glChAoS.P, real time 3D strange attractors scout and hypercomplex fractals

glChAoS.P / glChAoSP: Opengl Chaotic Attractors of Slight (dot) Particles A real time 3D strange attractors scout... and hypercompex fractals (new!)

To view all Attractors / Fractals currently inserted in this version, follow the link: Attractors Formula

All availabe 1.4.0 releases     ==> Release Notes (what's new)

• glChAoS.P - DeskTop - binaries available Windows / Linux / OS X
• wglChAoS.P - WebGL via webAssembly - live / online using your browser - also for mobile devices
  • You can select Advanced Mode check box (default) or deselect it for Standard Mode, for low resources devices (mobiles/tablet/smartphones), also from wglChAoS.P Advanced Mode page description

New ver.1.4.0 clipping planes feature:

Boundary Coloring	w/o Boundary Coloring

TWO planes	THREE planes

 
 

Particle System rendering features

• 100M of particles in minus of 1.6 GByte of VRAM.. until 265M (4G VRAM): Slight (dot) Particles
  • only a vec4 (4-float) per vertex for position and color
• Rendering: RealTime Surface Reconstruction / Shadows / Ambient Occlusion
• Light Models: Phong / Blinn-Phong / GGX
• Glow effects: Gaussian Blur / bilateral deNoise with threshold / Gaussian + deNoise
• Anti-aliasing: FXAA
• Image adjustment: Bright / Contrast / Gamma / Exposure / ToneMapping

With Billboard and PointSprite techniques

3D DLA (Diffusion Limited Aggregation) - DLA3D Video Example

Personal DLAf-optimized project, adaptation and optimization from original code of Michael Fogleman, with possibility to export/import to/from PLY format and to continue a previous rendering.

Rendering models with Aizawa attractor - Video Example

Alpha Blending	Solid Dots

Further rendering engine improvement (from ver. >= 1.3.x) - Rendering Video Example

DualPass rendering: Z-buffer surface reconstruction	DualPass + Ambient Occlusion
DualPass + AO + Shadows	DualPass + AO + Shadows + mixed AlphaBlending

*features also available in WebGL advanced version

 
 

wglChAoS.P - the WebGL2 online version (ver. 1.4.0)

This is a WebGL2 / WebAssembly lightened LIVE / ONLINE version of glChAoSP and Supports touch screen for mobile devices, smartphones and tablets

Go to wglChAoS.P - LIVE / ONLINE starting page

 
 

wglChAoS.P Advanced Mode - WebGL2 with new rendering engine

This is a WebGL2 / WebAssembly lightened LIVE / ONLINE version with new rendering engine: dual pass accurate rendering, shadows and ambient occlusion

Go to wglChAoS.P Advanced Mode page

*Advanced Mode not availabe/tested still for mobile devices

 
 

Hypercomplex fractals like attractors - via IIM (Inverse Iterations Method)

hypercomplex fractals	hypercomplex fractals

 
 

glChAoS.P features

glChAoS.P is a 3D realtime Particle System with some unique features:

• 100M of particles in minus of 1.6 GByte of VRAM.. until 265M (4G VRAM): Slight (dot) Particles
  • only 4-float (vec4) per vertex: position and color
• PointSprite and Billboard particles types
• 3D blended/solid/lighted particles
• Single dot or DualPass rendering (surface reconstruction from zBuffer)
• Shadows and AmbientOcclusion
• Light models: Phong / Blinn-Phong / GGX
• Distance attenuation on Size an Alpha channel
• Full customizable colors, with several color palettes
• Customizable glow effects: Gaussian Blur / bilateral deNoise with threshold / Gaussian + deNoise
• Customizable FXAA filter
• Motion blur
• Post processing image correction:
  • gamma
  • exposure
  • brightness
  • contrast
  • toneMapping / HDR

... and more

For more usage info: glChAoS.P info

 
 

Some screenshots from different operating systems

Windows	Windows Viewports
Linux	Mac OS X

 
 

Hardware required:

• glChAoS.P - GPU with OpenGL 4.1 or higher
• wglChAoS.P - Browser with WebGL2 capabilities (FireFox, Chrome or Chromium based browsers)

Theoretically all graphics card that supports OpenGL 4.0 supports also OpenGL 4.5, depends only from drivers (and O.S.)

About the GPUs that support the OpenGL 4.5 (with appropriate drivers and OS permitting):

• NVidia starting from GT/GTX 4xx series
• AMD starting from HD 5xxx series
• Intel starting from Ivy Bridge/Bay Trail CPUs (with HD 4000/2500 graphics)

Hardware recommended:

• GPU starting from AMD HD 7970 / NVidia GTX 670 or with better performance
• CPU with 2 or more cores

About performance

Glow effects, mostly with sigma > 5, and DualPass/Shadows/AO requires expensive calculations in terms of performance

If you have slow performance try, in this order:

• Disable DualPass rendering and/or AO and/or Shadows
• Disable GlowEffects and/or FXAA
• Prefer Pointsprite: on AMD and Intel GPU (sensible difference of performance)
• Decrease number of particles buffer < 3000
• Decrease point size (if you can)
• try squared 1024x1024 (power of 2) window size (from Settings panel)

Supported Operating systems:

Tested Operating System Versions:

• Microsoft Windows 7/8.x/10
• Linux distributions: Ubuntu 16.04/18.04, Fedora 27/28/29
• Mac OS X 10.14 (Mojave)
• Android 5/6/7/8/9 with Firefox and Chrome

Executables

No installation program is provided: just clone it form github or download the archive and decompress it in a folder whatever: only the internal directories structure must be preserved.

For Windows and Linux glChAoSP uses OpenGL 4.5 with AZDO (Approaching Zero Driver Overhead) and a separate thread (multithread) emitter/generator of particles with memory mapped directly on GPU vRAM.

On Mac OS X, for a limitation of the OS (from Mojave Apple have deprecated OpenGL) there is a downgraded version that use OpenGL 4.1 (higher possible) with a separate thread emitter/generator that uses the conventional CPU memory.

Are provided executable for the followings OS:

• Windows
  glChAoSP.exe and glChAoSP_32.exe: native executable (64 and 32 bit) are provided for OpenGL >= 4.5: Preferably use the 64-bit version. (you can recompile it, with appropriate define, to obtain an OpenGL 4.1 compliant)
  glChAoSP_viewports.exe: beta version of multiple viewports is also provided (floating GUI windows that can go out outside of main Viewport/Window): (only 64 bits). This is a great version, solid beta and full functional, but based on a under development version of ImGui library.
  Tested on Windows 7, 8 and 10

• Linux
  glChAoSP_Linux: native executable (64 bit) is provided for OpenGL >= 4.5, (you can recompile it, with appropriate define, to obtain an OpenGL 4.1 compliant)
  After clone, copy or decompression, take care that executable bit of the file glChAoSP_Linux is active (chmod +x).
  Take care to have installed OpenGL library, whereas libX11 libXext should already be installed.
  It was tested on Fedora 27/28 and Ubuntu 16.04/18.04 LTS, although with subsequent updates and different library versions you may need to rebuild it. Read Build/CMake sections for further information.
  Tested on Fedora 27/28 and Ubuntu 16.04/18.04

  • wine
    The Windows executable, 32/64 bit, works fine also in wine 3.xx with no evident loss of performance

NOTE: Ending support for Ubuntu 16.04 LTS (ended to April 2019): the distributed executable is no longer compatible, but compile compatibility remains: you can compile source code to build your executable.

• OS X
  glChAoSP_OSX: native executable (64 bit) is provided for OpenGL 4.1
  From “Finder” click on applescript: glChAoSP_OSX.app, or form command line type directly the command: ./glChAoSP_OSX
  It was tested on OS X ver 10.14 (Mojave) only, although with subsequent updates and different library versions you may need to rebuild it. Read Build/CMake sections for further information.
  Tested on 10.14 Mojave

 
 

Build requirements

• Compilers with full C++14 standard required
• CMake 3.10 or higher
• Boost Library to build DLA3D (Diffusion Limited Aggregation) object exlploration, (or uncomment DISABLE_DLA3D in CMake file to disable it)

Tested Compilers

• Microsoft Visual Studio 2019/2017/2015 (Platform Toolset v.142/141/140: it does not work with previous versions)
• CLang 5/6/7
• GNU C++ 5/6/7/8

For Windows and Linux glChAoSP uses OpenGL 4.5 with AZDO (Approaching Zero Driver Overhead) and a separate thread (multithread) emitter/generator of particles with memory mapped directly on GPU vRAM.

On Mac OS X, for a limitation of the OS (from Mojave Apple have deprecated OpenGL) there is a downgraded version, that use OpenGL 4.1 (higher possible) with a separate thread emitter/generator that use the conventional CPU memory.

Furthers “build” option are provided:

• Use OpenGL 4.1 also on Windows and Linux.
• Single thread version.

CMake

In the folder ./src there is the CmakeLists.txt, use this folder as base directory.

Read below more obout your OS.

GLFW Library

Enclosed 32/64bit built library for Windows, and 64bit for Linux and OS X
When build glChAoSP, compiler looks for GLFW installed library, before, in the follows path:

• src/src/libs/glfw/buildLinux (Linux)
• src/src/libs/glfw/buildOSX (OSX)
• src/src/libs/glfw/buildWin (Windows)

So, you need to delete it, or modify the CMake file, to use personal ones version. In this case you need to have installed GLFW Library, ver 3.3 or higher, or re-build the enclosed version in “./src/src/libs/glfw” folder.

Boost Library

Currently boost library for DLA is no longer necessary: has been replaced with nanoflann header-only library for KD-Trees of datasets point clouds (included in repository). In alternative, boost library is anyway enableable via internal define

Boost Library in particular: function_output_iterator and geometry are necessary to build DLA3D (Diffusion Limited Aggregation) object exlploration in glChAoS.P. It's not included in the repository, but can be downloaded from https://www.boost.org/

It is not necessary to build the library, only headers files is enough (they must be in the compiler research path). Add the location in to INCLUDE environment variable or unpack/copy the boost include directory under src/src/libs: this folder is already added in CMakeFile

You can also disable the building of DLA function: pass -DGLAPP_DISABLE_DLA to compiler, or uncomment GLAPP_DISABLE_DLA flag in src/CMakeFile.txt, or uncomment it directly in the file src/src/appDefines.h

Windows

Windows user needs of Visual Studio 2019 (it works also wit VS 2017/2015, but is need to change appropriate Platform Toolse and/or Windows SDK version that you have installed). In alternative, CMake 3.10 (or higher) for other compilers toolschain (non tested, but it should work).

• Microsoft Visual Studio In the folder ./src/msBuilds there is the solution project for use with Visual Studio 2017.
  The current VisualStudio solution refers to my environment variable RAMDISK (R:), and subsequent VS intrinsic variables to generate binary output: $(RAMDISK)\$(MSBuildProjectDirectoryNoRoot)\$(DefaultPlatformToolset)\$(Platform)\$(Configuration)\ Even without a RAMDISK variable, executable and binary files are outputted in base to the values of these VS variables, starting from root of current drive.
  You can use CMake to generate a VS2015 solution: previous versions do not support C++14 standard.
  If you want use LLVM clang to build glChAoSP, inside Visual Studio, you can use the LLVM plugin (after to have installed clang, in windows) and simply change the toolschain in “Properties → General → Platform Toolset”

• NOTE: To build viewports version add GLAPP_IMGUI_VIEWPORT compiler define or uncomment it in appDefines.h

Linux

Lunux users need to install the GCC C/C++ v.5 or higher (or clang v.5 or higher) compilers and associated tools such as make and CMake (need v3.10 or higher). To install gcc C/C++:

• Debian, Ubuntu: sudo apt-get install build-essential cmake cmake-qt-gui
• Fedora, RedHat: sudo dnf install make gcc-c++ cmake cmake-gui

You need also to have installed OpenGL library and relative development package: libgl1-mesa libgl1-mesa-dev (Ubuntu) or mesa-libGL mesa-libGL-devel (Fedora), and also of GLFW library 3.3 or higher.

The build_glChAoSP.sh script build glChAoSP, with the pre-built GLFW library (included).

The buildLinux.sh script is provided as helper, it call buildGLFW.sh (to build/erbuild GLFW) and build_glChAoSP.sh sequentially.

To build/rebuild GLFW from enclosed sources you must have installed also “development” packages: libx11-dev libxext-dev (Ubuntu) or libX11-devel libXext-devel (Fedora).

Use buildGLFW.sh from ./src directory, or build GLFW directly from ./src/src/libs/glfw

(documentation: https://github.com/glfw/glfw)

OS X

Mac users must have installed Xcode and the Command Line Tools, CMake 3.10 or higher.

CMake uses the enclosed built version of GLFW (actual development branch v.3.3)

To build glChAoSP on OS X, from ./src folder, call sh build_glChAoSP.sh OSX (recommended use).

If you need to build GLFW too, the buildOSX.sh script is provided as helper: it calls buildGLFW.sh OSX (to build/erbuild GLFW) and build_glChAoSP.sh OSX sequentially.

Or use sh buildGLFW.sh OSX from ./src directory, or build GLFW directly from ./src/src/libs/glfw

(documentation: https://github.com/glfw/glfw)

Several warnings are visualized, it is normal. I tested it only on OS X 10.14 Mojave (build and binary).

WebGL via WebAssembly - EMSCRIPTEN

The CMake file is able to build also an EMSCRIPTEN version, obviously you need to have installed EMSCRIPTEN SDK on your computer (1.38.20 1.38.28 1.38.40 or higher). Use emsCMakeGen.cmd or emsCMakeGen.sh from ./src directory, or look inside it, to pass appropriate defines/patameters to CMake command line. emsCMakeGen need to know the location of EMSDK, and the "build-type" object to create.

For exemple, run:

emsCMakeGen.sh /opt/emsdk/emscripten/1.38.20 Debug|Release|RelWithDebInfo|MinSizeRel

emsCMakeGen.cmd C:\emsdk\emscripten\1.38.20 Debug|Release|RelWithDebInfo|MinSizeRel

To build the EMSCRIPTEN version, in Windows, with CMake, need to have mingw32-make.exe in your computer and in the search PATH (only the make utility is enough): it is a condition of EMSDK tool to build with CMake in Windows.

CMake

To install CMake 3.10 or higher where is not provided (Ubuntu 16.04 LTS distribution have v3.5):

You have first to remove the installed version by typing executing: sudo apt purge cmake Then go to https://cmake.org/download/ and download the latest version you need. If you download a .tar.gz file you have to unpack it using a command like: tar -xvf cmake-3.XX.XX-Linux-x86_64.tar.gz Then go to the folder of cmake ( cd cmake-3.XX.XX-Linux-x86_64) and from there execute the following commands:

 sudo cp -r bin /usr/ sudo cp -r share /usr/ sudo cp -r doc /usr/share/ sudo cp -r man /usr/share/ 

 
 

3rd party tools and color maps

glChAoS.P uses 3rd party software tools components, they are located in the “./src/src/libs” folder and built with the program. A copy of each is included in the repository, to avoid incompatibility with future changes.

Structure and description of 3rd parts libraries/tools/palettes, and related copyrights and licenses:

Libs and Tools

Alternatives and optional, not strictly necessary

Below there are some used components, which differ from MIT / BSD 2-Clause / Zlib license.

External Color Maps/Palettes - (optional - to load)

Alternative Library

• Boost Library in particular: function_output_iterator and geometry are necessary as alternative (to nanoflann) to build DLA3D (Diffusion Limited Aggregation) object exlploration in glChAoS.P (can be disabled). It's not included in the repository, but can be downloaded from https://www.boost.org/ It is not necessary to build the library, only headers files is enough. (more information in: how to build)
  • Compile with GLAPP_USE_BOOST_LIBRARY define, to use instead of nanoflann lib

 

License

glChAoS.P is licensed under the BSD 2-Clause License, see license.txt for more information.

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