Polygon Mesh Compression via Fan Tessellation

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Solution Overview

Problem

Current polygon mesh compression technologies, such as the SC3DMC-TFAN standard, are limited to compressing triangle meshes and cannot effectively handle arbitrary n-sided polygon meshes, which are essential for modeling complex 3D objects, leading to memory and bandwidth issues in realistic 3D graphics rendering.

Innovation Solution

The proposed solution involves traversing a polygon mesh, partitioning it into polygon fans, and tessellating these fans into triangles, allowing for compression and decompression using the SC3DMC-TFAN standard, thereby enabling the reuse of existing SC3DMC encoders and decoders and optimizing storage space.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Measurement precision

If the number of vertices, edges, and faces in a polygon mesh is increased to create more realistic 3D graphics, then the visual realism is improved, but the memory requirements increase significantly

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvevisual realismVSAvoidmemory requirements
Core Design Contradiction:
Measurement precisionVSQuantity of substance

Solution Approach 1:

The patent segments a polygon mesh into multiple polygon fans, where each fan is a subset of polygons sharing a common vertex. This segmentation allows the mesh to be compressed in smaller, manageable units, reducing the overall memory footprint while preserving the detailed geometry needed for visual realism

Inventive Principle:
Principle #1Segmentation

Solution Approach 2:

The patent transforms the storage representation from storing all polygon vertices explicitly to storing compact fan definitions that reference shared vertices. This dimensional transformation in data organization reduces memory requirements while maintaining the ability to represent complex geometries

Inventive Principle:
Principle #17Another dimension (Dimensionality change)

2Measurement precision

If the number of vertices, edges, and faces in a polygon mesh is increased to create more realistic 3D graphics, then the visual realism is improved, but the bandwidth consumption increases

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvevisual realismVSAvoidbandwidth consumption
Core Design Contradiction:
Measurement precisionVSQuantity of substance

Solution Approach 1:

The patent merges multiple polygons into polygon fans that share common vertices, allowing redundant vertex data to be eliminated. This merging reduces the total data volume that needs to be transmitted, thereby reducing bandwidth consumption while maintaining high visual realism through preserved geometric detail

Inventive Principle:
Principle #5Merging (Combining)

3Adaptability or versatility

If the SC3DMC-TFAN standard is extended to handle arbitrary n-sided polygon meshes, then the versatility is improved, but the device complexity increases

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvecompatibility with arbitrary polygon meshesVSAvoidcompression algorithm complexity
Core Design Contradiction:
Adaptability or versatilityVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The patent applies preliminary triangulation to convert arbitrary n-sided polygon meshes into triangle meshes before compression. This preliminary action simplifies the subsequent compression process by leveraging the existing SC3DMC-TFAN triangle fan algorithm, achieving versatility without proportionally increasing complexity

Inventive Principle:
Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

The patent introduces triangle fans as an intermediary representation between arbitrary polygon meshes and the SC3DMC-TFAN compression algorithm. This intermediary allows the system to handle diverse polygon types while reusing existing optimized compression code, balancing versatility and complexity

Inventive Principle:
Principle #24Intermediary (Mediator)

Data Source

PatentEP3186781B1Extension of the MPEG/SC3DMC standard to polygon meshes
Publication Date: 2021.10.27 ATI TECHNOLOGIES ULC
  • EP3186781B1 patent drawingFigure 1~2
  • EP3186781B1 patent drawingFigure 3
  • EP3186781B1 patent drawingFigure 4

AI summary

A system, method and computer program product to traverse a polygon mesh, partition the polygon mesh into a set of polygon fans based on the traversal order, and tessellate the set of polygon fans into triangles based on the traversal order. This transformation of the polygon mesh into a triangle mesh enables the polygon mesh to be compressed and decompressed using the SC3DMC standard.