A METHOD FOR MAGNIFYING A COMPUTER GENERATED IMAGE AND A GRAPHIC USER INTERFACE INCORPORATING SAID METHOD

摘要

A method and graphic user interface incorporating the method for magnifying a portion of a computer generated image (14) displayed on a screen (10). The method involves generating an image of a panel (12) that is movable over or within the image (14). The panel (12) is sectioned into a central magnifying region (16) and a peripheral compression region (18). An area (20) of the image (14) underlying or within the footprint (22) of panel (12) is mapped into the central and peripheral regions (16, 18) in the following manner. A portion (24) of the area of the image (20) is mapped with a degree of magnification into the central region (16). A margin or portion (26) of the area (20) of image (14) that lies outside the portion (24) but within the footprint (22) is mapped into the peripheral region (18) in a compressed and/or otherwise translated manner. The mapping of the area (20) of image (14) into panel (12) is performed so that the magnified image appearing in the central region (16) is continuous with the compressed image appearing in the peripheral region (18) which in turn is continuous with the remainder of the image (14) outside the footprint (22).