SBIR Phase II: Reimagining Sketch in the Digital Age

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project results from the development of a new class of graphical-media-design system that lies between today's 2D digital paint systems and 3D computer-aided design systems. This technology will allow architects, engineers, artists, and school children to create compelling 3D experiences directly from their drawings without extensive training. Furthermore, it will accelerate the creation of interactive 3D content and significantly reduce the time, cost and expertise currently required to create it. By bridging the gap between traditional drawings and 3D modeling, this project will provide the unique ability to reuse and "reproject" drawn strokes, thus enabling the creation of expressive 3D drawings with minimal effort. The technology developed in this project will help lower the barrier and generate new business opportunities in content creation for electronic publishing and for other creative professionals, such as architects, designers, and ad-agency art directors. Finally, this project includes specific outreach activities, through collaboration with the American Museum of Natural History, that will provide unique educational services to the local community, while simultaneously introducing this new technology to the world. This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project will focus on making the creation of this new type of graphical media as intuitive and fluid as paper and pencil. This Phase II project will support system improvements - including user-interface improvements - to simplify 3D navigation for the consumers of this media. This will be needed for using this media in digital children's picture books, which have already been identified as early adopters of this technology as well as an important market. Another technical objective will be to develop a hybrid vector-raster representation, which will provide a wider range of artistic expression, while improving rendering performance of large scenes. A third objective is to develop stroke deformation algorithms to support direct manipulation of objects and characters to provide sketch-driven animation capabilities.