Parametric Modeling and Generation of Mandala Thangka Patterns

Abstract

The mandala thangka, as a religious art in Tibetan Buddhism, is an invaluable cultural and artistic heritage. However, drawing a mandala pattern of thangka style is both time- and effort-consuming and requires mastery due to intricate details. Retaining and digitizing this heritage is an unresolved research challenge to date. In this paper, we propose a parametric approach to model and generate mandala thangka patterns to address this issue. Specifically, we construct parameterized models of three stylistic elements used in the interior mandalas of Nyingma school in Tibetan Buddhism according to their geometric features, namely the star, crescent, and lotus flower motifs. Varieties of interior mandala patterns are successfully generated using these parameterized motifs based on the hierarchical structures observed from hand-drawn mandalas. Moreover, we design a user interaction tool which can flexibly generate stylized mandala patterns with arbitrary shapes and colors. The experimental results show that our approach can efficiently generate beautifully-layered colorful traditional mandala patterns used in Buddhism and stylized mandala patterns used in modern art design, which significantly reduce the time and effort in manual production and, more importantly, contributes to the digitization of this great heritage.