Fast sliding thin slab volume visualization

We present a method for fast rendering of a thin slab bounded by a set of clipping planes oriented perpendicular to the viewing direction. Our implementation allows the user to specify the view direction, slab thickness and slab position within the volume and performs either classical volume rendering or maximum intensity projection. The system can either render single slabs or a sequence of slabs that overlap and traverse the volume perpendicular to the viewing direction. This rapid rendering of geometrically segmented portions of the volume allows the user to explore the volume data or focus on a region or subvolume of interest. The rendering time for a thin slab with a thickness of approximately 4-5 times that of acquired sections, within a 256/sup 2//spl times/167 data set, is 0.6 seconds when averaged over a range of viewing angles. The renderings are performed on an SGI Indigo 2 workstation without graphics accelerators.