Palette-Style Volume Visualization

Abstract

In this paper we propose a palette-style volume visualization interface which aims at providing users with an intuitive volume exploration tool. Our system is inspired by the widely used wheel-style color palette. The system initially creates a set of direct volume rendered images (DVRIs) manually or automatically, and arranges them over a circle in 2D image space. Based on the initial set of DVRIs called primary DVRIs which imitate the primary colors in the color wheel, users can create more DVRIs on the wheel using PhotoShop-style image editing operations such as the fusing operation. With our system, non-expert users can easily navigate and explore volumetric data. In addition, users can always know where they have been, where they are, and where they could go in a visualization process and hence redundant exploration can be avoided.