline: Marching Cubes: A high resolution 3D surface
construction algorithm. In: Computer Graphics, Vol. 21, Nr. 4, July 1987

Results (MC vs ASC)

MC

ASC,

N=1

Results (MC vs ASC)

MC

ASC,

N=2

Results (MC vs ASC)

MC

ASC,

N=4

Results (MC vs ASC)

MC

ASC,

N=8

Marching Cubes

Marching Cubes

Marching Cubes

Marching Cubes

Marching Cubes

Marching Cubes

Marching Cubes

Ratio

Marching Cubes

Marching Cubes
Problem - Ambiguous cases can result in holes

Marching Cubes
Inconsistent Choice

Marching Cubes
Results in holes

Direct Volume Rendering

Ray-casting Algorithm

3D texture mapping for volume rendering

hardware dependent (in Part II)

Data Classification

Surface rendering
User picks threshold value

Direct volume rendering

User specifies color table map data values to
meaningful colors
User specifies opacity table map interesting
data to opaque, map other data to transparent

Ray-Casting Methods

Cast Rays from image plane through

volume to find pixel color
No intermediate surfaces
renders volume directly

References:
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volume_ray_casting
2. Marc Levoy, Efficient Ray Tracing of Volume Data, ACM
Transactions on Graphics, 9(3):245-261, July 1990.

More sample

Less sampling

Can be less expensive

Compositing

Compositing describes the way that the

individual contributions from the sample
points are accumulated

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Compositing

Back to front compositing

the contribution at sample position k is computed
by the previous contribution weighted by the
transparency at the current sample, plus the color
at the current sample

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Compositing

Front to back compositing

Compose samples from the front of the volume
dataset along the ray to the back end of the dataset

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Compositing

Compositing variations
First Hit
sample the casted rays until we find two sample points below and above a

certain intensity threshold

Pseudo X-ray
Traverse and accumulate sample values along the rays throughout the

whole volume

Threshold sensitive compositing

Similar to pseudo X-ray, but considering only sample values above a
certain intensity threshold

Maximum intensity projection (MIP)

Search for the sample point with the highest intensity value

Closest vessel projection (CVP)

Take the first sample with a local maximum that surpasses a specified
threshold

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Compositing

Left: pseudo X-ray. Right: threshold-sensitive

compositing

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Compositing

Left: maximum intensity projection. Right:

closest vessel projection

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Compositing

Thin slab volume rendering

Consider only a small number of slices from
the full volume dataset
Allow a better representation of the spatial
coherence between individual slices

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Compositing

Slab volume rendering of about 10 cm of CT

thorax data

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Compositing

Left: single slice representation. Right: thin

slab maximum intensity projection

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