Accelerating Transfer Function Update for Distance Map based Volume Rendering

Abstract: Direct volume rendering using ray-casting is widely used in practice. By using GPUs and applying acceleration techniques as empty space skipping, high frame rates are possible on modern hardware. This enables performance-critical use-cases such as virtual reality volume rendering. The currently fastest known technique uses volumetric distance maps to skip empty sections of the volume during ray-casting but requires the distance map to be updated per transfer function change. In this paper, we demonstrate a technique for subdividing the volume intensity range into partitions and deriving what we call partitioned distance maps. These can be used to accelerate the distance map computation for a newly changed transfer function by a factor up to 30. This allows the currently fastest known empty space skipping approach to be used while maintaining high frame rates even when the transfer function is changed frequently.