A Streamline Selection Technique Overlaying with Isosurfaces

Abstract: Integration of scalar and vector visualization has been an interesting topic. This paper presents a technique to appropriately select and display multiple streamlines while overlaying with isosurfaces, aiming an integrated scalar and vector field visualization. The technique visualizes a scalar field by multiple semitransparent isosurfaces, and a vector field by multiple streamlines, while the technique adequately selects the streamlines considering reduction of cluttering among the isosurfaces and streamlines. The technique first selects and renders isosurfaces, and then generates large number of streamlines from randomly selected seed points. The technique evaluates each of the streamlines according to their shapes on a 2D display space, distances to critical points of the given vector fields, and occlusion by isosurfaces. It then selects the specified number of highly evaluated streamlines. As a result, we can visualize both scalar and vector fields as a set of view-independently selected isosurfaces and view-dependently selected streamlines.