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We naturally expect virtual objects to behave like their real-world counterparts. Penetration-free simulation is very important for many graphics applications, but although there have been improvements with methods like Incremental Potential Contact (IPC), one big problem remains: the high computational cost. IPC-based simulators and similar methods are usually much slower than other techniques that don't guarantee no penetration. Plus, their running time varies a lot depending on the simulation’s state at each step.
Achieving guaranteed penetration-free simulation has been a long-standing goal for developers, and now, a team of scientists from the University of Utah has presented a new approach to help solve this problem.
Called Offset Geometric Contact (OGC), this novel contact model enables penetration-free simulation of codimensional objects with minimal computational overhead. Here are the results from dropping 50 layers of cloth onto a cylinder, totaling 500,000 vertices, as well as simulating cloth twisting at the yarn level:
OGC
OGC
"The method is based on constructing a volumetric shape by offsetting each face along its normal direction, ensuring orthogonal contact forces, thus allows a large contact radius without artifacts. We compute vertex-specific displacement bounds to guarantee penetration-free simulation, which improves convergence and avoids the need for expensive continuous collision detection. Our method relies solely on massively parallel local operations, avoiding global synchronization and enabling efficient GPU implementation.
Experiments demonstrate real-time, large-scale simulations with performance more than two orders of magnitude faster than prior methods while maintaining consistent computational budgets."
Find the paper along with the OGC implementation here. Also, join our 80 Level Talent platform and our Discord server, follow us on Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Telegram, TikTok, and Threads, where we share breakdowns, the latest news, awesome artworks, and more.