Synthesizing Subdivision Meshes Using Real Time Tessellation

We propose a new GPU method for synthesizing subdivision meshes with exact adaptive geometry in real time. Our GPU kernel builds upon precomputed tables of basis functions for subdivision surfaces and is therefore supporting all subdivision schemes, either interpolating or approximating, for triangle or quad meshes. We designed our kernel so that it can be integrated seamlessly within a standard tessellation pipeline, exploiting software or hardware (adaptive) tessellation methods. We make use of the tessellator unit as an adaptive mesher for maximum subdivision level, exploiting the linear nature of subdivision surfaces to enable arbitrary level of detail adaptivity and %extend the idea of Subdivision Shading to control the visual smoothness using the same tables as control the visual smoothness using Subdivision Shading by applying the same tables as for geometry. We evaluate our kernel on a variety of dynamic meshes and compare it to subdivision substitutes.