Abstract: A method regularizes a distance field of a graphics model or object. The distance field includes variable scalar values and a set of fixed zero values. The zero values define a boundary or surface of the object. The distance field is evaluated by a cost function, optimized according predetermined parameters, to determine a cost of the distance field. The variable scalar values are then randomly perturbed while holding the zero values fixed. The evaluating, determining, perturbing steps are repeated until the cost is less than a predetermined threshold. The distance field can be in the form of a non-differentiable implicial field. A surface of the graphics model can be textured or stenciled by following streamlines along the gradients of the regularized distance field.

Abstract: A system for translating a portrait-oriented software address to a portrait-oriented yet landscape-configured display address. Based on the orientation of a display device, a address translation system either passes the software address “as is” or translates the address to represent a portrait-oriented display address.

Abstract: An improved surface shading method computes and stores light reflectance values as a texture map for a given light direction and view direction to an object in a scene during development of a computer graphics (CG) program, and uses the stored texture map later for shading during real-time rendering. A selected bidirectional reflectance distribution function (BRDF) is applied using a standard model for distribution of normal direction vectors for a given type of surface, and BRDF values are computed as a global texture map for the object's surface in the scene. The BRDF values are stored as a look-up table indexed to the sampled range of normal direction vectors. During real-time rendering, surface shading can be readily processed by using the normal direction vector for any given point to look up the stored BRDF value. Shading with BRDF light reflectance values can be combined in one or more passes with shading of other surface texture characteristics, e.g.