BlobTree trees

In recent years several methods for modeling botanical trees have been proposed. The geometry and topology of tree skeletons can be well described by L-systems; however, there are several approaches to modeling smooth surfaces to represent branches, and not all of the observed phenomena can be represented by current methods. Many tree types exhibit nonsmooth features such as branch bark ridges and collars. In this research a hierarchical implicit modeling system is used to produce models of branching structures that capture smooth branching, branch collars and branch bark ridges. The BlobTree provides several techniques to control the combination of primitives, allowing both smooth and nonsmooth effects to be intuitively combined in a single blend volume. Irregular effects are implemented using precise contact modeling, constructive solid geometry and space warping. We show that smooth blends can be obtained, without noticeable bulging, using summation of distance based implicit surfaces. L-systems are used to create the branching structure allowing botanically based simulations to be used as input