METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR QUICKLY GENERATING NATURAL TERRAIN

• US 20150262392A1
• Filed: 01/12/2015
• Published: 09/17/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 03/17/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute
• Original Assignee: Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute
• Inventors: PARK, Jeung Chul, JEONG, Il Kwon
• Granted Patent: US 9,619,936 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 11/001 Texturing; Colouring; Generation of texture or colour inpainting G06T5/77
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 17/05 Geographic models

Abstract

A method and apparatus for quickly generating a natural terrain. The method according to an exemplary embodiment may include generating a new terrain through a patch-based synthesis from one or more virtual noise-based terrain models and one or more realistic terrain models; and processing blending of a boundary between synthesized terrains in the newly generated terrain.

Claims

1. A method of generating terrain, comprising:

generating a new terrain through a patch-based synthesis from one or more virtual noise-based terrain models and one or more realistic terrain models; and

processing blending of a boundary between synthesized terrains in the newly generated terrain.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more noise-based terrain models are at least one of a Perlin terrain and a fractal terrain.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more realistic terrain models are a digital elevation model (DEM).

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the generating of the new terrain utilizes a patch-based synthesis on each terrain model from an original terrain, and comprises calculating a minimum error of an overlapped area between a terrain patch to be newly generated from an original terrain patch and an already generated terrain patch, and arranging, in order, a terrain patch with a minimum error to complete the new terrain.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the generating of the new terrain comprises generating a high-resolution new terrain from a low-resolution original terrain through the patch-based synthesis.

6. The method of claim 4, wherein the generating of the new terrain comprises parallelizing the calculation of the minimum error to accelerate a processing speed.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the processing of the blending comprises:

finding a rapidly changing part by calculating a curvature that numerically expresses a variation of a surrounding area by targeting the boundary between the synthesized terrains in the newly generated terrain; and

applying smoothing to the found area.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the finding of the rapidly changing part comprises parallelizing the calculation of the curvature to accelerate a processing speed.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the finding of the rapidly changing part comprises using Compute Unified Device Architecture (CUDA) as a method for parallel processing.

10. The method of claim 8, wherein the finding of the rapidly changing part comprises parallel-processing through multiple Graphics Processing Units (GPUs).

11. The method of claim 7, wherein the processing of the blending further comprises allocating a value of the curvature as weight in applying the smoothing.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving input of selection of one or more noise-based terrain models and one or more realistic terrain models from a user.

13. An apparatus of processing a terrain, comprising:

a first database configured to store one or more virtual noise-based terrain models;

a second database configured to store one or more realistic terrain models;

a terrain synthesizer configured to select a noise-based terrain model from the first database, select the realistic terrain model from the second database, and generate a new terrain through a patch-based synthesis from the selected terrain models; and

a blending processor configured to process blending of a boundary between synthesized terrains in the newly generated terrain.

14. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the terrain synthesizer is configured to generate a new terrain through a patch-based synthesis on each terrain model from an original terrain, and comprise calculating a minimum error of an overlapped area between a terrain patch to be newly generated from an original terrain patch and an already generated terrain patch, and arranging, in order, a terrain patch with a minimum error to complete the new terrain.

15. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the terrain synthesizer is configured to generate a high-resolution new terrain from a low-resolution original terrain through the patch-based synthesis.

16. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the blending processor comprises:

an area finder configured to find a rapidly changing part by calculating a curvature that numerically expresses a variation of a surrounding area by targeting the boundary between the synthesized terrains in the newly generated terrain; and

a smoothing processor configured to apply smoothing to the found area.

17. The apparatus of claim 16, wherein the area finder is configured to parallelize the calculation of the curvature to accelerate a processing speed.

18. The apparatus of claim 17, wherein the area finder is configured to use CUDA as a method for parallel processing

19. The apparatus of claim 16, wherein the blending processor further comprises a weight allocator configured to allocate a value of the curvature as weight in applying the smoothing.

20. The apparatus of claim 13, further comprising:

an input configured to receive input of selection of one or more noise-based terrain models and one or more realistic terrain models from a user.