Fluid flow on interacting, deformable surfaces

Abstract

Fluid simulation is an interesting research problem with a wide range of applications including mechanical engineering, special effects in movies and games, and scientific simulation. Due to the complex nature of typical fluid flow equations, there are circumstances where a full volumetric fluid simulation may not be necessary to generate the desired effect. Fluid flow on surfaces, such as in the case of rain-drops or moving rivers, can be solved more effectively by using a surface simplification to the normally expensive 3D Navier-Stokes equations. We present such a system in which the user can guide fluid flow on surfaces that are not only deforming, but also colliding with other surfaces in an environment. We also describe a technique for rendering the fluid on surfaces as a height field, which allows nearly volumetric effects to be achieved through a computationally less expensive surface simulation. Such a framework, we believe, can be extended to allow interactive control and visualization of surface flows carving into surfaces.