SCROOGE: Perceptually-driven polygon reduction

Many real-time 3D graphics renderers represent each object as a collection of simple polygons. The complexity of this polygon structure is of practical relevance because it can manifestly affect the performance of the graphics system. It is therefore commonplace to find techniques to reduce the polygonal complexity of a model with the ultimate aim of improving the interactivity of the application. In the past, many of these schemes have not been concerned with the perceptual side-effects of this reduction and as a result a number of visual incongruities are often perceivable when these correspondingly-reduced representations are employed. As an attempt to circumvent these problems, this paper presents a methodology for reducing the polygonal complexity of a model, whilst retaining a degree of perceptual predictability. This allows the visual consequences of the degradation to be quantified and accurately modelled.