Drag, Drop, and Clone: An Interactive Interface for Surface Composition

We describe a novel interface for composition of polygonal meshes based around two artist-oriented tools: Geometry Drag-and-Drop and Mesh Clone Brush. Our drag-and-drop interface allows a complex surface part to be selected and interactively dragged to a new location. We automatically fill the hole left behind and smoothly deform the part to conform to the target surface. The artist may increase the boundary rigidity of this deformation, in which case a fair transition surface is automatically computed. Our clone brush allows for transfer of surface details with precise spatial control. These tools support an interaction style that has not previously been demonstrated for 3D surfaces, allowing detailed 3D models to be quickly assembled from arbitrary input meshes. We evaluated this interface by distributing a basic tool to computer graphics hobbyists and professionals, and based on their feedback, describe potential workflows which could utilize our techniques.