Poisson Disk Sampling: Modern Techniques

PhD Thesis Proposal Defence


Title: "Poisson Disk Sampling: Modern Techniques"

by

Mr. Hongwei Li


Abstract:

Poisson disk sampling has proven to be very useful and versatile in a
variety of computer graphics applications in the past 35 years since
it was first introduced to solve the ray tracing sampling problem. It
can simply and mathematically be defined as a set of samples (points)
in a certain distance space such that every pair of samples are at
least certain distance away from each other. Poisson disk sampling is
by far the sampling which achieves the combined objective of acquiring
the highest quality in visual appearance and producing the least
spectral artifacts in the spectral domain. Henceforth, it is favored
by ray tracing, which wants least artifacts when using a small number
of ray samples, by stippling, which requires a uniform distribution of
drawing metaphors to represent gray scale smoothly without any
noticeable structure, by surface remeshing for its random and uniform
resultant vertex positions, and by many other applications which ask
for a plausible uniform distribution of objects in any distance space.

In this thesis, I present my three works on Poisson disk sampling,
each of which addresses certain problems in a more specific context:
Poisson disk sampling on surface by using dual tiling, the
acceleration of capacity constrained Voronoi tessellation and
anisotropic Poisson disk sampling in Riemannian distance space. Apart
from the detailed description of my own work, the prior work on the
same topic will also be discussed to serve as background of Poisson
disk sampling research. I categorized all these algorithms (including
my own) into 3 chapters based on their working domain, 2D Euclidean
space, manifold surface and Riemannian space. Finally, I compare
different Poisson disk sampling algorithms in terms of quality and
performance in order to provide a reference by which the audience can
grasp the usage of Poisson disk sampling in their own research problem
and choose the appropriate method.


Date:  			Monday, 24 May 2010

Time:           	3:00pm - 5:00pm

Venue:          	Room 3501
 			lifts 25/26

Committee Members:      Dr. Pedro Sander (Supervisor)
 			Prof. Long Quan (Chairperson)
 			Dr. Chiew-Lan Tai
 			Dr. Ajay Joneja (IELM)


**** ALL are Welcome ****