"A Finite Element Method for Animating Large Viscoplastic Flow"

We present an extension to Lagrangian finite element methods to allow for large plastic deformations of solid materials. These behaviors are seen in such everyday materials as shampoo, dough, and clay as well as in fantastic gooey and blobby creatures in special effects scenes. To account for plastic deformation, we explicitly update the linear basis functions defined over the finite elements during each simulation step. When these updates cause the basis functions to become ill-conditioned, we remesh the simulation domain to produce a new high-quality finite-element mesh, taking care to preserve the original boundary. We also introduce an enhanced plasticity model that preserves volume and includes creep and work hardening/softening. We demonstrate our approach with simulations of synthetic objects that squish, dent, and flow. To validate our methods, we compare simulation results to videos of real materials.



A. W. Bargteil, C. Wojtan, J. K. Hodgins, G. Turk
"A Finite Element Method for Animating Large Viscoplastic Flow."
In ACM Transactions on Graphics (SIGGRAPH 2007), August 2007, vol. 26, No. 3.

Download PDF           BibTex 


Examples



 
  Full Paper Movie (1280x720)  
  Low Res Movie (640x360)

 
      Animation Examples Only (1280x720)             Real-World Comparisons Only (1280x720)             Explanatory Video Only (1280x720)      
Low Res Movie (640x360) Low Res Movie (640x360) Low Res Movie (640x360)



Project Members

Adam W. Bargteil Chris Wojtan Jessica K. Hodgins Greg Turk



Addendum

Craig Reynolds did some similar work modeling ductile flow in the early 1990s. Unfortunately, we were unaware of this work when we wrote our paper. For more information please see his paper, Adaptive Polyhedral Resampling for Vertex Flow Animation.