🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <85892@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu>, mark@giza.cis.ohio-state.edu
(Mark Jansen) writes:
| 
| 	I am interested in doing a computer animation of flocking birds and
| 	such and am looking for pointers and references to reducing the
| 	computational cost of doing large swarms.  Any help would be 
| 	appreciated.
| 
| 	I know that physicists have been doing particle systems for 
| 	some time.  I occasionally see advanced papers on the subject
| 	but am looking for more basic approaches.  Interestingly enough
| 	in computer animation, numerical accuracy is NOT the most 
| 	important issue.  Reasonable 'looking' simulation with computational
| 	efficiency and strong generalization is more important.
| 
| 	Also, I am interested in extending the method to sound, where the
| 	messages do not travel instantaneously, seems that some of the 
| 	issues might also be addressed in very large scale astronomic
| 	simulations.  I am looking for readable papers and textbooks on
| 	these matters.  Any help would be appreciated.
| 

You might check into Lattice Gas Dynamics.  This is a relatively
new technique employed by some guys at Los Alamos to do fluid dynamics
very cheaply.  It basically does particle dynamics with very simple
particles which are constrained to sites on a hexagonal lattice.
I am currently working on a more general (read: less efficient) version
of the technique and would be happy to share what I know about it
with you.  

There is a book which summarizes the results of the LA group and 
includes many of the original papers describing the technique.
It is called "Lattice Gas Methods for Solving Partial Differential
Equations".  And is published by the Santa Fe Institute.
If this much info is not sufficient to find the book, send me e-mail
and I will bring my copy into the office and post the ISBN.

Steve Madere
steve@pkg.mcc.com