SBIR-STTR Award

Exploitation of archived and time-sensitive imagery for tactical decision making tasks is becoming more difficult. This is due to the increasing sophistication of modern weapon systems, the nature of future conflicts (e.g. low-intensity, humanitary support, etc.) and the large volumes of imagery and other data now available to analysts and tactical decision makers. Civilian, tactical and national sensors are providing an increasing amount of data for processing and analysis. This data are increasingly critical for time-sensitive operations when the demands on humans in the loop are maximum. As weapons become more complex and tactical choices multiply, operational decision-makers will find in more difficult to deal with the increasing variety of input data that must be considered in selecting the optimum combination of weapons and tactics. Investigation, selection and development of advanced, innovative techniques for graphics rendering and visualization using massively parallel processors is needed to determine the feasibility and support the development of a Battlefield Visualization System (BVS). The proposed BVS will provide theater commanders and other users with advanced visualization and image exploitation tools. It will allow users to efficiently produce and utilize timely, highly accurate image analyses and visualizations tailored, simultaneously, for a wide variety of specialized end-users.

Simulation and visualization of the modern battlefield is becoming more difficult, due to the increasing sophistication of modern weapons systems, the diverse nature of future conflicts (e.g. low-intensity, humanitarian support, etc.). This diversity and the increasing complexity of modern weapons systems indicates a need for advanced simulation capabilities. To be effective training and planning devices, future military simulation systems will have to provide high-fidelity views of real and simulated battle spaces, including environmental and man-made effects. Current simulation systems lack the performance required for high-fidelity simulations. This is due to limitations in modeling and graphics software, pipelined graphics systems, I/O technology and user interface restrictions. The specific area addressed in this proposal is development of high-performance graphics software and associated tools for parallel platforms. In this project Onyx Sciences Corporation proposes to develop a parallel graphics toolkit to support development of visual simulation applications for the US Army. The proposed Scalable Visual Simulation Toolkit (SVST), to be delivered to the Army Customer, consists of two main sections (1) a software toolkit to support visual application development, and (2) a high performance graphics library for realtime rendering. The proposed system will utilize state-of-the-art commercial technologies and standards to provide enhanced, high-fidelity graphics capabilities for a variety of visual simulation applications.