Simulation, modeling and authoring of glaciers

Abstract

Glaciers are some of the most visually arresting and scenic elements of cold regions and high mountain landscapes. Although snow-covered terrains have previously received attention in computer graphics, simulating the temporal evolution of glaciers as well as modeling their wide range of features has never been addressed. In this paper, we combine a Shallow Ice Approximation simulation with a procedural amplification process to author high-resolution realistic glaciers. Our multiresolution method allows the interactive simulation of the formation and the evolution of glaciers over hundreds of years. The user can easily modify the environment variables, such as the average temperature or precipitation rate, to control the glacier growth, or directly use brushes to sculpt the ice or bedrock with interactive feedback. Mesoscale and smallscale landforms that are not captured by the glacier simulation, such as crevasses, moraines, seracs, ogives, or icefalls are synthesized using procedural rules inspired by observations in glaciology and according to the physical parameters derived from the simulation. Our method lends itself to seamless integration into production pipelines to decorate reliefs with glaciers and realistic ice features.

Flexible Terrain Erosion - A Fluid Simulation-Independent Approach Compatible with Multiple Representations

“…Table 1: Parameters used for the generation of the terrains presented in Figure 14, with "Rep" the representation (H: Heightmap, DV: Density-voxels, BV: Binary voxels, I: Implicit) "Res" the resolution in meter per voxel or cell, #P the number of particles per iteration, #N the number of iterations, R the particles radius (in voxel or cell unit), COR the coefficient of restitution, ρ p the particle density in kg m −3 , C f actor , ε and ω respectively the capacity, erosion and deposition factors, "Vel field" the type of velocity field used and t the computation time of the simulation in seconds on CPU. (1) The velocity field is a vector field defined as υ f (p) = [0 sin(p.x) 0] T .…”

“…a cornice falls down a slope or a grain of sand is thrown into the air) -and deposition -transported pieces of land are accumulated at a new part of the landscape. Various phenomena can cause these alterations: thermal erosion (bursting of rocks caused by expansion of water under frost, then falling of debris to the bottom of a slope), hydraulic erosion (detachment caused by the impact of water particles on surfaces and the transport of sediments by the flow of runoff), wind erosion (fine particles carried away in the wind and hit surfaces on their way, creating new fine particles which then also fly away), chemical erosion (chemical decomposition of rocks caused by rainwater or other fluids), other exceptional phenomena such as avalanches, animals, lightning, etc... modify the terrain [1,[8][9][10][11].…”

Snow and Ice Animation Methods in Computer Graphics

“…Physics‐based snow accumulation models (a) diffusion‐based cover by [FG11], (b) heat transfer simulation for modeling realistic winter scenes in [MGG*10], (c) time‐evolving snow‐covered landscape and ski tracks generated by Cordonnier et al [CEG*18], (d) physically‐based glacier evolution and rendering by Argudo et al [AGP*20]. …”

Fire in paradise

“…been expanded modeling large-scale ecosystems [Kapp et al 2020;Makowski et al 2019], and terrain features, such as avalanches [Cordonnier et al 2018] or glaciers [Argudo et al 2020]. Together, these methods provide a testament that efforts trend toward physically plausible and specialized approaches to simulate natural phenomena.…”