Octree simplification of polyhedral solids

Abstract

Multiresolution representations are becoming more and more important for the visualization, operation and interrogation of very complex scenes. In this paper, an automatic simplification algorithm for general two-manifold polyhedra is presented. The algorithm is based on the generation of an intermediate octree representation of the object and produces a set of valid two-manifold polyhedral approximations of the initial solid ensuring precise distance approximations between the surface of the initial object and the surface of the resulting solids. A restricted non-iterative version of the general algorithm is proposed and implemented for the particular case of isothetic polyhedra. In this case the proposed scheme is specially simple and generates a whole family of isothetic simplifications.