Patents by Inventor Andrew Graham Styles

Andrew Graham Styles has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Patent number: 8152613
    Abstract: Methods and systems for damaging objects in digital environments are provided. The objects may be defined by a number of tiles. Tiles may be joined together to form objects of various sizes, shapes, and facades. The tiles may be broken up or divided into smaller tiles as the objects sustain damage. These smaller tiles may be rejoined to the objects providing virtually unlimited ways in which the objects can be damaged. In addition, the objects may incorporate stress-related damage that allows the object to break or collapse under its own weight.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 14, 2009
    Date of Patent: April 10, 2012
    Assignee: Sony Computer Entertainment America LLC
    Inventors: David Ratdogg Williams, Andrew Graham Styles, Scott Francis Butler
  • Patent number: 7830375
    Abstract: Constraint schemes for use in the computer simulation and animation of cloth, clothing and other materials helps to prevent clothing from excessive stretching, bunching up in unwanted areas, or “passing through” rigid objects during collisions. Several types of constraint systems are employed, including the use of skinned vertices as constraints and axial constraints. In these schemes cloth simulated vertices are generated for the material using a cloth simulation technique, and skinned vertices are generated for the material using a skin simulation technique. One or more of the cloth simulated vertices are compared to the corresponding skinned vertices. The cloth simulated vertices are modified if they deviate from the corresponding skinned vertices by more than a certain amount.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 11, 2008
    Date of Patent: November 9, 2010
    Assignee: Sony Computer Entertainment America Inc.
    Inventor: Andrew Graham Styles
  • Publication number: 20100178965
    Abstract: Methods and systems for damaging objects in digital environments are provided. The objects may be defined by a number of tiles. Tiles may be joined together to form objects of various sizes, shapes, and facades. The tiles may be broken up or divided into smaller tiles as the objects sustain damage. These smaller tiles may be rejoined to the objects providing virtually unlimited ways in which the objects can be damaged. In addition, the objects may incorporate stress-related damage that allows the object to break or collapse under its own weight.
    Type: Application
    Filed: January 14, 2009
    Publication date: July 15, 2010
    Inventors: David Ratdogg Williams, Andrew Graham Styles, Scott Francis Butler
  • Patent number: 7652670
    Abstract: An alternative to cloth simulation in which a plurality of different poses for a material are established, and then each component of each vertex position of the material is encoded into a polynomial by using corresponding vertices in the plurality of different poses for the material. The vertices are encoded relative to a neutral bind pose. The polynomial coefficients are calculated offline and then stored. At runtime, the poses are interpolated by using key variables which are input into the polynomials as different states, for example the turning speed of the player wearing the material, which may comprise a cloth jersey. The bind pose vertices are transformed into world space using the character skeleton. A smooth interpolation is achieved, and the polynomials can encode a large number of pose-meshes in a few constants, which reduces the amount of data that must be stored.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 6, 2006
    Date of Patent: January 26, 2010
    Assignee: Sony Computer Entertainment America Inc.
    Inventor: Andrew Graham Styles
  • Publication number: 20090066703
    Abstract: Constraint schemes for use in the computer simulation and animation of cloth, clothing and other materials helps to prevent clothing from excessive stretching, bunching up in unwanted areas, or “passing through” rigid objects during collisions. Several types of constraint systems are employed, including the use of skinned vertices as constraints and axial constraints. In these schemes cloth simulated vertices are generated for the material using a cloth simulation technique, and skinned vertices are generated for the material using a skin simulation technique. One or more of the cloth simulated vertices are compared to the corresponding skinned vertices. The cloth simulated vertices are modified if they deviate from the corresponding skinned vertices by more than a certain amount.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 11, 2008
    Publication date: March 12, 2009
    Applicant: SONY COMPUTER ENTERTAINMENT AMERICA INC.
    Inventor: Andrew Graham Styles
  • Patent number: 7463265
    Abstract: Constraint schemes for use in the computer simulation and animation of cloth, clothing and other materials helps to prevent clothing from excessive stretching, bunching up in unwanted areas, or “passing through” rigid objects during collisions. Several types of constraint systems are employed, including the use of skinned vertices as constraints and axial constraints. In these schemes cloth simulated vertices are generated for the material using a cloth simulation technique, and skinned vertices are generated for the material using a skin simulation technique. One or more of the cloth simulated vertices are compared to the corresponding skinned vertices. The cloth simulated vertices are modified if they deviate from the corresponding skinned vertices by more than a certain amount.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 2, 2005
    Date of Patent: December 9, 2008
    Assignee: Sony Computer Entertainment America Inc.
    Inventor: Andrew Graham Styles
  • Patent number: 7298374
    Abstract: Scheme for use in cloth simulation that provides a good dynamic “wrinkled” look to the cloth as it moves. The simulated area of each of the triangles in the triangle mesh is compared with the original area of the triangle to determine how much it got compressed or stretched during animation. This comparison is then used as a basis for altering the lighting of the pixels representing the triangles in order to improve the appearance of the wrinkles in the cloth. The lighting of each pixel is altered by altering a surface normal of the pixel using a value obtained from each of one or more normal maps. Normal maps are selected by using wrinkle ratios that are calculated based on the above mentioned comparisons.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 2, 2005
    Date of Patent: November 20, 2007
    Assignee: Sony Computer Entertainment America Inc.
    Inventor: Andrew Graham Styles