• computer animation
• multimedia content production
• video similarity
• 2D vector field comparison
• image based reconstruction
• image based modeling
• surface reconstruction
• depth maps fusion
• energy minimization on the GPU
• stereoscopy
• image based rendering

In recent years, improvements in the acquisition and creation of 3D models gave rise to
an increasing availability of 3D content and to a widening of the audience such content
is created for, which brought into focus the need for effective ways to visualize and
interact with it.
Until recently, the task of virtual inspection of a 3D object or navigation inside a 3D
scene was carried out by using human machine interaction (HMI) metaphors controlled
through mouse and keyboard events.
However, this interaction approach may be cumbersome for the general audience.
Furthermore, the inception and spread of touch-based mobile devices, such as smartphones
and tablets, redefined the interaction problem entirely, since neither mouse nor
keyboards are available anymore. The problem is made even worse by the fact that these
devices are typically lower power if compared to desktop machines, while high-quality
rendering is a computationally intensive task.
In this thesis, we present a series of novel methods for the easy presentation of 3D
content both when it is already available in a digitized form and when it must be acquired
from the real world by image-based techniques. In the first case, we propose
a method which takes as input the 3D scene of interest and an example video, and it
automatically produces a video of the input scene that resembles the given video example.
In other words, our algorithm allows the user to replicate an existing video, for
example, a video created by a professional animator, on a different 3D scene.
In the context of image-based techniques, exploiting the inherent spatial organization
of photographs taken for the 3D reconstruction of a scene, we propose an intuitive
interface for the smooth stereoscopic navigation of the acquired scene providing an immersive
experience without the need of a complete 3D reconstruction.
Finally, we propose an interactive framework for improving low-quality 3D reconstructions
obtained through image-based reconstruction algorithms. Using few strokes on
the input images, the user can specify high-level geometric hints to improve incomplete
or noisy reconstructions which are caused by various quite common conditions
often arising for objects such as buildings, streets and numerous other human-made
functional elements.