The Solid Map: Methods for Generating a 2-D Texture Map for Solid Texturing

The solid map provides a view-independent method for solid texturing using an ordinary 2-D surface texture map. The solid map transforms a model’s polygons into 2-D texture space without overlap. It then rasterizes the polygons in this space, interpolating the solid texture coordinates across the pixels of the polygon. These stored solid texture coordinates are then read by a texture synthesis procedure, which generates a color that is stored at the corresponding location in the texture map. This texture map when applied to the model’s polygons yields a procedural solid texturing of the model. Artifacts of this method include coverage, sampling, distortion and seams. Four algorithms for mapping polygons into texture space without overlap are presented and compared across these artifacts. Applications of the solid map are also presented, including solid texturing deformed objects, real time procedural solid texturing, procedural solid texturing in OpenGL and storing solid textures in model description files.