Procedural Generation of Large-Scale Forests Using a Graph-Based Neutral Landscape Model

Jiaqi Li,Xinchi Li,Jiangfeng She,Junzhong Tan,Xiaoyan Gu

doi:10.3390/ijgi7030127

Jiaqi Li, Xinchi Li + Show 3 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi7030127

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Abstract

Specifying the positions and attributes of plants (e.g., species, size, and height) during the procedural generation of large-scale forests in virtual geographic environments is challenging, especially when reflecting the characteristics of vegetation distributions. To address this issue, a novel graph-based neutral landscape model (NLM) is proposed to generate forest landscapes with varying compositions and configurations. Our model integrates a set of class-level landscape metrics and generates more realistic and variable landscapes compared with existing NLMs controlled by limited global-level landscape metrics. To produce patches with particular sizes and shapes, a region adjacency graph is transformed from a cluster map that is generated based upon percolation theory; subsequently, optimal neighboring nodes in the graph are merged under restricted growth conditions from a source node. The locations of seeds are randomly placed and their species are classified according to the generated forest landscapes to obtain the final tree distributions. The results demonstrate that our method can generate realistic vegetation distributions representing different spatial patterns of species with a time efficiency that satisfies the requirements for constructing large-scale virtual forests.

Highlights

The modeling and realistic rendering of large-scale vegetation patterns, which represent an indispensable component of the natural environment, constitute popular topics in the study of computer graphics, which is widely employed in the generation of virtual geographic environments, animation and games
Most studies have focused on the procedural modeling of individual trees [4] and on the real-time realistic rendering of large-scale forest scenes [5]
Three approaches are employed for the placement of trees in virtual scenes: data-based modeling, bottom-up simulation and top-down synthesis

Summary

Introduction

The modeling and realistic rendering of large-scale vegetation patterns, which represent an indispensable component of the natural environment, constitute popular topics in the study of computer graphics, which is widely employed in the generation of virtual geographic environments, animation and games. Most studies have focused on the procedural modeling of individual trees [4] and on the real-time realistic rendering of large-scale forest scenes [5]. The reasonable placement of trees without forest data, which are used to assign various positions and attributes (e.g., tree species, canopy extents and heights) to trees, has not been thoroughly studied. The efficient procedural generation of ecologically sound vegetation distributions for large-scale scenes attributable to large numbers of diverse plants is a challenging problem. Three approaches are employed for the placement of trees in virtual scenes: data-based modeling, bottom-up simulation and top-down synthesis

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