Hybrid-based snow simulation and snow rendering with shell textures

Abstract

In this study, we develop a system for interactive snow simulation and rendering. Snow is modeled as a hybrid structure that handles movable snow and static snow separately. We develop a simple approach to convert between these two types of snow. Movable snow is represented by a set of particles, whereas static snow is modeled as grid cells. For a piece of movable snow (e.g., snowflake), the particles are connected using springs. Thus, we can model snow as a type of brittle material, such as a snow pile split into chunks of smaller snow pieces after a collision. To render the snow, we adopt a shell structure that has a series of concentric, semitransparent, textured shells. We applied our system to several examples, with the rendered snow appearing similar to real snow. Copyright (c) 2015John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.