A physically based approach to 2–D shape blending

Abstract

This paper presents a new afgorithm for smoothly blending between two 2-D polygonal shapes. The algorithm is based on a physical model wherein one of the shapes is considered to be constructed of wire, and a solution is found whereby the first shape can be bent and/or stretched into the second shape with a minimum amount of work. The resulting solution tends to associate regions on the two shapes which look alike. If the two polYgons have m and n vertices respectively, the afgorithm is O(mn). The algorithm avoids local shape inversions in whkh intermediate polygons self-intersect, if such a solution exists.