Bas-relief generation from point clouds based on normal space compression with real-time adjustment on CPU

This paper presents a bas-relief generation algorithm from scattered point cloud directly. Compared with the popular gradient domain methods for mesh surface, this algorithm takes normal vectors as the operation object, making it independent of topology connection, thus more suitable for point clouds and easier to implement. By constructing linear equations of the bas-relief height and using the solution strategy of the subspace, this algorithm can adjustment the bas-relief effect in real-time relying on the computing power of a consumer CPU only. In addition, we also propose an iterative solution to generate a bas-relief model of a specified height. The experimental results indicate that our algorithm provides a unified solution for generating different types of bas-relief with good saturation and rich details.