@inproceedings{kohlmann-2009-cp, title = "Contextual Picking of Volumetric Structures", author = "Peter Kohlmann and Stefan Bruckner and Armin Kanitsar and Eduard Gr\"{o}ller", year = "2009", month = may, isbn = "978-1-4244-4404-5", location = "Peking, China", editor = "Peter Eades, Thomas Ertl, Han-Wei Shen", booktitle = "Proceedings of the IEEE Pacific Visualization Symposium 2009", pages = "185--192", URL = "https://www.cg.tuwien.ac.at/research/publications/2009/kohlmann-2009-cp/", } @phdthesis{kohlmann-2009-lssl, title = "LiveSync: Smart Linking of 2D and 3D Views in Medical Applications", author = "Peter Kohlmann", year = "2009", abstract = "In this thesis two techniques for the smart linking of 2D and 3D views in medical applications are presented. Although real-time interactive 3D volume visualization is available even for very large data sets, it is used quite rarely in the clinical practice. A major obstacle for a better integration in the clinical workflow is the time-consuming process to adjust the parameters to generate diagnostically relevant images. The clinician has to take care of the appropriate viewpoint, zooming, transfer function setup, clipping planes, and other parameters. Because of this, current applications primarily employ 2D views generated through standard techniques such as multi-planar reformatting (MPR). The LiveSync interaction metaphor is a new concept to synchronize 2D slice views and 3D volumetric views of medical data sets. Through intuitive picking actions on the slice, the users define the anatomical structures they are interested in. The 3D volumetric view is updated automatically with the goal that the users are provided with diagnostically relevant images. To achieve this live synchronization a minimal set of derived information, without the need for segmented data sets or data-specific precomputations, is used. The presented system provides the physician with synchronized views which help to gain deeper insight into the medical data with minimal user interaction. Contextual picking is a novel method for the interactive identification of contextual interest points within volumetric data by picking on a direct volume rendered image. In clinical diagnostics the points of interest are often located in the center of anatomical structures. In order to derive the volumetric position, which allows a convenient examination of the intended structure, the system automatically extracts contextual meta information from the DICOM (Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine) images and the setup of the medical workstation. Along a viewing ray for a volumetric picking, the ray profile is analyzed to detect structures which are similar to predefined templates from a knowledge base. It is demonstrated that the obtained position in 3D can be utilized to highlight a structure in 2D slice views, to interactively calculate approximate centerlines of tubular objects, or to place labels at contextually-defined 3D positions.", address = "Favoritenstrasse 9-11/E193-02, A-1040 Vienna, Austria", school = "Institute of Computer Graphics and Algorithms, Vienna University of Technology ", URL = "https://www.cg.tuwien.ac.at/research/publications/2009/kohlmann-2009-lssl/", } @techreport{TR-186-2-08-14, title = "Smart Linking of 2D and 3D Views in Medical Applications", author = "Peter Kohlmann and Stefan Bruckner and Armin Kanitsar and Eduard Gr\"{o}ller", year = "2008", abstract = "This paper presents two techniques for the linking of 2D and 3D views in medical applications. Hereby, the goal is a better integration of 3D volume visualization into the diagnostic workflow. Until now, the main obstacle for a good integration is the time-consuming process to adjust various parameters. The LiveSync interaction metaphor is a new concept to synchronize 2D slice views and 3D volumetric views of medical data sets. A single intuitive picking interaction on anatomical structures which are detected in 2D slices results in an automatically generated 3D view. To further improve the integration contextual picking is presented as a method for the interactive identification of contextual interest points within volumetric data. Our results demonstrate how these techniques improve the efficiency to generate diagnostically relevant images and how contextual interest points can, e.g., facilitate the highlighting of relevant structures.", month = dec, number = "TR-186-2-08-14", address = "Favoritenstrasse 9-11/E193-02, A-1040 Vienna, Austria", institution = "Institute of Computer Graphics and Algorithms, Vienna University of Technology ", note = "human contact: technical-report@cg.tuwien.ac.at", URL = "https://www.cg.tuwien.ac.at/research/publications/2008/TR-186-2-08-14/", } @inproceedings{haidacher-2008-vcbm, title = "Information-based Transfer Functions for Multimodal Visualization", author = "Martin Haidacher and Stefan Bruckner and Armin Kanitsar and Eduard Gr\"{o}ller", year = "2008", abstract = "Transfer functions are an essential part of volume visualization. In multimodal visualization at least two values exist at every sample point. Additionally, other parameters, such as gradient magnitude, are often retrieved for each sample point. To find a good transfer function for this high number of parameters is challenging because of the complexity of this task. In this paper we present a general information-based approach for transfer function design in multimodal visualization which is independent of the used modality types. Based on information theory, the complex multi-dimensional transfer function space is fused to allow utilization of a well-known 2D transfer function with a single value and gradient magnitude as parameters. Additionally, a quantity is introduced which enables better separation of regions with complementary information. The benefit of the new method in contrast to other techniques is a transfer function space which is easy to understand and which provides a better separation of different tissues. The usability of the new approach is shown on examples of different modalities.", month = oct, isbn = "978-3-905674-13-2", publisher = "Eurographics Association", location = "Delft", issn = "2070-5778", editor = "C.P Botha, G. Kindlmann, W.J. Niessen, and B. Preim", booktitle = "VCBM ", pages = "101--108", keywords = "Multimodal Visualization, Transfer Function, Information Theory", URL = "https://www.cg.tuwien.ac.at/research/publications/2008/haidacher-2008-vcbm/", } @inproceedings{kohlmann-2008-lse, title = "LiveSync++: Enhancements of an Interaction Metaphor", author = "Peter Kohlmann and Stefan Bruckner and Armin Kanitsar and Eduard Gr\"{o}ller", year = "2008", abstract = "The LiveSync interaction metaphor allows an efficient and non-intrusive integration of 2D and 3D visualizations in medical workstations. This is achieved by synchronizing the 2D slice view with the volumetric view. The synchronization is initiated by a simple picking on a structure of interest in the slice view. In this paper we present substantial enhancements of the existing concept to improve its usability. First, an efficient parametrization for the derived parameters is presented, which allows hierarchical refinement of the search space for good views. Second, the extraction of the feature of interest is performed in a way, which is adapting to the volumetric extent of the feature. The properties of the extracted features are utilized to adjust a predefined transfer function in a feature-enhancing manner. Third, a new interaction mode is presented, which allows the integration of more knowledge about the user-intended visualization, without increasing the interaction effort. Finally, a new clipping technique is integrated, which guarantees an unoccluded view on the structure of interest while keeping important contextual information.", month = may, location = "Windsor, Ontario, Canada", booktitle = "Proceedings of Graphics Interface 2008", pages = "81--88", keywords = "Viewpoint Selection, Linked Views, Medical Visualization, Smart Interaction", URL = "https://www.cg.tuwien.ac.at/research/publications/2008/kohlmann-2008-lse/", } @inproceedings{bruckner-2008-IVV, title = "Integrating Volume Visualization Techniques Into Medical Applications", author = "Stefan Bruckner and Peter Kohlmann and Armin Kanitsar and Eduard Gr\"{o}ller", year = "2008", abstract = "One of the main obstacles in integrating 3D volume visualization in the clinical workflow is the time-consuming process of adjusting parameters such as viewpoint, transfer functions, and clipping planes required to generate a diagnostically relevant image. Current applications therefore make scarce use of volume rendering and instead primarily employ 2D views generated through standard techniques such as multi-planar reconstruction (MPR). However, in many cases 3D renditions can supply additional useful information. This paper discusses ongoing work which aims to improve the integration of 3D visualization into the diagnostic workflow by automatically generating meaningful renditions based on minimal user interaction. A method for automatically generating 3D views for structures in 2D slices based on a single picking interaction is presented.", month = may, isbn = "978-1-4244-2002-5", location = "Paris, Frankreich", booktitle = "Proceedings of 5th IEEE International Symposium on Biomedical Imaging: From Nano to Macro", pages = "820--823", keywords = "viewpoint selection, medical visualization, volume rendering", URL = "https://www.cg.tuwien.ac.at/research/publications/2008/bruckner-2008-IVV/", } @article{kohlmann-2007-livesync, title = "LiveSync: Deformed Viewing Spheres for Knowledge-Based Navigation", author = "Peter Kohlmann and Stefan Bruckner and Armin Kanitsar and Eduard Gr\"{o}ller", year = "2007", abstract = "Although real-time interactive volume rendering is available even for very large data sets, this visualization method is used quite rarely in the clinical practice. We suspect this is because it is very complicated and time consuming to adjust the parameters to achieve meaningful results. The clinician has to take care of the appropriate viewpoint, zooming, transfer function setup, clipping planes and other parameters. Because of this, most often only 2D slices of the data set are examined. Our work introduces LiveSync, a new concept to synchronize 2D slice views and volumetric views of medical data sets. Through intuitive picking actions on the slice, the users define the anatomical structures they are interested in. The 3D volumetric view is updated automatically with the goal that the users are provided with expressive result images. To achieve this live synchronization we use a minimal set of derived information without the need for segmented data sets or data-specific pre-computations. The components we consider are the picked point, slice view zoom, patient orientation, viewpoint history, local object shape and visibility. We introduce deformed viewing spheres which encode the viewpoint quality for the components. A combination of these deformed viewing spheres is used to estimate a good viewpoint. Our system provides the physician with synchronized views which help to gain deeper insight into the medical data with minimal user interaction.", month = oct, journal = "IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics", volume = "13", number = "6", note = "to be presented at IEEE Visualization 2007", pages = "1544--1551", keywords = "linked views, interaction, medical visualization, navigation, viewpoint selection", URL = "https://www.cg.tuwien.ac.at/research/publications/2007/kohlmann-2007-livesync/", } @article{Kohlmann-2007-EBV, title = "Evaluation of a Bricked Volume Layout for a Medical Workstation based on Java", author = "Peter Kohlmann and Stefan Bruckner and Armin Kanitsar and Eduard Gr\"{o}ller", year = "2007", abstract = "Volumes acquired for medical examination purposes are constantly increasing in size. For this reason, the computer’s memory is the limiting factor for visualizing the data. Bricking is a well-known concept used for rendering large data sets. The volume data is subdivided into smaller blocks to achieve better memory utilization. Until now, the vast majority of medical workstations use a linear volume layout. We implemented a bricked volume layout for such a workstation based on Java as required by our collaborative company partner to evaluate different common access patterns to the volume data. For rendering, we were mainly interested to see how the performance will differ from the traditional linear volume layout if we generate images of arbitrarily oriented slices via Multi-Planar Reformatting (MPR). Furthermore, we tested access patterns which are crucial for segmentation issues like a random access to data values and a simulated region growing. Our goal was to find out if it makes sense to change the volume layout of a medical workstation to benefit from bricking. We were also interested to identify the tasks where problems might occur if bricking is applied. Overall, our results show that it is feasible to use a bricked volume layout in the stringent context of a medical workstation implemented in Java.", month = jan, journal = "Journal of WSCG", volume = "15", number = "1-3", issn = "1213-6972", pages = "83--90", keywords = "MPR, Bricked Volume Layout, Medical Visualization, Medical Workstation", URL = "https://www.cg.tuwien.ac.at/research/publications/2007/Kohlmann-2007-EBV/", }