| A unified architecture for the computation of b-spline curves and surfaces (1997) | |||||||||||||||||
Abstract | |||||||||||||||||
| B-Splines in general, and Non-Uniform Rational B-Splines in particular, have become indispensable modeling primitives in computer graphics and geometric modeling applications. In this paper a novel high-performance architecture for the computation of uniform, non-uniform, rational and non-rational B-Spline curves and surfaces is presented. This architecture has been derived through a sequence of steps. First, a systolic architecture for the computation of the basis function values, the basis function evaluation array (the BFEA), is developed. Using the BFEA as its core, an architecture for the computation of non-uniform rational B-Spline curves is constructed. This architecture is then extended to compute NURBS surfaces. Finally, this architecture is augmented to compute the surface normals so that the output from this architecture can be directly used for rendering the NURBS surface. The overall linear structure of the architecture, its small I/O requirements, its non-dependence on the size of the problem (in terms of the number of control points and the number of points on the curve/surface that has to be computed), and its very high throughput make this architecture highly suitable for integration into the standard graphics pipeline of high-end workstations. Results of the timing analysis indicate a potential throughput of one triangle with the normal vectors at its vertices, every two clock cycles. 1 | |||||||||||||||||
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