Chapter Topological Visualisation Techniques for Volume Multifield Data

• Main Author: Thomas, Dean P. (auth)
• Other Authors: Hands, Simon (auth), Borgo, Rita (auth), Laramee, Robert S. (auth)
• Format: Electronic Book Chapter
• Language: English
• Published: InTechOpen 2019
• Subjects: Graphics programming; indirect volume rendering, topology driven visualisation, multivariate visualisation, contour tree, Reeb graph, Reeb space, joint contour net, Reeb skeleton, scalar data
• Online Access: OAPEN Library: download the publication; OAPEN Library: description of the publication

This survey paper provides an overview of topological visualisation techniques for scalar data sets. Topological algorithms are used to reduce scalar fields to a skeleton by mapping critical changes in the topology to the vertices of graph structures. These can be visualised using graph drawing techniques or used as a method of seeding meshes of distinct objects existing in the data. Many techniques are discussed in detail, beginning with a review of algorithms working on scalar fields defined with a single variable, and then generalised to multivariate and temporal data. The survey is completed with a discussion of methods of presenting data in higher dimensions.