Patent · US Active

Methods and systems for generating 3-dimensional computer images

US8723860B2 · kind B2 · utility

5Cited by
4References
21Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateNov 21, 2007
Grant dateMay 13, 2014
Priority date
Expiry dateAug 20, 2031

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC G)Physics
  • CPC primaryG06T15/06
  • WIPO fieldComputer technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

There are provided methods and apparatus for generating a 3-dimensional computer image. The image includes a number of objects and is divided into separate areas. Control data to link to object data stored in a memory for each object is derived for two objects at a time. Two or more separate areas can be processed in parallel by deriving control data for the two separate areas at a time. To avoid fetching data for both areas, which is actually only applicable to one area, encoding is used in the control data. The object data can be stored on one or across two memory pages, and the control data includes one memory page address in the former case and two memory page addresses in the latter case. The object data can also be stored across two non-contiguous memory pages, by using a look-up table with contiguous portions allocated for each object's object data. When partial rendering is used, and partial depth data is stored and subsequently updated, the depth data can be stored across two memory pages using link portions in the memory pages to either indicate the end of data storage or point to the next memory page.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.