How to export vtkVolume data to XTK as MIP rendering

Question

we are using VTK to render data in a regular desktop application, e.g. for images such as this one:

http://www.invicro.com/images/stories/NasalMergeSolidLabeled.gif

and I was very excited to learn about xtk, which does an awesome job to produce the same renderings in a web browser. I already managed to export our ROIs in vtk so I can load them into xtk, e.g.

http://www.vivoquant.com/xtk/index.html

However, as you see in the image of the first link, I would like to also add the MIP rendering of the mouse (to provide some further context). On the VTK side I use a vtkVolume, vtkVolumeRayCastMIPFunction and vtkFixedPointVolumeRayCastMapper to produce the MIP rendering. Unfortunately, I did not yet understand how to export this in a way xtk can use (similar to lessen 05 with skull.vtk).

Could you please let me know how you produced the skull.vtk example from a raw volume dataset?

Thank you very much. Awesome tool! Christian

Answer 1

Christian, your demo looks awesome!

Unfortunately, the volume rendering/MIP functionality is not available in XTK yet.

Likely, it will be included in the next release 3 which is scheduled for 3/12/12.

Right now, it is already possible to load .nrrd volume data files like in this (unofficial) lesson: http://lessons.goXTK.com/10/ Please not that it uses the xtk_edge.js version which might be unstable.

This functionality is the base for the upcoming volume rendering so you can imagine something like this:

v = new X.volume();
v.load('rat.nrrd');
v.setVolumeRendering(true); // this call might change

The skull.vtk file you refer to and which might look like MIP is actually just a surface model with reduced opacity :)

Cheers, Daniel