Occlusion Reduction and Magnification for Multidimensional Data Presentations

• US 20100208968A1
• Filed: 05/04/2010
• Published: 08/19/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 09/03/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Accessify, LLC (Ascend Innovation Management, LLC)
• Original Assignee: Noregin Assets N.V. LLC (Intellectual Ventures LLC)
• Inventors: Shoemaker, Garth B.D., Solehdin, Ali, Baar, David J.P.
• Granted Patent: US 8,907,948 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 382/131
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2203/04805 Virtual magnifying lens, i.e. window or frame movable on top of displayed information to enlarge it for better reading or selection
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 15/20 Perspective computation
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 15/40 Hidden part removal
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 17/20 Finite element generation, e.g. wire-frame surface description, tesselation
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 17/205 Re-meshing
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2219/2016 Rotation, translation, scaling

Abstract

A method in a computer system for generating a presentation of a region-of-interest in an original image for display on a display screen, the original image being a collection of polygons having polygons defined by three or more shared edges joined at vertex points, the method comprising: establishing a lens for the region-of-interest, the lens having a magnified focal region for the region-of-interest at least partially surrounded by a shoulder region across which the magnification decreases, the focal and shoulder regions having respective perimeters; subdividing polygons in the collection of polygons proximate to at least one of the perimeters, as projected with the polygons onto a base plane, by inserting one or more additional vertex points and additional edges into the polygons to be subdivided; and, applying the lens to the original image to produce the presentation by displacing the vertex points onto the lens and perspectively projecting the displacing onto a view plane in a direction aligned with a viewpoint for the region-of-interest.

Claims

1. One or more computer-readable media comprising instructions stored thereon, that responsive to being executed by a data processing system, cause the data processing system to perform operations comprising:

displacing objects that occlude an object-of-interest in an image, away from a line of sight between a viewpoint and the object-of-interest, wherein the objects are displaced away from the line of sight based on a transform function and minimum displacements determined from a volume defined by extrusion of surface points included on the object-of-interest towards the viewpoint; and

generating a presentation, from the viewpoint'"'"'s perspective, that includes the objects displaced away from the line of sight so that the object of interest is not occluded and additional objects included in the image remain visible.

2. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 1, wherein the volume comprises an exclusion volume that is cleared of the objects.

3. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 1, wherein the image comprises a medical image.

4. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 3, wherein the medical image represents at least a portion of a human body.

5. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 1, wherein the instructions further comprise instructions that, responsive to being executed by the computing system, cause the computing system to magnify the object of interest, in comparison to the object of interest'"'"'s size in the image, prior to extrusion of the surface points.

6. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 5, wherein a magnified region, that includes the object of interest, is at least partially surrounded by a shoulder region.

7. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 1, wherein the instructions further comprise instructions that, responsive to being executed by the computing system, cause the computing system to accept an input that specifies the viewpoint.

8. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 1, wherein the objects are displaced perpendicular to the line of sight.

9. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 1, wherein the surface points comprise vertices of a polygon.

10. One or more computer-readable media comprising instruction stored thereon, that responsive to being executed by a data processing system, causes the data processing system to perform operations comprising:

displace one or more objects away from a line of sight between an object-of-interest and a viewpoint responsive to selection of the viewpoint to view the object-of-interest based on a transform function and minimum displacements determined through extrusion of surface points on the object of interest towards the viewpoint, wherein the one or more objects would at least partially occlude the object of interest from the viewpoint'"'"'s perspective, but for displacement of the one or more objects; and

generate a presentation, from the viewpoint'"'"'s perspective for presentation on a display device associated with the computing system, in which the object of interest is not occluded by the one or more objects.

11. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 10, wherein selection of the viewpoint is accomplished by clicking on an image.

12. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 11, wherein the image comprises a scan of at least a portion of a human body.

13. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 11, wherein the image comprises a magnetic resonance image (MRI) of at least a portion of a human body.

14. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 10, wherein the instructions further comprise instructions that, responsive to being executed by the computing system, cause the computing system to:

display an image on the display device associated with the computing system; and

accept an input that selects the viewpoint.

15. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 10, wherein the computing system is configured to receive a scan from a medical device.

16. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 10, wherein the instructions further comprise instructions that, responsive to being executed by the computing system, cause the computing system to magnify the object of interest prior to extrusion of the surface points.

17. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 10, wherein the object of interest comprises a portion of a human body.

18. The one or more computer-readable media of claim 10, wherein the object of interest comprises a portion of a human brain.

19. A method comprising:

displacing a representation of a body part in a scan that originally obstructed a representation of a body part of interest in the scan, away from a line of site between a viewpoint and the representation of the body part of interest, wherein the representation of the body part is displaced away from the line of sight based on a transform function and a minimum displacement determined from a volume defined by extruding surface points included on the representation of the body part of interest towards the viewpoint; and

generating a presentation from the viewpoint'"'"'s perspective that includes the representation of the body part displaced away from the line of sight so the representation of the body part of interest is not occluded in the presentation and representations of additional body parts represented in the scan are visible in the presentation.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the scan comprises a magnetic resonance image (MRI) of at least a portion of a human body.

21. The method of claim 19, wherein the representation of the body part of interest comprises a portion of a human brain.

22. The method of claim 21, wherein the scan comprises one or more x-rays of a human body.

23. The method of claim 19, further comprising selecting the viewpoint by receiving an input that clicked on the scan.