TRANSFER OF ATTRIBUTES BETWEEN GEOMETRIC SURFACES OF ARBITRARY TOPOLOGIES WITH DISTORTION REDUCTION AND DISCONTINUITY PRESERVATION

Attributes associated with components of a three-dimensional source geometry may be transferred to a target geometries having an arbitrarily different topology. The two geometries are placed in a general alignment in three dimensions. Correspondences are found between anchors for attributes in the target geometry and anchors for attributes in the source geometry. The identified correspondence locations on the source geometry are locally redistributed so as to ensure that concave regions of the source geometry are mapped to the target geometry, and that convex edges or vertices of the source geometry do not map to a large area on the target geometry. Attribute discontinuities in the source geometry are preserved in the target geometry by relating discontinuous edges in the source geometry to the target geometry. This relationship may map each discontinuous edge in the source geometry locally to the target geometry. Alternatively, this relationship may involve mapping discontinuous paths globally to the target geometry. Thus, the quality of attribute transfer is improved by reducing distortions introduced by the method through which correspondence between a target geometry and a source geometry is determined and/or by preserving discontinuities in attributes from the source geometry by relating discontinuous edges in the source geometry to the target geometry.