Voxel-Based Sand Simulation
My master's thesis research was focused on the development of a novel, real-time, GPU-based simulation of fine-grained materials, such as sand, soil, and dirt. In our approach, we use a 3D voxel grid to track the motion and evolution of granular materials in a virtual environment. With a voxel-based approach, we are able to simulate complex, three-dimensional effects that are difficult, if not impossible, in previous heightmap and particle-based approaches. To our knowledge, this is the first voxel-based approach to simulating sands and soils in real-time computer graphics applications.
This research project was done in collaboration with Serious Labs, a company that develops interactive training simulators for high-stake jobs the construction, mining, and oil and gas industries. The research project was also featured on NSERC's homepage in October 2014, where they released a video interview with my supervisor, Dr. Howard Hamilton, and our liason at Serious Labs.
My master's thesis can be found here: PDF
