Fredagskollokvium: Nicolaas Groeneboom: The procedural future

In computational science, we strive to build realistic bottom-up physical simulations that reproduce and explain patterns of complex systems, such as n-body simulations of dark matter or simulations of the outer atmosphere of the sun. On the other hand, the field of computer graphics has a long tradition of the opposite: producing complex systems by emulating natural patterns directly. In this talk, we’ll discuss whether these two fields could benefit from each other, and what the difficulties are.  

I will give a brief introduction to the history of fractals (in nature), procedural geometry and noise functions from a computational perspective, focusing on CGI and real-time applications (eg computer games), both ancient and modern. I’ll also go through some examples from my latest paper where I have used procedural noise to simulate realistic-looking (but ultimately, fake) galaxies (see http://gamer.irio.co.uk). I’ll show some other cool projects that I’m working on (http://orphancity.tumblr.com), as well as discuss how modern real-time graphics now start to include physics simulations.