3D Generalization Lenses for Interactive Focus + Context Visualization of Virtual City Models

Focus + context visualization facilitates the exploration of complex information spaces. This paper proposes 3D generalization lenses, a new visualization technique for virtual 3D city models that combines different levels of structural abstraction. In an automatic preprocessing step, we derive a generalized representation of a given city model. At runtime, this representation is combined with a full-detail representation within a single view based on one or more 3D lenses of arbitrary shape. Focus areas within lens volumes are shown in full detail while excluding less important details of the surrounding area. Our technique supports simultaneous use of multiple lenses associated with different abstraction levels, can handle overlapping and nested lenses, and provides interactive lens modification.